UKBA – it’s not all IT’s fault

Yesterday Theresa May announced the demise of UKBA – it is being replaced by separate agencies for immigration and visas and for immigration policing.

It was interesting to see that one reason May cited for UKBA’s failings was its ‘inadequate’ IT systems. It isn’t difficult to see why. A number of years ago I was involved in discussions with the Agency, along with colleagues at Universities UK, to work out how the new points based immigration system would work with the education sector (the ‘Tier 4’ route). UKBA’s initial premise was that those wishing to bring in migrants (ie international students) would enter the data directly into the system. It was only when the potential cost of doing that was pointed out to them, allied with the fact that universities already possessed most of the data that UKBA required, did they consider the possibility of developing a mechanism of transferring data between institutional student records systems and the points based immigration system. This was despite universities and colleges being responsible for bringing in the most migrants into the country. Clearly there had been no assessment of the potential users of the system and consequently the needs of the biggest users had not been addressed. The points based system was specified as a closed system – there was no expectation that data would be transferred in or out but just viewed on a screen.

Once the argument had been won regarding the need for a data transfer mechanism, the specifications were delivered in a reasonably quick time. But this was something that was unplanned and institutions and suppliers had to make special provision in order to develop the extracts and imports required. UCISA has recognised that there is a need to plan for such developments and consequently has agreed relatively long lead times with sector agencies such as HESA and UCAS to ensure that there is adequate time for development, testing and implementation. With the points based system, however, we did not have the luxury of time. Nor did we have the luxury of a test system. Because there had been no consideration of interfaces to the points based system, there had been no provision for a system against which the developments could be tested. In the end, testing for suppliers and institutions was largely restricted to four days for everyone. That meant in practice, half a day to carry out the initial tests followed by a further half day to test any amendments. Predictably not everyone was ready when Tier 4 went live. Even now suppliers have nothing to test against when they develop new releases or when UKBA has changed their requirements.

So there is a promise that the ‘inadequate’ IT systems will be revamped. But to focus on the IT is misguided. The Home Office needs to take the opportunity to review all the processes around the visa application process and ensure that they are fit for purpose and deliver the good and effective customer service that May said would be the focus of the new visa agency. As many have learnt to their cost, without process change the best that revamping the IT will do will make bad processes run faster. Once the processes have been refined, we can move onto the IT. It is to be hoped that, in this era of open government and transparency, the education sector will be recognised as a major stakeholder and will be fully involved in scoping the new processes and system, with efficient data transfer mechanisms between institutional and Agency systems. The development of the new system needs to be adequately resourced and the needs of those developing interfaces to and from it need to be considered. Without process review, involvement of the key stakeholders and a well-funded development, the promises of an improved service will founder.

 

A business case for MOOCs emerging?

Although the Guardian Future of Higher Education Summit touched on many themes throughout the day, MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) were mentioned throughout. One difficulty I had was that “MOOCs” and “online learning” were used interchangeably by a number of the speakers. This suggests that some believe online learning to be new. It isn’t – there have been good examples of online course delivery around for some time and many existing courses and modules now contain an online element. What is new with MOOCs is the openness and hence the potential scale of engagement.

So how do MOOCs fit into the HE landscape? The consensus was that, although they will be a disruptor, they will not be a threat to most traditional universities. But equally it was recognised that the global increase in demand for higher education cannot be met by more of the same – the traditional system is not scalable. David Willetts saw “online learning” as key to delivering early parts of degree courses with students, on completing the online introductory elements, then applying to university to complete their studies. He clearly saw the later stages of courses as those where face to face teaching and tuition can really add value. He may have a point – the aim of some first year modules is to bring all up to the same level and to introduce themes built on in subsequent years. How many face to face tutorials feature in such modules? I can see this working for UK universities, particularly those looking to build their overseas engagement – offer first year modules online, assess them in a way where identity can be verified and then offer enrolment to successful candidates to year 2 of courses either in overseas campuses or in the UK. But I suggest that this sort of engagement is unlikely to be entirely open in the way that MOOCs are intended. It is likely to be more controlled, will necessarily need to deliver an income to the institution in order to sustain it as a genuine pathway to completing a degree.

