As HEPI marks 20 years of debate and constructive criticism on matters relating to higher education in the UK and beyond, it has invited expert researchers, practitioners and commentators to reflect on the way that tertiary education has developed over that time. To provide a context for these contributions, we first begin with summary data, which illustrate shifts in the scale and scope of UK higher education during the life of HEPI to date.
The large majority of the figures used here to create an outline of the size and shape of the sector (and increasingly sectors, with the devolution of responsibility for education policy within the UK during this period) are drawn from publicly available sources such as the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), the admissions service UCAS and Funding Councils / Office for Students (OfS).1 This reflects not only the accountability that is expected of organisations that receive public funds, but also a long-standing collegial attitude among institutions toward data sharing and re-use.
The sector’s commitment to the collection and publication of a wide range of data about its activities, participants and resources can be traced back to the Robbins Report of 1963.2 The review committee decided to base its recommendations on evidence-based forecasts of likely demand for higher education up to 20 years ahead. These were prepared by a group of economists led by Claus Moser, who was then at the London School of Economics. The resulting data became one of the foundations for the findings of the committee and its report emphasised the importance of such an evidence base, recommending that sector-wide data-collection along the lines developed by Moser and his team should continue.
