New report says ‘universities need to be embedded as key partners with MCAs and local authorities’

Universities UK (UUK) has published its Higher Education and Research Blueprint which sets out a package of reform, aiming to stabilise, mobilise and then maximise the contribution of UK universities to economic growth and widening opportunity for all.

The new report ‘Opportunity, growth, and partnership: a blueprint for change from the UK’s universities, has been authored by a series of experts from within and outside higher education on behalf of Universities UK (UUK).

It includes recommendations on how universities can do more to break down barriers to opportunity, help boost the economy, train the doctors and nurses of the future and support the drive to net zero. Achieving this, the blueprint says, will require the sector to change, becoming more efficient, collaborating more and transforming ways of working.

The Blueprint also calls on the UK government to stabilise the sector’s finances and increase direct public funding in England so the cost of going to university is rebalanced towards government instead of students.

Critical partners in local growth plans

One of three ‘key ideas’ in the report is for universities to work more closely in local areas with businesses, chambers of commerce and metro mayors to make the strongest possible contribution to growth at local and regional levels. Indeed, Chapter 3, ‘Generating local growth ‘notes that to maximise their contribution, universities need to be embedded as key partners with MCAs and local authorities, are well positioned to put themselves forward as critical partners in local growth plans,’ – citing Y-PERN as an example of this.

For example, South Yorkshire Combined Authority’s (SYMCA) Skills Strategy was devised to help build a better, not just a bigger economy in the region. Y-PERN colleagues were actively involved in supporting the development of the Skills Strategy for as well as a Plan for Good Growth. They delivered a range of activities including an evidence briefing on skills and labour market ecosystems and a series of workshops feeding into the Skills Strategy design

Meanwhile, the West Yorkshire Plan sets out an ambitious vision and five missions for 2040 that will transform lives and communities across the region. Y-PERN and West Yorkshire Combined Authority (WYCA) are working together on this vision through a systems of provision approach, which will ultimately feed into a Local Growth Plan (LGP) for the region. By analysing the underlying structures and relationships within a system, wider determinants of complex problems can be identified rather than merely addressing symptoms.