Teaching excellence framework (TEF)

Online distance learning specialist blames old data as OfS identifies ‘absence of excellence’

Five more institutions achieve gold awards after OfS resolves challenges to original ratings

Institutions without ratings at a disadvantage during crucial recruitment period as many wrongly assume appeals are due to their being designated ‘requires improvement’

Stringing out the numerous challenges could risk influence of Teaching Excellence Framework declining across the sector, experts fear

Large swathes of scores missing as OfS publishes first results of newly revamped exercise

As deadline for submissions approaches, OfS outlines how revamped exercise will benefit sector

Label would apply to providers failing to get a rating and in England would limit the fees they can charge, according to consultation

Regulator extends existing awards, with results of reformed evaluation not due to be published until 2023

Experts fear submissions in 2021 won’t be able to appropriately account for wide range of disruptions to student experience caused by pandemic

Teaching excellence framework will also no longer be an annual exercise, with next assessment due to be published next year

This week’s spending review could see commitments revisited and important policy documents released, predicts Nick Hillman

Ministers’ eagerness to launch yet another review when so many others remain unpublished is testing the patience of universities, says Andrew McRae

Long-awaited publication of Pearce review expected in autumn, but lack of time and changes in government priorities make 2021 awards unlikely

University of Glasgow principal Sir Anton Muscatelli says inputs into England’s TEF will become unreliable owing to pandemic shocks

Both are too resource-intensive to be sustainable during this crisis, and their objectives can be achieved through other measures, argues Dorothy Bishop

The UK government is determined to make good on its manifesto pledge to crack down on substandard university programmes. But what is quality? Is it best measured by graduate earnings, learning gain, a national university curriculum – or something else entirely? Anna McKie ponders the options 

Birmingham’s Kathleen Armour emphasises need for collaboration across traditional disciplinary boundaries

Education secretary’s backing for subject-level exercise before publication of TEF review prompts university warnings of ‘significant diversion of staff time’

Poland’s underperforming university system raises hard questions for those who advocate academic self-government over ‘managerialism’ 

Disciplinary-level assessment unlikely to survive in its current form, say sector leaders