Our elite universities are international leaders. In their admission policies most pride themselves as having worldwide reputations for excellence and aspire to recruit the brightest and best globally. Nevertheless, at the heart of last year’s battle over tuition fees was an implicit recognition that the UK’s university sector cannot afford to rest on its laurels. The world is moving on apace and greater freedoms are vital to ensuring our best universities can continue to compete with the very top institutions in the international league tables. Yet the concessions the government made to secure reform may undermine the future of our university sector....

The following article was posted this morning on Critical Reaction, an online blog which commissions pieces from a wide range of authors on politics, culture and books: Formulating an acceptable policy on tuition fees was never going to be an easy task. There were far too many hostages to fortune given before the General Election for that. It is also worth remembering that the opt-out in the Coalition Agreement applies implicitly only to Lib Dems outside the government and expressly to the outcome of Lord Browne’s Report. Yet these proposals have already been watered down considerably at the behest of the Liberal Democrats. ...

For many years, the government has assumed that tinkering with the structure of our education system leads to an almost automatic improvement in standards. Yet schools, colleges and universities are fed up of constant interference and employers tell me that we are simply not equipping our young people with the skills relevant to the modern workplace...

Mark Field MP welcomed early-career researchers from Imperial College to the House of Commons today to compete in the national scientific poster competition, SET for Britain.

SET for Britain is an exhibition of posters by early-stage and early-career research scientists, engineers and technologists. The exhibition gives them the opportunity to present their work to their local MPs and their scientific peers. All posters are entered into a competition and significant cash

On 19 January, the Department for Children, Schools and Families launched an independent review of home education by Graham Badman, former director of children and education services at Kent County Council...