If we must have a market in higher education, it’s important that there’s a regulator that secures and strengthens students’ rights in it – so we were thrilled to be invited to give evidence to the Lords’ Industry and Regulators Committee and its inquiry into the work of the Office for Students (OfS).
We were especially pleased because unlike universities and colleges, neither students nor their students’ unions have previously been asked for their views on OfS, and so nor has any action plan to improve engagement with us been developed.
We did not want to dwell too much on issues of process, but it is important that OfS takes extra steps to involve students in its work given the name over the door.
In our view the regulator is very difficult to engage with – outside of the TEF, engagement amounts to being invited to round tables on specific policy issues and being invited to submit responses to consultations.