Steven Schwartz returned to the theme later in the day. MOOCs could replace commodity courses, he opined, so that the sector doesn’t have 130 versions of ‘Introduction to statistics for non-statisticians’ (or Stats 101 as it is colloquially known). This was recognised early in the shared services days as a potential saver. A feasibility study was carried out and reported that ‘although the rationale for sharing curriculum in HE is inescapable, particularly at level one, the obstacles to implementation are substantial’. The barriers include culture, the question of “what’s in it for me?” (both institutional and for individual academics), management of reputation (“will it be as good as what we can offer?”) and competition. I don’t see that those barriers have changed but I do believe that there is probably little difference between most of the offerings for such courses and so real potential for sharing. Whether MOOCs are the mechanism to deliver this is a moot point but if they start to encourage a real debate about pedagogy and how foundation modules can be delivered more effectively then it is possible that the uniform Stats101 may emerge. The challenges here are perhaps different to those with David Willetts’ proposition. If you are delivering commodity modules online then I would question whether this really is value for money if you are paying £9k fees. I’d suggest that if it is a one for one replacement then the answer is probably ‘no’. On the other hand, if I am getting more out of my first year so can explore more new areas in years two and three, then the answer may be ‘yes’. An alternative proposition is that authenticated completion of Stats101 online could be an additional entry criterion – is there the possibility that institutions might offer different options to those who have completed the elementary modules online ahead of the course starting?

There was a session that was entitled ‘online learning – passing fad or a major game changer?’ It was the wrong question in my view – online learning is well established and here to stay. As for MOOCs, we can only hypothesise – we just don’t have the evidence yet. However the discussion highlighted a number of points. Rajay Naik from the Open University noted that online learning needs to be positioned as an opportunity. It does. Too often it is enforced on academics (“you must put x% of your module online”) and what results is low quality online learning. If you can demonstrate that investment in online learning by an academic will lead to better engagements with students and perhaps contribution (by students) to the academic’s research then there is the opportunity for a double win. Academics will engage, they will challenge and be challenged by their undergraduates. This assumes mainstream teaching. MOOCs don’t currently fall into that category.

David Willetts noted that ‘online learning will be the biggest recruitment instrument universities have got’. Initially that may well be where MOOCs get positioned. As Naik observed “many have viewed our iTunesU content”. What he didn’t add is how many of those viewers have converted into registered students. That would be one side of the equation for the business case. The other side is the cost of producing the material and supporting the course. Quality material comes at a price and the content of the MOOC will need to be high quality in order to act as an effective marketing tool.

The conclusion from the day is that some applications for MOOCs beyond marketing are emerging. Although online learning isn’t new, the scale of MOOCs is innovative and gives them the potential to be disruptive. There are still some challenges remaining. Authenticated assessment is one but also, as Jeff Haywood pointed out, we have still a lot to learn about pedagogy online. However there are the first signs of a business case that will sustain the innovation starting to emerge.

 

Sustainable shared services – one tool in the box

I spoke at a conference on shared services last week. There was a familiar feel to the programme with a number of us having presented at similar events before (and we have been talking about shared services since 2006!) but there were still a few pertinent points raised during the day.

Firstly, it is a year since the Chancellor announced the introduction of an exemption from VAT for shared services for several sectors. This was trumpeted at the time as heralding a new wave of shared services for the sector, coming as it did so soon after the Diamond report on efficiencies and modernisation in universities. I’ve never been convinced that the exemption will open the floodgates to many more shared services. The basis for my scepticism is the low figure set against the cost of the exemption included in the budget statement at the time (£125million a year after five years) and that this cost is for application of the exemption across all the relevant sectors, which includes the banking and insurance world. Nevertheless I do expect it to enable some new services to be developed and that some institutions will be well placed to take advantage of the exemption. Guidelines on establishing cost sharing groups (CSGs), which are key to participants being able to benefit from the exemption, are being prepared.

