JERSEY has a solid foundation from which to extend the current range of university and further-education courses available locally, but greater collaboration between providers, investment and a clear vision about what the Island wants to offer are all needed, business leaders have been told.
They were joined by students and teachers at a recent breakfast briefing organised by the Chamber of Commerce entitled “Should Jersey have a university?”. The event was sponsored by Parslows, whose partner Carl Parslow is a JEP columnist who has written articles for this newspaper about the need for a university.
While more radical suggestions were made, including creating a “metaverse” university based in the Island which would offer online, virtual learning across the world, there was broad consensus that the best approach was to partner with UK academic institutions and develop and extend what was already on offer.
Representatives from Highlands College and University College Jersey, the Jersey Institute of Law, Digital Jersey, the Hospital’s degree programme and the Jersey International Centre of Advanced Studies were joined by Education Minister Rob Ward to speak and appear on a panel to explore the question.
They discussed many related issues, including whether the Island needed a standalone university, to the cultural impact of a student population, how to keep talented young people in Jersey, funding and student grants, the quality of what is already available, student accommodation and tax breaks and other incentives to woo Island students studying in the UK back to the Island. Highlands principal Jo Terry Merchant said: “This topic, ‘Should Jersey have a university?’, has been a topic of interest for at least two decades, for employers, parents, young people, educators and, of course, government.
“The arguments about the value of higher education are well versed, the social and economic returns to the individual, and to their community. But are we, as an island, brave enough to invest in a step change now for longer-term gains?”
She quoted from a report written in 2004 by a UK academic which said that Jersey had to make more of its home-grown talent against a background of factors, including the “changing economic environment in Jersey, in which Jersey operates its strategic positioning, and the policy development of the States, the future impact of an ageing population and the effects of the new Higher Education Policy in England”. She suggested that little had changed.
Mrs Terry Merchant said that there were currently 175 further-education students at UCJ, with 39 teaching staff.
“We offer full-time, degree-level apprenticeships and part-time,” she explained. “We already do hybrid online, flying faculty – that’s when we bring the experts into the Island, less so now because we can do it online.
“We use international experts in their field, and all of our staff are dual qualified, so they’re experts in their industry, and also a trained degree level, master’s postgraduate level in teaching and learning.”
She added: “Don’t our Jersey students deserve more than one or two floors in an ageing campus? I would argue yes… So I know we have the capability to do more and be more, but we need Jersey to understand that you limit investment into skills and education at your peril. It creates the greatest gains for the individual and the economy.
“Ask the experts who know, like you’re doing today at the Chamber, and this time together with employers and government and the Higher Education Advisory Board, let’s take action.”
There are a similar number of students studying for graduate and postgraduate degrees at Health, only a handful of whom have left to work elsewhere.
