十八世紀以來，劍橋大學和牛津大學打破了宗教限制，開始了精英教育的高等教育，現在，英國已成為世界上最高水平和最大規模的高等教育國家之一。目前，英國高等教育機構包括90多所大學、123所學院、50所教育學院。值得注意的是，英國高等教育的宗旨和相關政策并不是一成不變的，在過去二百多年的歷史中，特別是近50年來，英國高等教育的宗旨和管理政策進行了許多調整。這些調整在解決英國高等教育規模、教學質量和經費問題上取得了一定的成就和經驗。這些調整在英國未來的高等教育改革提供了有價值的參考，也為其他發展中國家的高等教育發展模式。本研究旨在探討英國高等教育的目的和20世紀60年代以來的政策調整過程，以期預測英國高等教育的目的和政策調整的未來走向。

 

1.0 Introduction 簡介

 

Since the 18th century, the University of Cambridge and the University of Oxford broke religious restrictions to begin elite education of higher education, and now Britain has become one of the countries in the world with the highest level and the largest scales of higher education (Scott, 1995). Currently, British higher education institutions include more than 90 universities, 123 colleges, 50 educational colleges. It is noteworthy that the purpose of British higher education and related policies are not static, in the history of more than two hundred years, especially in the last 50 years, the purpose and management policies of British higher education have made many adjustments. These adjustments have made certain achievements and experiences in solving the problems of scale, teaching quality, and funding of British higher education (Scott, 1995). These adjustments provide a valuable reference for the future reform of higher education in the UK, they also provide a model for the development of higher education in other developing countries (Smith and Webster, 1997). This study studies the purpose of British higher education and the adjustment process of the policies since the 1960s, so as to forecast the future trend of purpose and policy adjustment of British higher education.

 

2.0 British Higher Education (1960-1980) 英國高等教育（1960-1980）

 

2.1 The Transformation of British Higher Education (1960-1980)

Robbins Report is the forecast and planning for British higher education development during 1960s - mid-1980s. The report elaborates the goals and principles of higher education, the status of higher education in the United Kingdom in 1962, the comparison of higher education in the UK with other countries, the prediction and vision of future higher education development, funding issues, management mechanisms and responsibilities of various departments, as well as a series of major problems that British higher education reform and development faced (Tasker, 1993). After more than 30 years, profound changes have taken place in British higher education in school-running policy, system design, development strategy, fund investment mechanism, management operation mechanism and establishment, scale, monitoring, evaluation of universities, as well as other aspects. Robbins Report is the transition declaration of the British higher education from the traditional model to the modern model, from elite higher education to popular higher education (Robbins Report, 1963).#p#分頁標題#e#

 

2.2 British Higher Education Policy (1960-1980)

2.2.1 Democratized higher education system 

Higher education system tended to be democratized, transforming from the aristocratic education into civilian education. Robbins Report stated at the outset that the goal of higher education was to change the traditions of cultivating missionaries, judges, lawyers and physicians to provide services for skills and talents needed for competition in social life; the principle of running a school was allowing those who have the ability, condition, and desire to accept higher education to have an access to higher education (later it is known as "Robbins principle") (Robbins Report, 1963). From this, British higher education began to move toward the civilian class, the education system also bided farewell the traditional aristocratic model and changed into a modern, democratic, pluralistic model. Students of different genders, classes and races, as well as adult students, part-time students and students with disabilities entered universities, which became the best mark for the democratization and diversification of British university education (Smith and Webster, 1997; Williams, 1992). By the 1996-97 academic year, the proportion of girls enrolled in higher education had doubled from 25% in the 1960s to 50%, minority students of 18-20 years old accounted for 12.2 percent of the total number, disabled students accounted for 3.6% of the total number of full-time students, part-time students accounted for 28% of the total number of students, adult students accounted for 58%. In the social stratum, 36%, 34%, 30% of the students were from the management and above classes, white-collar workers, industrial workers and the lower class (Andreas, 2004; Williams, 1992). It is particularly worth mentioning that the Open University established in 1969 was through the communication television broadcasting and the Internet to teach, which mainly provides opportunities for adults who have missed the opportunities to accept higher education, it does not emphasize whether they have formal educational background, all young people over the age of 21 can apply for admission (Louise, 2003; Andreas, 2004; Williams, 1992). Open University opened the modernization of a modern higher education teaching mode and effectively promoted the implementation of "Robbins principle", and its form integrates new set of contemporary communication and information technology, the students included students aged from 18-19 to 80-90, women, people of lower middle class and the disabled. Since the 1990s, it has more than 100,000 students and it becomes the symbol of popularization of the British higher education system, it has also been emulated by many countries in the world (Louise, 2003; Smith and Webster,1997).

