This blog has been kindly written for HEPI by Dr Alex Bols, Deputy Chief Executive of GuildHE.
The recent HEPI paper, Opportunities to improve university governance in England (HEPI Report 155), by Dr Alison Wheaton, is an insightful look into how we can improve university governance in England. It suggests that there have been recent moves towards more interactive governance, and that these rely on clarity of role as well as capacity and capability.
I was unsurprised that governors expressed least confidence in their role relating to academic governance and institutional performance monitoring. This is something that I have written about for HEPI, Why it is time for university governors to do more on academic quality (HEPI Policy Note 36). The Policy Note highlighted the increasing expectations on governing bodies to seek their own assurances that standards are being maintained and to enable governors to have a more interactive role in this.
