Insights by Craig Ling, Director and Head of Southern Region, Grayling UK 

Exams results lie just around the corner, but in truth the education sector itself has been examined like never before over past few years, not least over the course of the last General Election. But what’s perhaps most interesting for those of us with a communications background, immersed in the sector on a daily basis, is that there are a number of issues, some highly topical and others bubbling away in the background, which speak volumes about the wider direction of travel.

We’ve considered some of these as part of our 2017 Education Trends Report, which is downloadable, below.

Many of today’s issues offer an insight into the themes we can expect the Higher Education institutions we work with, to face in the years ahead. The current tuition fees agenda tells us a great about the emergence of the student population as ‘consumers’, actively seeking value for money from their fees – it’s why we are seeing universities place great emphasis on upping the number of contact teaching hours; it’s why we’ve seen Jo Johnson ask the Office for Students (OfS), which comes into being next year, to consider a sector-wide university-student contract to improve protection; and it’s why three of the six metrics for the new Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) directly form the annual student survey.

That’s just one example. Brexit and the widening skills gap, opens up a larger conversation around social mobility, not least how we tackle the unspoken challenge of social mobility – the fact that student retention rates and graduate outcomes for students from disadvantaged backgrounds have scarcely improved in the last two decades.

As one of the country’s leading communications companies and a specialist in education communications, we continue to be privy to some truly fascinating innovations in the education sector. But we also know that due to the pace of change, few in the sector have yet had time to catch their breath and start to think about the next set of key communications challenges that lie ahead.

For the sector, now is the time to take stock and start strategy planning. The expert team at Grayling are on hand to host planning, strategy and messaging sessions, but in the meantime, our Education Trends Report for 2017 offers food for thought.

For more information please download the report below.

Contact: Craig Ling or call +44 (0)7 8086 41778.

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Original article: http://www.grayling.com/gb/insight/emerging_trends_in_the_education_sector