Conditions of Flexibility: securing a more responsive higher education system

[Jill Anderson]

The long-anticipated culmination to the HEA’s research series Flexible Pedagogies: preparing for the future (http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/projects/detail/Research/FP_prep_for_future_research) has arrived with the publication of Conditions of flexibility: securing a more responsive higher education system, written by Professor Ron Barnett.

 

The report proposes 15 conditions of flexibility to inject new thinking and new practices into an emerging new age. Flexible provision has the potential to enhance student learning, widen opportunities for participation in higher education, and develop graduates who are well-equipped to contribute to a fast-changing world. This report shows how these conditions of flexibility provide the foundations for the implementation of robust, well-informed and thought-through structures and strategies that will lead the sector into the future.

 

Click here to read the report: http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/resources/detail/flexible-learning/flexiblepedagogies/conditions_of_flexibility/main

 

 

Professor Barnett’s report draws on and threads together the strand reports from the Flexible Pedagogies research series published earlier this academic year.

 

Click here to access the strand reports:http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/projects/detail/Research/FP_prep_for_future_research

 

Conditions of flexibility was also used as a starting point at a roundtable event hosted by The Guardian, bringing together experts and senior managers in higher education to discuss the future of flexible learning and to what extent the sector may need to rethink its approach to flexible learning.

 

Click here to read the Guardian write-up of this event: http://www.theguardian.com/higher-education-network/blog/2014/jun/10/flexible-study-future-for-universities