Wales

White Paper, Wales and the Weather

by Dewi Knight July 10, 2012

It’s not just the torrential rain and gales that have hit university campuses and rattled Vice Chancellor’s whisky cabinets across Wales over recent weeks and months – the whirlwind reform and restructuring in higher education demanded by the Welsh Government and HEFCW also took its toll. But the publication last week of the Government’s White Paper on Further & Higher Education had the effect of bringing some calm to the storm.

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Party politics and the future shape of Welsh HE

by Dewi Knight April 16, 2012

The headline higher education news in Wales can be summed up in one word: mergers. Nothing gets Welsh education correspondents’ filing copy quicker than a ‘buried’ Government report into amalgamations; threats of ‘judicial reviews’; or concerns about the very future of institutions.

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Failing to plan is planning to…

by Dewi Knight February 21, 2012

On the political battleground of recession, jobs and growth, the rhetorical weapon of choice is the “plan”. Whether you’re signed up to the UK Coalition’s ‘Plan A’, prefer to think there’s been a subtle change towards ‘Plan A+’, or you’re more of a Two Eds ‘Plan B’ supporter, you’re nobody if you’re not a “man with a plan”.

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Nos da, Prifysgol Cymru | Goodnight, University of Wales

by Newell October 26, 2011

In a classic ‘Take out the Trash Day’ move last Friday, it was announced that University of Wales would move under the royal charter of Trinity St David once it merges with Swansea Metropolitan, effectively abolishing an institution which has stood for 190 years.

I have reflected a great deal about how my grandfather, a Welsh nationalist and academic, would have reacted to recent events. The University of Wales was an iconic higher education symbol for the Welsh identity, but I am sure he’d agree the effectiveness and relevance of this symbolism was waning long before recent events. With the more respected universities like Cardiff, Swansea and Bangor looking to move away from the UoW collegiate, it became harder for the university to hold the same significance it once had in Wales.

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