The rural university campus and support for rural innovation

This paper examines the potential for engagement in local innovation activities of six rural university campus developments in the UK. A number of common narratives emerged around the tension between local educational interests, and the needs of local industry. The paper examines both the strategies of the campuses and the expectations of local partners. Whilst these new campuses have been able to add to the regional innovation systems of rural areas, they struggle with economies of scale and scope. Where disciplinary specialisation has been pursued, potential exists for engagement with niche clusters, although a long development period is required. Where campuses have focused on broad educational equity issues, engagement with business has been difficult to achieve. Overall policies to enhance rural innovation through new university campuses must be seen to be very long term strategies and not necessarily congruent with strategies to increase HE participation and equity of opportunity

Performance in Higher Education Institutions and Its Variations in Nordic Policy

The need for greater efficiency, productivity and quality in the higher education sector has triggered increased governmental interest towards different mechanisms of accountability, especially evaluation and performance measurement. This interest has developed over a relatively long period of time, but it has now reached its culmination point in many ways. For instance, advances in citation tracking, performance data collection and databases and the professionalisation of evaluative practices and methods have opened new avenues for verifying accountability. This chapter offers definitions for the key concepts used throughout the book, as follows: accountability, evaluation, and performance measurement and management. Each section is followed by a short contextualisation of the concept in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden. The chapter ends with a short discussion about the policy convergence between Nordic countries and the reasons for it.QC 20190507</p