Engaging In Radical Work: Students As Partners In Academic Publishing
Students as partners is the radical antithesis of the consumerist mind-set in higher education. Yet students have traditionally been absent from one key arena of academia: publishing. Ruth Healey, from University of Chester with co-authors Mick Healey, from University of Gloucestershire and Anthony Cliffe from Liverpool John Moores University, discuss The International Journal for Students as Partners which seeks to address this absence through pairing academic and student co-editors for all its sections.
North east universities to benefit from £750m construction agreement
Collaborative procurement on construction for universities in the north east of England has been made easier with a £750m framework agreement, the first of its scale in the UK. Greg Barnes, who worked on the agreement for the North Eastern Universities Procurement Consortium (NEUPC), describes its benefits and lessons learned while putting it together.
New chief for SUPC as it explores collaboration options
Southern Universities Purchasing Consortium (SUPC) has appointed Simon Hill to the role of interim head in advance of a review that will examine how SUPC and London Universities Purchasing Consortium (LUPC) can work more closely together. Hill, who has experience of change management in the private and not for profit sectors, starts in September at SUPC, which has agreed a collaboration project brief with LUPC outlining background and objectives for the review.
Why blockchain could be the future in knowledge procurement
More applications are emerging for blockchain - a formerly obscure technology that underpins the digital currency Bitcoin. Nick Petford, chair of the Procurement UK forum and vice chancellor of the University of Northampton, is excited about its potential for procurement.
SUPC takes steps to protect supply chain workers
SUPC has joined with the world-wide monitoring organisation Electronics Watch which assists public sector buyers to meet their responsibility to protect the labour rights of workers in their global electronics supply chains more effectively, and less expensively, than any single public sector buyer could accomplish on its own.
Sir Ian Diamond: ‘We can improve… by sharing best practice’.
In an interview with Efficiency Exchange, Professor Sir Ian Diamond reflects on how universities have adapted to become more efficient.
Measuring, tracking, agreeing and banking procurement benefits
Procurement teams can play an important role in releasing savings to help to reduce budgets in higher education institutions or to bank and reinvest. But Jim Reed, who has held senior procurement roles in a number of sectors, argues that there is room for improvement in how universities measure the benefits they secure.
Nick Petford: seismic shifts at Northampton
The University of Northampton is undergoing many changes ahead of the move to the Waterside campus in 2018. Vice chancellor, Professor Nick Petford, tells Efficiency Exchange about his role in the change and draws some surprising parallels between his academic specialism of volcanology and the higher education environment.
How can we tackle procurement skills shortages in higher education?
The higher education sector is facing difficulties in finding and recruiting procurement professionals with the right skills. NEUPC’s CEO Frank Rowell talks about how the consortium is addressing the issue.
LUPC launches new contracts database
A contracts database developed jointly by the regional higher education purchasing consortia is now live. HE Contracts replaces the previous database, uniBuy, and includes a host of new features and easier access for consortia members looking to find information about the sector’s collaborative agreements. Members can find resources and information about training on their local consortia website.
