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Before the effect of the COVID-19 Pandemic, there had been continued debate about the future of Higher Education (HE) in the UK. It is now accepted that the effect of the pandemic will have a long-lasting effect on HE in the UK and elsewhere. This paper addresses the changes that are currently taking place, based on a strategy that aims to develop a future knowledge-based economy, following the UK governments 2019 landmark review of HE. It explores the underlying parallels between the current situation and certain historical events that catalysed the development of a new approach to HE in the past, which is very relevant today. In this context, the paper discusses why major changes in UK HE provision is now required as a response to the fact that although the cost of education is rising, employers are reporting that graduates are increasingly unprepared for the workplace. In this respect, the paper addresses a model for HE that focuses on 'earn-as-you-learn' apprenticeships and work-place-based learning. The key to this is the emphasis that the UK government is now placing on funding new 'Technological Colleges', in which students are trained by experts from the industry on a contractual basis, rather than by university academics with tenured positions.

This rapid systematic review aims to examine emerging evidence on the effects of COVID-19 on educational institutions and assess the prevalence of e-learning changes in the sector. This paper reviews literature on learning, teaching, and assessment approaches adopted since the COVID-19 outbreak, and assesses the impact on the sector, staff, and students, summarizing findings from peer-reviewed articles. It categorizes these into five key themes: (1) digital learning; (2) e-learning challenges; (3) digital transition to emergency virtual assessment (EVA); (4) psychological impact of COVID-19; and (5) creating collaborative cultures. This represents the first systematic review of COVID-19's impact on education, clarifying current themes being investigated. The author suggests that the term 'emergency virtual assessment' (EVA) is now added for future research discussion. Finally, the paper identifies research gaps, including researching the impact on lesser developed countries, the psychological impact of transition, and the important role of leadership and leadership styles during the transition and handling of the pandemic.

This essay offers a broken narrative concerning the early history of anti-oppressive practice as an approach in the U.K. to youth and community work and the struggles over this in the context of UK higher education between the 1960's and the early 2000's. Educating informal educators as youth and community workers in the UK has been a site of contestation. Aspects of a genealogy of that struggle are presented in ways which link publicly available histories with personal memories and narratives, through the use of a personal archive developed through collective memory work. These are chosen to illuminate the links between theory and practice: on the one hand, the conceptual field which has framed the education of youth and community workers, whose sources lie in the academic disciplines of education and sociology, and, on the other hand, the social movements which have formed the practice of informal educators. Six have been chosen: (1) The long 1968: challenging approaches to authority; (2) the group as a source of learning; (3) The personal and political: experiential learning from discontent; (4) Paolo Freire and Critical Praxis; (5) A critical break in social education and the reality of youth work spaces as defensive spaces; (6) New managerialism: ethics vs. paper trails. The approach taken, of linking memory work with present struggles, is argued to be a generative form for current critical and enlivening practice.

COVID-19 forced the closure of UK universities. One effect of this was a change in how lectures, and their recordings, were made and used. In this research, we aimed to address two related research questions. Firstly, we aimed to understand how UK universities replaced in-person lectures and, secondly, to establish what academic staff believed the post-pandemic lecture would look like. In a mixed-methods study, we collected anonymous quantitative and qualitative data from 87 academics at 36 UK institutions. Analysis revealed that respondents recognised the value and importance of interactive teaching and indicated that the post-pandemic lecture would and should make greater use of this. Data also revealed positive views of lecture capture, in contrast to pre-pandemic studies, and demonstrated that staff recognised their value for those who were unable to attend, or who had specific learning differences. However, staff also recognised the value of asynchronous lecture videos within a blended or flipped approach. This study provides evidence that the pandemic has engendered changes in attitudes and practices within UK higher education that are conducive to educational reform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]