 

2.2.2 Expanded scale of higher education, transforming from elite education to popular education

When Robbins Report was published, under the spur of "Robbins principle ", the British government took the policies of linking the number of students with education fund to encourage universities to expand enrollment and the creation of new institutions of higher learning, which promoted higher education to expand rapidly. The number of students in tertiary education increased from 120,000 in 1963 to 1.7 million in the 1997-98 school year, and the number of institutions of higher education increased from 30 to 190. The enrollment rate of the Relevant Age Group increased from 8% to 32%, according to Martin Trow’s point of view, when a country's school-age youth enrolls is more than 15%, the nature of its higher education is transformed into a popular mode. Obviously, Britain has completed the transition from elite higher education to popular higher education (Louise, 2003; Andreas, 2004).#p#分頁標題#e#

 

2.2.3 Diverse structure of higher education, forming multi-level, multi-standard education system 

As the birthplace of the world's higher education, the United Kingdom has always abided by the concept that higher education is university. However, Robbins Report on the connotation of the interpretation of higher education is very creative, it includes all education provided after students’ graduating from secondary school by universities, colleges, advanced technical colleges. Such higher education is not only a regular degree education, it also includes a variety of informal certificate courses and professional diploma education, in order to meet what economic and social development needs for multifaceted talents and provide more education opportunities, the British government was committed to promoting the diversification reform of higher education system (Keçetep and Özkan, 2014; Prisacariu, 2015). For example, from 1963 to 1968, 10 new universities which differ from Oxford, Cambridge and other classical universities were established. From 1969 to 1973, 30 polytechnic colleges were established to strengthen the part-time higher vocational, technical education at all levels. By the 1980s, Britain had formed a multi-level higher education system including classical universities, modern universities, multi-technical colleges, education colleges, continuing education colleges and open universities. British scholar Peter Scott called it a popular higher education system combining dual systems, binary systems, unified systems, stratified systems as one (Louise, 2003; Andreas, 2004).

 

2.2.4 More open higher education system 

The higher education system became more open, forming distinctive international characteristics.

"Robbins principle" not only promoted UK's higher education system to open the door for their own young students, but also attracted a growing number of young students from the continent, Africa and the Far East. British government’s policy of attaching importance to recruiting overseas talents to enhance its competitiveness, as well as standards and good quality reputation established based on the deep historical traditions of British universities have a great attraction for overseas students, which provides the foundation for internationalization of British higher education (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014). While huge economic returns brought by overseas students became the direct cause for universities’ committing to open doors to compete for overseas education market (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014). From the late 1970s to the late 1990s, government funding for student education fell by 40% as a result of the expansion of higher education, prompting universities to take the economic income from overseas students as an important supplement complementing to educational resources (tuition of overseas students is 5 to 6 times of tuition of British students, the annual income from overseas students is more than one billion pounds) (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014). In 1998, 300,000 British immigrants were students, of which one-third were from Asian, 23% of graduate students in UK universities were overseas. The internationalization of British higher education has increased the multiculturalism of the society and higher education, which promotes social consumption, increasing educational resources and potential human resources as well (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014).#p#分頁標題#e#

 

3.0 British Higher Education (1990-2010) 英國高等教育（1990-2010）

 

3.1 Problems in British Higher Education (1990-2010)

3.1.1 Unsatisfactory scale of higher education and unequal opportunities for education 

Although Britain's higher education scale and democratization of education have made great progress after the Robbins Report, the enrollment rate of higher education for young people is still lower than that of in the United States, Australia, Canada and some European and Asian countries ; the proportion of children of middle and high-income families in receiving higher education is twice as the proportion of children of low-income families, equal opportunities for education still need to be improved further (Yan and Tan, 2014; Salter and Tapper, 1994).