The discussion that followed perhaps echoed my scepticism. There was consensus that a shared service that was dependent on the exemption to be sustainable probably wasn’t financially viable in the long term. In other words, the basis for the shared service did not really exist. It was also pointed out that setting up a cost sharing group was a business decision – it may be more advantageous to deliver services within current structures as the benefits from other tax breaks (such as the ability to claim back VAT paid) outweigh the those gained from the exemption.

For all the debate about CSGs, new shared services will continue to emerge from the sector. Some will develop bottom up, starting with collaboration between a number of institutions and building to a commercially sustainable service. These services are driven by operational challenges and business need. They will take time to become established but will grow, perhaps with financial assistance, until they achieve sustainability. Others will develop from a top down approach. These may be more innovative and may well be in areas where the need is not yet widely known or understood. There is, of course, risk in the top down approach. Some may succeed but others, where the assessment of the business need proves to be incorrect, may fail. It is rare for such services to be an overnight success and they will almost certainly need financial support for the first few years of operation until they achieve sustainability (or fail). There needs to be a medium term commitment to such support. It will not help the service achieve sustainability if there are doubts about its viability going forward. There is, of course, a risk in providing such support – some potential services may fail and the investment lost. The concern is that the current economic climate might deter the sort of commitment required.

Finally, for all the hype about shared services, IT Directors have blended internal and externally provided services to deliver their overall service for some years. To some extent we are fortunate in IT that there is a wide range of commercial and free services that can be deployed for aspects of our operations. Shared services are one option but they are not the only tool in the box.

Supporting students with analytics

One of the topics that cropped up several times at this year’s Educause conference was analytics. This has been something of an emerging topic for some time and something that I don’t think we have really developed here in the UK, although next week’s CISG Conference may prove otherwise.

In the first case, an institution had identified a specific problem and has made use of the data it had to offer a solution to its student population. The problem was that many students select modules or pathways that are not suitable for them. This affects the completion rate as students who are on courses that they are not suited to often drop out or fail. As the level of completion was one of the criteria used to establish funding for the institution concerned, finding a solution would have a financial benefit.

One reason for students selecting the wrong options is that the language used to describe modules is often opaque – the suggestion was that the descriptions might just as well be in a foreign language for the amount of sense they made to the undergraduate trying to select their degree pathway. The solution was a course selection programme that made use of historic and personal data to recommend the modules that would best suit the students and so offer them the best chance to succeed. The grade information from all students over time was combined with the entry grades for the individual student to predict the grades for the student’s chosen path. The system then uses the course plans and predicted grades to make recommendations to the students to assist them to choose. However the student is not left to his or her own devices to make the decision. Rather the system supplements face to face advice and helps inform the discussion with advisors. There was some concern that such a system would lead to greater standardisation in the course pathways but, in the same way that Amazon or the iTunes Genius bar offer unexpected choices, it has sometimes broadened horizons. The predictions made as part of the recommendations have proved to be very accurate and that accuracy will improve further as more and more data is collated and used. And the system is delivering results – those students taking the modules recommended to them are getting better grades which in turn are providing greater incentive to those students to return. The student is also given advice on the potential careers that their major may lead them to which may also influence the student choice.

The system builds on the recognition of the fact that students have particular strengths and weaknesses and as such are going to be better suited to some paths over others. This was a problem identified in the Italian higher education system a few years ago; one of the main reasons for the high drop out rate in Italian universities was simply the fact that students were taking courses that were wholly inappropriate for their personal traits. The introduction of pre-admissions profiling resulted in students taking more suitable courses for their personalities and analytic capabilities with a consequent improvement in retention rates.

