Management and governance

Review chair’s comments on ‘discretionary’ funding raise disturbing questions, say Mark E. Smith, Sarah Randall-Paley and Andrew McConnell

We must create spaces, resources and communities where individuals and groups can achieve optimal health through everyday activities, says Alan Cromlish

Independent review finds college's actions breached data protection law, as well as going against its own values

Starting again from scratch every October causes no end of stress, mix-ups and wasted time, says one hourly paid lecturer

Formulating and implementing a strategic plan is core to the modern university leader’s job description. But amid complaints that such documents are vacuous, generic and irrelevant to the wider community, John Ross asks how the process can be improved

Crowdsourcing a new configuration for the University of South Australia boosted brainpower and perhaps even institutional loyalty, says David Lloyd

Most fervent opponents of dropping requirement for Australian universities to conduct research employ large numbers of teaching-only academics

OfS investigation followed Dominic Shellard’s departure, with university admitting failure on oversight of leadership, ‘in particular the v-c’

‘Irresistible’ network technology raises threat level from crooks and spooks, says Jeff Bleich

With such wide disagreements in grading, the research excellence framework’s gravity for careers is unjustifiable, says Philip Moriarty

Data on more than 19,000 institutions show Europe lags behind leading anglophone sectors on female leadership

Leeds accused of attempting to extend control of central management by ending practice of selecting heads of school from within the faculty

University leaders more likely to have attended Oxford or Cambridge compared with five years ago, but also to have gone to a comprehensive school

Sir Ian Diamond reportedly did not trigger his 12-month notice period until his departure from the university

Governing body gambit torpedoes court case but further isolates academic senate

It is not enough for UK universities with charitable status merely to conduct teaching and research, say Nicola Dandridge and Helen Stephenson

Promotion criteria requiring top researchers to also be good teachers and managers undermine the nature of universities, says Andrew Oswald

Overseas branch campuses have mushroomed in the past two decades, but with the risks larger than initially assumed and the returns less certain, stories of abandoned ventures have begun to mount. Ellie Bothwell asks whether the model still has a future 

Teesside’s Leading Roles project uses stage techniques to train university staff in handling ‘challenging conversations’ and conflict, write Sharon Paterson, Paul Hessey and Mike Rogers

Running a university and composing music both involve ‘strategic planning’, says Roderick Watkins, composer of the ‘very dark, very violent’ Juniper Tree

Gradual changes to lifestyles will not save the planet. Universities need to go beyond Cambridge's recent lead and think bigger, says Peter Harper

University chooses ‘private sector partner’ to deliver project

Western ‘settler’ nations such as Canada and Australia are wrestling with how to redress historical injustices visited on their native populations. One proposal is for universities to embrace Indigenous knowledge. But what does that mean in practice? Will it achieve its aims? And where does it leave science? Matthew Reisz considers the arguments

The controversy over a Harvard dean’s defence of Harvey Weinstein is no reason to disregard the core academic mission, says Sandro Galea 

University acknowledges that drop in student recruitment has brought ‘financial challenges’

Institutions Down Under do not have the resources to lead the world across the board, says former vice-chancellor

School’s new student intake fell by nearly 40 per cent in just two years

Survival depends on institutional buy-in to a fundamental questioning of operating models and cost structures, says Angus Laing

Hepi report ties increase to mounting workloads and performance management

Dean was removed following opposition to his role in Harvey Weinstein’s legal team

Crucial cash flow in jeopardy as regulator scrutinises bush institutions’ urban partners

Home of United Nations court and Dutch government has no university of its own – but Leiden’s outpost ‘could grow to 10,000 or 20,000’ students

Successful publish-or-perish operators should look in the mirror before writing their next diatribe about marketisation, says Mike Marinetto

Shift in council membership may be factor in escalating vice-chancellor pay

Recent controversies in Australia over vice-chancellors’ pay, Ramsay Centre funding and the role of academic presses have raised questions about whether university boards have too few – or, perhaps, too many – members from scholarly backgrounds. John Ross chairs the discussion

V-c who left school at 16 before entering university without A levels says university’s social mission is irreplaceable

In a managerial era, universities are challenging the traditional idea that only individuals need protecting, say Otto Hüther and Georg Krücken

The unfettered pursuit of knowledge is every university’s core value – even if management doesn’t always see it that way, says Dennis Hayes

Dutch universities are conspicuously and consistently successful. Yet their funding is declining and their embrace of internationalism has put them on a collision course with the populist right. John Morgan assesses the mood in Leiden, Rotterdam, Amsterdam and Maastricht

Former OU pro vice-chancellor returns to take top job at troubled institution

Wollongong’s Paul Wellings rejects claims he contravened rules in approving Ramsay Centre course, as decision faces legal challenge

Struggles of Hampshire College suggest to some that students may be reluctant to shape their own degrees in a debt-heavy, career-focused higher education sector

The country’s recent judge-led review is another instance of the global misperception of institutional censorship, say Ian Jacobs and Susan Dodds

Report warns that racism persists in South Africa’s leading university, but it has attracted criticism

The US admissions scandal notwithstanding, Australian university history reveals a variety of approaches to allocating university places, say Gwilym Croucher, James Waghorne and Hamza Bin Jehangir

Apparent moves to increase university autonomy will have the opposite effect given the government’s authoritarian tendencies, says Jarosław Płuciennik

Opponents should learn from Chinese candidates’ successful and potentially formative forays into democratic politics, says Salvatore Babones

Australia’s vice-chancellors must wake up: China's munificence is all motivated by its vast geopolitical ambition, says Nick Forster

Ford administration is blind to incompatibility of statistical metrics and quality teaching, academics warn

US universities might be world-leading in research terms, but there is scant evidence that this has any bearing on their prowess as educators. Why do institutions of higher education show so little interest and aptitude in instilling genuine learning, asks John Tagg 

As public debate grows crude, University of Miami’s Julio Frenk pushes faculty to emphasise thoughtful alternatives

Shin Sung-chul, who is under investigation by the Korean government, says state is starting to provide more freedom to universities but progress is slow

Friendly competition can push us all to do better. But when the competitiveness that fuels excellence and prestige becomes based in the logic of the market, universities lose sight of their true purpose, writes Kathleen Fitzpatrick

Candid interviews with Chinese university presidents and government officials reveal widespread doubt that institutional freedom has increased

Scholarly society investigated alleged breaches of harassment and bullying policy by Alun Evans

Questions have been raised over appointment as design school head of academic who is being sued for alleged age discrimination

Sunderland v-c urges policymakers to recognise post-92 universities’ ‘contribution to the health of the nation’

Executive exchanges in universities, business and government ‘would improve policy’, says Monash council member

A lack of accountability can permit a toxic culture to linger unchecked, says one former employee, who was the victim of antisemitism

US university president tells THE summit that institutions need to ‘rethink’ their operations