 

3.1.2 Increased grants and reduced education funding 

Over the past two decades, despite there was a 45 per cent increase in government funding for higher education, the number of students receiving higher education has doubled, leading to a real drop in per-student education funding of 40 per cent. The serious shortage of funds faced by universities has become an important factor affecting the quality of teaching and the level of scientific research (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014; Tasker and Packham, 1993).

 

3.1.3 Diverse students and unified education 

The sources of students in higher education are diverse, students' cultural background, educational experience, admission qualifications, professional knowledge, interests and expertise, value orientation are becoming more diversified, but the curriculum content and teaching methods provided to them have not changed much, which obviously fail to meet what students needs (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014; Lucas, 2014).

 

3.1.4 New requirements for learning ability 

Higher education has not yet been able to provide students with the ability to adequately cope with future learning societies, in the face of the rapidity of knowledge renewal, shortening cycles, and rapid changes in professional knowledge, students should have the ability to acquire learning resources after graduation, which mainly means that students master the skills to collect information (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014; Lucas, 2014).

 

3.2 British Higher Education Policy (1990-2010)

In order to review and evaluate the educational policy and development since the 1960s, so as to develop the 21st century framework and development strategy for higher education reform, the UK government in 1996 was through 14 months of detailed investigation and study to carry out a comprehensive study on British, European and Australian higher education, in July 1997, an advisory report entitled Higher Education in the Learning Society was published. The report was a programmatic document which was through a comprehensive review and reflection on British higher education to provide strategic construction for its future development (National Committee of Inquiry into Higher Education, 1997). Based on the report, the British government and the education department have made a series of planning and reforms about the purpose, scale, structure, fund, educational crisis faced of British higher education and the development of the next two decades (National Committee of Inquiry into Higher Education, 1997).#p#分頁標題#e#

 

3.2.1 Establish new mechanisms to raise funds for higher education and broaden the sources of education funding 

Considering establish new mechanisms to raise funds for higher education, the main measures proposed include that the government further increased investment in higher education; the growth ratio of university grants should keep up with the growth ratio of GDP (Guerrero, Cunningham and Urbano, 2015); the government should immediately set up an industrial co-operation development fund to attract funding from the industrial sector to subsidize higher education; it should end the history of British students’ accepting a free full-time higher education, according to principle of sharing the costs of education by beneficiaries, since 1998 school year, each student has been charged for tuition fees of £ 1,000; the government, funding agencies, the quality assurance department, universities and scientific research institutions cooperated to adjust the flow of funds through legislation and evaluation, reforming the conditions of funding and project management mode to increase the utilization benefit of funds for higher education (Guerrero, Cunningham and Urbano, 2015).  

 

3.2.2 Strengthen the function of the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA)

Strengthening the function of the newly founded QAA to ensure quality of education while expanding the scale of higher education at the same time (Fook and Sidhu, 2014), the main measures included that QAA should assume responsibility for the management of quality assurance, public information, standards validation and certification framework to develop operational norms for institutions of higher education to apply for government funding; QAA and institutions of higher learning were authorized in cooperation to set up a panel of experts to develop quality standards, especially the minimum requirements of quality standards; an external examiner system should be established and improved; QAA was authorized to cooperate with higher institutions to establish a UK academic staff information library, taking this as a candidate library of external examiner for assessing the quality of teaching in higher education institutions (Keçetep and Özkan, 2014); QAA should clearly define the criteria for commencing a course, enhance the assessment of the quality of degree awarding, towards accredited universities which made improper use of degree-granting authority, QAA would abolish their power to confer a degree, establishing a fair and sound system of complaints about the quality of education services (Fook and Sidhu, 2014).