Another institution had created a student dashboard that facilitated evaluation of both a cohort and individual students’ learning. Again the system made use of both historic and current data to help guide the student towards the resources they needed according to their learning preferences and styles. The dashboard was used by the student to identify areas where they need further work in order to improve their grades, and by faculty to identify areas where the lessons delivered in their teaching had not been absorbed by their students. Consequently they were able to make changes to their courses to improve understanding and hence student success. The intention was to move to a personalised environment where a body of historic and personal data is used to understand an individual’s learning style and so better guide them to what they need to succeed.

Finally, one institution made use of a wide range of current data to assess which students were at risk of dropping out. This is common application in the UK where data is pulled from diverse sources such as the coursework submission system, library access gates, and VLE login data to pick up those who are not engaging with their university. There was a difference in the application however. The US institution analysed the data and put the students into three categories. Interestingly rather than focus on the lower tier (ie those most at risk of failing), efforts were concentrated on the middle tier to ensure they remained and improved their results. This contrasts with the approach adopted by UK institutions where support is given to the most at risk group to try to ensure they continue in their studies. This perhaps reflects the different drivers – in the US, some institutions are funded according to the numbers of successful graduates so it makes sense to put more effort into those who are likely to stay but need support to graduate. In the UK, institutions are penalised for high drop out rates and so the emphasis is on retaining those students at risk of dropping out.

Students paying higher fees are likely to expect far more in terms of support. The data institutions have built up over the years can play a role in supporting students but there is a cost in developing systems to analyse that data and tailor it to individual circumstances. The driver for institutions to invest may well emerge as the quality of student support becomes an area to seek competitive advantage.

Giving ownership to the student body

A recurring theme at this year’s Educuase conference has been the need to better engage students in the development of services and courses.

One presentation from Clemson University highlighted the approach they had adopted. Clemson have established an IT Student Advisory Board which is not only involved in helping to shape Clemson’s IT Strategy and plans, but has control over a proportion of the IT budget which it can use for developments. The members of the Board are nominated by their respective colleges and they elect their chair from that number. Members serve on the board for a number of years to ensure that there is some continuity from one year to the next.

The students at Clemson are subject to a charge for use of IT and so the Board, in addition to making suggestions as to future services, reviews those already in place. In order to inform the discussion, the Board are given costs for the services. The experience has been positive. The Board have not been afraid to make unpopular decisions – they recommended that the IT charge was increased and have introduced charging for print. The latter delivered savings which the department were then able to invest in other projects. The Board, being students themselves, have identified services that have enhanced the student experience including introduction of Mac based labs and the development of a mobile app.

In theory the Board can make any recommendation to the IT department, even to the extent of suggesting closing down services. It was clear that there hadn’t been any ridiculous suggestions to date but also there was provision for IT services to explain the consequences of such suggestions.

Overall, the Board was responsible for delivering benefits for its fellow students and was clearly working in partnership with the IT department. For their part, the IT department benefited from a source of innovation which, because it was coming from the student body, was aligned to the student experience.

University IT departments have great difficulty in engaging students. This is little surprise when the default method of engagement is often a committee meeting where the student will often only be one of a larger group comprising academics and administrators. The students have no ownership of the services and don’t feel that they are making much of a contribution. This seemed to me to be a model that could be applied to every institution, giving ownership to the students and developing a strong partnership with the IT department.

MOOCs – is there value?

One of the sessions at the Future of Technology in Education (FOTE) conference last week discussed the value of MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses). There was a lively debate, both amongst the panel and on the Twitter backchannel.

The discussion was inconclusive – it is perhaps too early to determine wither MOOCs are the next big thing or just a passing fad. However, it was clear that none of the panel saw MOOCs replacing the traditional university offering but did see it supplementing provision in a number of ways. Firstly, there may be scope for integrating all or part of a MOOC into formal teaching, either as an assessed piece of work or as optional supplementary course that students may choose to follow if they have a particular interest. In the former case, it is perhaps no different from a standard online offering as may be provided via the institutional VLE, on the assumption of course that it is subjected to the same level of academic rigour and quality. The informal learning is rather different of course, but there may be added incentive if there was a link between taking the additional course and improved grades. This might imply a sort of Amazon style approach along the lines of ‘80% of students taking this as an additional course, attained grade A for their module’.

