New TEF plans could wrongly label 40% of universities “low quality”, analysis warns
Almost 40 percent of English universities could be branded “low quality” under proposed changes to the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF), according to analysis by pro vice chancellors, Professor Tony Moss, London South Bank University, and Professor Claire Pike, University of East Anglia.
The plans come from the Office for Students (OfS) — the independent regulator for higher education in England that's responsible for ensuring universities meet minimum standards for teaching, student outcomes and value for money.
The regulator wants to link TEF ratings more closely to these minimum standards, with a university’s overall score based on whichever of its two component ratings is lower.
Professors Moss and Pike say this would have drastically changed the most recent TEF results — halving the number of Gold-rated universities and sharply increasing those rated Requires Improvement. Both Bronze and Requires Improvement ratings could trigger penalties such as limits on student recruitment or tuition-fee freezes.
Their WONKHE article discussed the potential risks of these new changes across the higher education sector and proposes a solution:
- Retain Bronze, Silver and Gold in the TEF as ratings that reflect a positive judgement of High, Very High and Outstanding quality, respectively.
- Introduce a new rating — Meets Minimum Requirements — to recognise providers who deliver student experience and outcomes above regulatory minimum thresholds but are too far from benchmarks to justify a TEF quality award. This category needs to be monitored by the OfS, due to the future risk of provision falling below minimum standards.
- Retain Requires Improvement category to indicate a strong likelihood that regulatory intervention is required to address more serious performance issues.
- Continue to recognise Bronze ratings as a mark of High Quality and position the threshold for additional regulatory restrictions or intervention such that these would apply only to providers rated as Meets Minimum Requirements or Requires Improvement.
Professor Tony Moss said: “Our analysis shows that the current proposals for the future of TEF won’t deliver the policy commitments outlined in the government’s recent Post-16 Skills White Paper and risks destabilising the sector and confusing students about the meaning of TEF ratings.
“Our proposal shows that there is a different way of approaching these reforms, which helps deliver on government policy, while ensuring that we don’t send erroneous signals to the wider world that we think our sector is experiencing a crisis of quality.”