 

3.2.3 Strengthen roles of higher education in local and regional development,

Strengthening roles of higher education in local and regional development, as well as further strengthening the role of higher education in local and regional social progress and economic development, no public utility can naturally expect more and more public funding to support it unless it can continue to increase its support for social development (Shiel and Paço, 2016). Institutions of higher learning are committed to making a significant contribution to the development of the region and the wider regions in which they are located. The contribution of colleges and universities to local and regional development diversity should be diversified. It includes support for local development through scientific research and advice, meeting the needs of the labor market for professionals, attracting investment and the provision of new employment opportunities, supporting the lifelong learning of local communities and contributing to the improvement of people's quality of life as a cultural center (Guerrero, Cunningham and Urbano, 2015). Higher education institutions should bid for and compete for local development fund projects to keep abreast of what local industries and business needs to find an effective way to enable enterprises, especially small and medium enterprises to get and share information resources of higher education in the region. This is the premise of interaction between colleges, universities and a community. Local governments and enterprises should be committed to helping students and teachers from institutions of higher learning to form the entrepreneurial capacity to enable them to better serve local communities (Filho, Shiel and Paço, 2016).#p#分頁標題#e#

 

3.2.4 Strengthen the extensive application of communication (C) and information technology (IT)

Rapid development of C & IT's brings about revolutionary changes to information storage and delivery means, and it has posed a severe challenge to traditional model of higher education. The education sector and universities paid full attention to the role of communication and information technology in improving the quality, flexibility and management of higher education over the next two decades, emphasizing the need to strengthen the wider use of communication and information technology in higher education (Louise, 2003). All institutions of higher learning were at the center of the UK's communications and information strategy. The government and funding agencies would help colleges and universities to develop strategies to adapt to changes in communications and information technology, improving the overall development and management levels of communications and information technology in higher education institutions. Those needed to be matched with the UK's sound information technology base were the needs for high quality materials and excellent management to meet the needs of students and other personnel (Andreas, 2004), during 2000-2001 school year, higher education ensured that all students were able to use the network desktop computers, all students in the 2005-2006 school year would have their own portable computers (Andreas, 2004).

 

3.2.5 Further enhanced degree of internationalization

The UK government has implemented two successive Prime Minister's Initiative for International Education from 1999 to 2011. The program ended the history that the UK's internationalization of higher education was carried out separately by each college and university, and it opened the national strategy era of British education internationalization, the government, universities and international organizations have jointly built the British education brand and opened up overseas markets (Warwick, 2014). The program increased by 200,000 non-EU students for the UK higher education, the education sector and higher education institutions have established significant partnerships, while it has brought considerable economic income for the UK (Warwick, 2014).

 

4.0 British Higher Education (2010-present) 英國高等教育（2010-至今）

 

4.1 Problems in British Higher Education (2010-present)

In 2007, the US subprime mortgage crisis broke out, the financial crisis has a serious impact on the whole world economy. In the shadow of the economic crisis, the UK has suffered from huge fiscal deficit and expenditure pressure. The government has begun to think about the quality, efficiency in the field of higher education and the close connection with the social economy (Lucas, 2014). 

 

4.2 British Higher Education Policy (2010-present)#p#分頁標題#e#

4.2.1 Education funding

In October 2010, a study on the theme of higher education finance named Browne Report was carried out, in June 2011, with the publication of Higher Education: Students at the Heart of the System, the Higher Education Fund Committee published a report named A New Fitfor-Purpose Regulatory Framework "in August of the same year. Several papers have been published and proposed the risk awareness in higher education grant, the Higher Education Funding Council (HEF) will reduce the overall amount of block grant, allowing institutions to raise tuition fees and provide adequate loan protection and flexible repayment mechanisms (Filho, Shiel and Paço, 2016).

 

4.2.2 Education quality evaluation

At the same time, in the field of quality assurance, a "post-Browne debate" was triggered, which has focused on the possibility of adding a risk awareness to external quality assessments, to those institutions which have good credit and internal quality assurance mechanisms, it could extend the evaluation cycle, while strengthening the assessment and tracking of institutions with poor performance (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014). Based on the above discussion, QAA presented a risk-based approach of higher education inspection. In June 2013, the "Higher Education Inspection: User's Manual" was officially released. It was decided to start a comprehensive review of UK institutions of higher education from 2014. New higher education inspection bases mainly focused on four areas: how institutions of higher education set up and maintained basic academic standards; how to manage the quality of learning opportunities for students in terms of teaching, resources and academic support; how to promote students' learning opportunities; how to ensure that public information was transparent and effective (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014). It could be seen that the new mechanism focused on students. Because, considering from the perspective of QAA, students were important stakeholders and beneficiaries of higher education, therefore, quality and standards should be carried out around students.