Secondly, MOOCs offer an opportunity to bring an aspect of higher education to a broader audience. Whilst it might not necessarily be regarded as widening provision, it certainly offers an opportunity for individuals to sample material from an institution. The opportunity is the key thing here, not the completion. There will be many more registrants than there will be people completing the course. Some will register but will never find the time (or perhaps the inclination) to ever start. That is always a challenge when something is offered for free and is largely there for interest – there is no negative impact if you don’t complete. Others will start the course and will realise that it is not for them. Some will dip in and out of the programme, sampling pieces as and when they feel or as and when the topic is of greater interest. And of course some will religiously go through the course through to the end. But overall, it will have provided an insight into the institution and what it provides and so has a role to play as part of outreach activity.

The MOOC itself may well be regarded as a marketing tool. There is always scepticism when something is given away for nothing that it has little value. However, the various US universities that made significant volume of their teaching material publicly available don’t seem to have suffered and the availability of free content through iTunesU has seen an increase in registrations for the Open University. It also provides the opportunity to showcase the quality teaching that takes place in our institutions.

During the course of the discussion, it was suggested that the longevity of MOOCs was partly dependent on the value that employers attached to any qualification attained. I suspect this probably won’t be the case. I sense that there is some scepticism (certainly reflected by one participant at the conference) about online courses in general and this is certainly amplified if the course can be freely taken. And as Paul Greatrix points out in his blog, there is little accreditation, no assurance of quality and it is nigh on impossible to ensure that a student’s work is their own. MOOCs may have a role in supplementing existing teaching and in extending the reach of the institution beyond the formal student body. Whether they are here to stay perhaps depends on whether there is a return, in terms of increased registrations or softer measures such as increased awareness of the institution’s work, on the investment preparing and supporting the course. But it will be a hard business case to make.

A phish called Wanda

One news story that caught my eye today was on the BBC website highlighting a survey that the Student Loans Company had carried out of freshers’ potential use of social media sites. The survey identified that many freshers will accept friend requests without necessarily knowing who the person is making the request and will make personal information such as their date of birth, mobile number and email address. All of which can be used by fraudsters to construct phishing emails to obtain students’ bank account details and so attempt to defraud them. The threat is real. I received an email purporting to be from the Student Loan Company asking for my bank details. It was clearly a phishing attempt (firstly I am not a student in receipt of a loan and secondly, I was able to identify that the mail had not actually originated from the SLC despite its appearance) and I duly reported it to the SLC. However, I am familiar with this sort of mail. New undergraduate students are less likely to be and may well respond.

In the coming weeks, Freshers’ Weeks will be starting at universities all over the country. The incoming students will be bombarded with information about their university including a whole host of information about the do’s and don’ts of using the university’s information systems and pointers to good social media behaviour. The challenge for IT departments is to make sure that their new students understand the importance of protecting their identity stands out amongst all the other information and advice that they get. I used to give a lecture to incoming students on the IT facilities at the institution I was working at and the things they should and shouldn’t do. Within a couple of weeks, several students had done some of the do nots and in general suggested that they hadn’t be told that their actions were in breach of the regulations (perhaps it was my lecturing style…).

There are, of course, a number of ways that the institution can get in touch with their incoming students. Many will have joined university Facebook groups and these can be used to advise students before they arrive. Others may use Twitter announcements to point to advice. However, there is much to take in when you join university and it is easy to miss information that could help you, particularly if it relates to a service you have been using for a number of years before arriving. The threat may not seem to exist. The SLC have produced some guidance – institutions will have their own. Most institutions will have technical solutions in place to protect their networks and their students against software vulnerabilities. But, as is so often the case, technology is not the problem – people need to understand why it is important. No one approach will do the trick – it is likely to be a case of utilising a range of approaches to try and get the message across.

