Thanks to the CAUT for posting the news that Melbourne University has decided to stop funding the U21 Joint Venture. This comes on the back of another poor year for the struggling enterprise. Back in October, the Times Higher Education Magazine reported on UCU’s concerns about Universities investing in the online education joint venture. The Times Higher reported that Nottingham, Birmingham, Edinburgh and Glasgow universities between them sank £5.5 million into the project for a return of a mere £40,000. U21 Global was established as a joint venture between 16 members of the Univeristas 21 consortium and the private education company Thomson Learning. Since then, the troubled project has consistently under-recruited, four universities have backed out and Thomson Learning quit in 2007, to be replaced by a Mauritius-based company called Manipal.
Back in June 2009, we reported our concerns and UCU branches wrote to their managements asking whether they intended to continue investing in the joint venture.
In addition, the UK government announcing that it will “support the new task force led by Lynne Brindley, Chief Executive of the British Library to help UK higher education remain a world leader in online learning and grow its market share by 2015. The task force will identify opportunities for investment and innovation within and between universities and colleges and with the private sector in the development of online learning, including the building of critical mass. Through HEFCE we will be prepared to provide seedcorn funding on a competitive basis for university-private sector partnerships which will strengthen our market position.”
It’s clear to us that the lessons of the U21 joint venture must be learned by the universities involved and by the sector in general and we will be applying new pressure to rethink or at the very least tightly regulate these joint ventures and partnerships.
To read the Times Higher story, click here: http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=408445&c=1
For our own report, click here: http://www.ucu.org.uk/stopprivatisation