 

4.2.3 Attach great importance to student participation. 

The manual required, a self-assessment report would also be sent when an appointed Leader of Student Representative (LSR) submitted a written document. The field visit team must also have a student leader who was familiar with the local higher education as a full member (Keçetep and Özkan, 2014). Student participation is also an important measurement in the self-assurance system of each institution. For example, the academic committees of institutions, the committees responsible for professional revision and accreditation, and the executive boards required student participation. Students' complaints and information feedback should also be the constant mechanisms in the quality assurance of institutions (Keçetep and Özkan, 2014).#p#分頁標題#e#

 

4.2.4 Ensured students’ access to high-quality learning opportunities

In the quality code, the basic academic standards at all levels were a reference basis to develop learning opportunities. The focus of the inspection was that not only the development, approval, and revision of profession required students’ participation, but also the expected professional outcomes and the characteristics of the formulated graduates of an institution should be consistent, and the professional plans should reflect the coherence and logic of knowledge (Guerrero, Cunningham and Urbano, 2015). There was also an important inspection point on how to promote the quality of student learning opportunities, namely the degree of connection between students, universities and employers. The Wilson Report published in 2012 has suggested that universities should be the center of economy, cultivating graduates with an entrepreneurial spirit, to foster the development of students’ high-quality learning experiences to adapt to the needs of a community and economic development (Guerrero, Cunningham and Urbano, 2015). Therefore, throughout the evaluation process, QAA focused on how students have access to high-quality learning experience.

 

4.2.5 Transform from the focus on "quality assurance" to "quality enhancement". 

QAA believes that the process of quality management is not only the process of guarantee, more importantly, it is also a major enhancement process (Lucas, 2014). This aspect is reflected in the attention to student learning outcomes, in addition to requiring institutions to provide a variety of "evidence" to prove that students have achieved the expected results set, it is also through a number of special thematic element inspection, such as new students’ learning experience, to help institutions to focus on improving the quality of students’ learning (Lucas, 2014); on the other hand, it is through information disclosure to promote institutions to attach great importance to quality enhancement initiatives. For example, the "Inspection Report" published online by the QAA in June 2013 suggested that universities needed to establish a viable student participation mechanism to ensure student participation and providing all students with accurate, transparent professional cost accounting information (Keçetep and Özkan, 2014).

 

5.0 Discussion 討論

 

5.1 Discussion on the Purpose of British Higher Education

After World War II, considering the development of the country and the thought of humanism, the realization of higher education popularization has also become one of the goals of various countries since modern times (Scott, 1995). The reason lies in, firstly, in a democratic society, every right-age citizen should have the right to receive education, higher education popularization policy is to meet the aspirations of the masses to pursue equality and democracy. Secondly, the popularization of higher education for the country can train more senior specialized personnel, which contributes to the growth of the national scientific and technological strength, as well as the overall national strength. Thirdly, more young people of the right age have access to high-level education, which helps them to realize their dreams. Finally, higher education can help people to make better decisions in many aspects of their lives, so as to improve their personal literacy and moral integrity  (Scott, 1995). Throughout the last 60 years, one of the most important aims of higher education is to popularize higher education. Of course, at each stage, the purpose of higher education will be some subtly different, but the ultimate goal of development is the same, that is to achieve the popularization of higher education. In the course of the development of higher education in the UK, the relevant government policies have also been adjusted for several times. The reason for this adjustment is to better achieve the goal of popularization of higher education, or to solve the new and old problems in the process of popularization of higher education, such as the issue of supervision of the quality of education arising from increase in enrollment, education funding and so on.#p#分頁標題#e#

 