 

A first step to wholesale outsourcing?

I read the recent article on the Guardian’s website on the prospect of London Metropolitan University outsourcing its service departments. It was old news in so far as the tender went out on the EU journal some months ago but it does look at if the process is reaching a conclusion with three companies in the frame. What isn’t clear is now much of the business is likely to end up being outsourced. That may of course be covered in the tender document – it is not beyond reason that organisations were being invited to tender for all or part of the business on offer and looking at the companies that have responded, that would appear to be the case. Of the three, only one appears at first sight to have any experience of delivering non-IT services in the education sector.

This may not be a particular issue if (as may be the case) the staff currently employed at London Met are transferred to whichever company takes over services. In this case the knowledge and understanding of processes and procedures that currently resides in the University will be transferred to the service company. No service provision, whether internally or externally delivered, is perfect and there will be occasions when mistakes are made or the service does not deliver to the required standard. How issues like this are dealt with will depend on the contract and, more particularly, the service level agreement between the University and its supplier. This is something that a number of IT service departments struggled with when they took their first steps to outsource aspects of their service provision; the departments did not have the skills to manage the contracts well. However, it is a lesson that is being learnt and service departments are employing IT procurement/contract managers or are training their staff so that vendor management is part of their overall role in delivering the service. I imagine that there will be some interesting discussions on service levels ahead at London Met. The University recently had its Highly Trusted Sponsor status with the UK Border Agency suspended – will eventualities such as this be subject to penalty clauses within the service level agreement?

The sector will be watching developments at London Met with interest. Malcolm Gillies, Vice-Chancellor of London Met, has been a strong advocate of shared services and the outsourcing of services is perhaps a first step – prove that it can be done and then roll the services out to others. How successful this will be remains to be seen. It is a bold step and one borne partly out of financial necessity. There will be some ready to highlight the lightest failing but realistically it will be a number of years before an accurate assessment of the move to outsource can be made. Before then, the dust will have settled on this year’s admissions and we will have a better understanding of the impact of the new fees regime in England. Some are suggesting that there will be institutions that will significantly under recruit and they may need to look at cutting costs as a result. That picture will start to emerge over the next few weeks but if there are institutions in that position, they may well be beating a path to London Met’s door to learn from their experience.

A fully priced menu

I attended UCISA’s Support Services Conference last week. The opening presentation from Barclay Rae talked about the need for IT departments to understand their customers’ requirements. The foundation of the engagement with customers is the service catalogue, listing the services provided and the scope of provision. It is a document that needs to be written in terms that the customer can understand. After all, if you can’t get across to your customers what it is you are providing, you have little chance of engaging them in a discussion about those services.

It is a two way conversation. It isn’t enough to tell customers what it is you are providing – you have to listen and understand what they want. Support and service desk staff have a key role to play in understanding how customers are using IT and so explain what it is they want from services. There needs to be a good mechanism for promulgating that information throughout the department. All too many service failings are down to poor understanding of customer requirements and poor communications. Better understanding of customer needs will lead to better decision making and a better service. And those same support and service desk staff have a role too in feeding back to the customers news of changes that have been made to help the customers.

The customers and key stakeholders should play a role in determining the services provided. It is something I’ve been quite vocal about at the Janet Stakeholder Advisory Board – the main users of the service should play a role in determining the elements delivered and assist in scheduling the deprecation of services where appropriate. In order to do this they need to know the cost of each element. As Barclay commended “you wouldn’t run a restaurant without a menu”. But unlike a restaurant the customers will be choosing which items they want on the menu rather than picking individual items. And they will want to know how often each dish was chosen. The cost information, along with usage figures, will help assess the relative worth of the service elements and help determine the scope of your services in the service catalogue. So 24/7 support might be off the menu if it proves to be expensive and no one is using it. However if there are hundreds of calls at three in the morning, the cost could be justified.