5.2 Education Equity

In order to realize the popularization of higher education, the scale of higher education in England was expanding and the objects of education were increasing. From the 1960s to the 1990s, students of different races, adult students, part-time students entered university campus, which was the best mark of popularization of education. However, the enrollment rate of high school-age students in the UK was relatively low, and the proportion of students in middle and high-income families who have received higher education was twice as high as that of students of low-income families, and the problem of equal opportunity of education has not been effectively solved (Salter and Tapper, 1994; Yan and Tan, 2014). During 1990-2010, the government led the creation of new mechanisms to raise funds for higher education, and the government further increased its investment in higher education, while reforming the funding conditions for reform, ensuring that excellent students could receive more funding, which helped low-income students to have an access to higher education. From 2010 to the present, higher education in the UK has not only focused on addressing the issue of equity in education, but also begun to pay attention to student needs and quality of teaching, for example, by taking a series of measures to ensure high quality learning opportunities for students to promote students to develop high quality learning experiences to adapt to the needs of communities and economic development. This showed that British higher education not only began to pursue the popular form in terms of the quantity of students, but also pursed popular education in terms of the specific content and effect, showing that the degree of popularization of higher education in the UK continued to deepen.

 

5.3 Financing of Education Funds

From 1960 to 1990, the British Government adopted the policy of linking the number of students to education funds, so as to encourage the expansion of enrollment in colleges and universities and the establishment of new institutions of higher education (Fell and Lukianova, 2015). However, due to the number of students was doubled, the actual costs of student education has led to a 40% decline (Tasker and Packham, 1993; Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014). In the 1990s and the 2010s, the British government led the policy of establishment of new funding mechanisms for higher education funding to broaden the sources of funding for education, while changing funding conditions and project management methods to improve the use of higher education funding benefits (Soo and Elliott, 2010). In 2010, the British government have put forward the concept of attaching importance to the risk of higher education funding, while allowing institutions to improve tuition fees and give students adequate loan protection and flexible repayment mechanism. The UK government has adopted the market mechanism to solve the problem of funds, which raised the efficiency and efficiency of the funds to play a positive role to achieve the purpose of popularization of higher education.#p#分頁標題#e#

 

5.4 Deepen the Degree of Internationalization

The implementation of popularization of higher education lead to the rapid expansion of the scale of teaching, colleges and universities took economic income of enrolling overseas students as an important supplement to educational resources (Zheng, 2014). In the 1960s and 1990s, the number of foreign students studying in the United Kingdom began to grow rapidly, they brought more than £ 1 billion a year to British higher education. These costs have a positive effect on the problem of insufficient funding due to the popularization of higher education, while the internationalization increased the multiculturalism of communities, colleges and universities, improving the international reputation of British higher education as well (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014). However, the internationalization of the universities was only carried out by the universities separately. In order to further enhance the international attractiveness of British higher education to attract more international students to study in the UK or increase the income from international students, from 1999 to 2011, two successive phases of the Prime Minister's Initiative for International Education were implemented, bringing the income of £ 10 billion generated by international students per year (Bruce and McGregor, 2015). These revenues were particularly important for the UK to continue to deepen the development and reform of higher education.

 

5.5 Supervision and Evaluation of Educational Quality

In the 1960s and 1990s, because the policy of popularization of higher education led to the increase of teaching scale, the quality of teaching was not good enough, and the curriculum content and teaching methods provided to them did not change much when it was compared with that in the past, obviously it was unable to meet the needs of students (Li, Roberts, Yan and Tan, 2014;  Lucas, 2014). In order to solve these problems, in the 1990s, the British Government emphasized the strengthening of function of QAA for higher education to ensure the quality of education while expanding the scale of higher education, and further strengthened the role of higher education in local and regional social progress and economic development (Filho, Shiel and Paço, 2016). On the one hand, these measures made higher education play a greater role in promoting socio-economic and cultural development and cultivate more talents for the society, allowing students to have more opportunities to realize their own value (Gegel, Lebedeva and Frolova, 2015). On the other hand, it also helped colleges and universities to obtain more funds, technical support from communities, which provided strong support to achieve the popularization of universities. By 2010, the British government began to attach importance to the participation of students in the supervision of the quality of education in colleges and universities, the academic committees of institutions, committees which were responsible for professional revision and the executive boards required the participation of students. Students' complaints and information feedback should also be the constant mechanism in the quality assurance of institutions of higher education (Keçetep and Özkan, 2014). The implementation of these above measures ensure the quality of education while expanding the scale of education to ensure that students learn the knowledge that can meet the needs of communities to improve their employment rate, which will help to improve public access to higher education Enthusiasm, these measures provide a guarantee for the realization of the goal of popularization of higher education.#p#分頁標題#e#