The difficulty is that the cost information is difficult to ascertain. This is something UCISA, with our colleagues at JISC, Janet and BUFDG are looking to address. Hopefully the service catalogue will soon be fully like a menu with prices against each item.

A standard each? Not the way forward…

I was pleased to note that David Willetts, Universities and Science Minister, took the opportunity at a recent event on university-industry links to support the adoption of the Higher Education Achievement Report (HEAR). The report goes beyond the traditional transcript, providing details of the modules or units studied (including information such as how the unit was assessed, whether the module contained elements of group working etc) as well as information about additional activities individual students may get involved in. These can include additional study, participation in university or student union societies and volunteering (say to work on charitable activities). The HEAR is issued by the institution and consequently the additional activities are validated by the institution. The purpose is to give a more complete picture of the individual, to highlight areas of strength which may be of as much interest to prospective employers as their academic grade. The Government are looking to encourage employers to use the HEAR to look at more than just the academic achievement when considering taking on graduates.

So support from the Government and support too from the sector at large – the HEAR has been implemented in ninety institutions, although not necessarily across the whole academic portfolio in each. Nevertheless, I believe that this is a positive in that institutions recognise that this is the direction to travel. The HEAR, which is not currently mandated, seems to have been welcomed with more enthusiasm than some of the mandatory transcript related reports that have emerged out of the Bologna Process. This is probably in part because few UK students seek to integrate study at European institutions into their programme (and so the Diploma Supplement is seen as an overhead) and partly because the sector has been able to recognise the benefits that the HEAR may offer graduates.

Clearly such a report will draw on a range of information sources within an institution. It is important that, in order to achieve economies of scale, that there is clarity about what is to be included within the report and the format it should take. So it is pleasing to note that the JISC have been involved in the process, have established a standard for the HEAR and have engaged with a number of suppliers (through institutions) to pilot the HEAR in institutions. All positive so far but there is a cloud on the horizon.

I was at a meeting last week when the topic of the HEAR was raised. It was disappointing to hear that whilst most, if not all, institutions around the table were providing a HEAR like report to their undergraduates, it was just that – HEAR like. There was no dissent from the view that ‘the standard is fine for the basic content but isn’t a perfect fit for every institution so we’re developing a variation’.

This is of concern on two counts. Firstly a lack of standardisation across the sector will lead to confusion amongst employers. It won’t be apparent to them whether items that are present in the HEAR for students from one institution but not another are missing because the second institution doesn’t offer the opportunities detailed or because they aren’t included in that institution’s interpretation of ‘the standard’. Without consistency there is a risk of the HEAR falling into disrepute and an opportunity will have been lost. Secondly, there is clearly additional effort (and hence cost) to produce these variations. Suppliers may have invested time in developing reports that meet the standard only for these to be customised for local use.

The level of adoption suggests that the HEAR is recognised as being beneficial to graduates particularly as it surfaces skills and achievements that might not be immediately apparent from a standard transcript. A standard exists but it is being used as a base for the report rather than being used entirely for the report itself. This is perhaps the problem with a standard that is not mandatory – institutions will always find areas where it doesn’t meet their needs because they are somehow ‘different’. Consequently a variety of HEARs will exist and employers will complain about the lack of standardisation. Standardisation is key, not just to the HEAR but for any chance of shared services being adopted on a wide scale across the sector. Perhaps the route forward is to establish a core set of data for the HEAR and then permissible additions. But the standard will need to be adopted and enforced by an agency such as HESA in order to be accepted as a consistent document by employers. Without that its true value may be lost.

Footnote: I’d like to stress that no criticism of my colleagues at the JISC is intended. Establishing standards in this sector is challenging and believe that JISC have achieved much in putting together a standard for the HEAR. There is a lot of good work going on to establish mechanisms for delivering HEARs and other documents. I hope that I might have stumbled across a particularly errant group and that this post will be proved inaccurate quickly. However, I have a nagging feeling that it won’t be.