 

5.6 Trends of British Higher Education Policy in the Future

5.6.1 Education funds

The purpose of introducing market mechanism into higher education is to make up for the shortage of government expenditure on higher education and to improve the efficiency and quality of higher education. It shows that British higher education gradually transforms from the past "self-centered model" to "consumer-centered model", it pays more attention to the quality and efficiency of teaching, research and other services, at the same time, British universities need to strengthen close ties with the business community, so as to constantly enhance sources of funding channels (Guerrero, Cunningham and Urbano, 2015). Multi-channel funding aims to ensure that higher education is developed according to the social needs defined by the decisions of students, employers and research contractors (Byrne, et al., 2012). The introduction of market mechanism has undoubtedly stimulated the enthusiasm of reform and development of higher education in the UK, which has brought vigor and vitality to the whole higher education system. However, the marketization of higher education has also brought some new problems, such as the weakening of university education function, the utilitarianism of university behavior, the violation of university autonomy, the threat of teaching quality, the development of utilitarianism, interest relations between teachers and students, etc. (Guerrero, Cunningham and Urbano, 2015). There is contradiction between pure marketization and the characteristics of higher education itself, so "pure" market competition does not work in higher education, how to find a balance between market mechanism and university education is the issue that the future British higher education needs to consider.

 

5.6.2 Student autonomy

Future British higher education policy is likely to have more emphasis on student self-selection, self-realization. The 21st century is a new era in which everyone has full independent awareness. Especially in the field of higher education (Middlehurst, 2016), if the government can fully realize the importance of students' subjectivity and selectivity, then take effective measures, which will be very beneficial to the sustained and benign development of higher education (Keçetep and Özkan, 2014). Therefore, under the situation of the popularization of higher education in the UK, it is very likely that the future policy of higher education in the UK will emphasize more on the selective and participatory nature of individuals who have the potential to participate in higher education, such as more opportunities to participate in academic evaluation, professional revision, day-to-day management, and so on, so as to provide policy-based and practical system of protection for them to achieve their own highest level of demand.

 

5.6.3 Fair education#p#分頁標題#e#

In this study, the author expects that the future British higher education policy will be able to maintain the basic academic requirements on the basis of continuing to expand the coverage of higher education, while individual access to higher education institutions will gradually increase. The UK government will also continue to promote equitable enrollment rates for socially vulnerable groups and take steps to increase access to top universities. Judging from the perspective of deep-seated analysis, the elite education concept, the social values of exclusive elite and upper class higher education will slowly fade in future British higher education.

 

5.6.4 Degree of internationalization 

In terms of internationalization of education, in the future, the UK's higher education policy will continue to expand its national strategy to recruit international students, improve national student support policy, focus on improving the quality of teaching and service quality, increase publicity, promote international network teaching, strengthen international cooperation in running schools in terms of the internationalization of education.

 

6.0 Conclusion 結論

 

After World War II, considering the development of the country and the thought of humanism, the realization of higher education popularization has also become one of the goals of various countries since modern times. Throughout the last 60 years, one of the most important aims of higher education is to popularize higher education. In the course of the development of higher education in the UK, the relevant government policies have also been adjusted for several times, including the expansion of educational objects and the scale, the introduction of market-oriented mechanisms to solve the problem of education funding, the continuous improvement of internationalization, the continuously improved supervision mechanisms of quality of teaching. Overall, the introduction of these policies helped to achieve the purpose of popularization of British higher education. In the future, the United Kingdom continues to promote the popularization of higher education, this trend will not change, the policies on student autonomy, education equity, fairness and internationalization will be further strengthened.