The challenges of governing increasingly diverse higher education systems Dr Gunnar Stave, former president of the Norwegian Association of Higher Education Institutions (UHR) and former rector of Volda University College, Norway EUA Autumn Conference, Wroclaw, 27 October 2007

Structure of presentation  Recent changes in the Norwegian higher education system  Consequences for public governance of the institutions  Consequences for institutional strategies  UHR: the higher education sector’s organisation

Recent changes in Norway’s HE system  Before 1994: a distinctly two-tiered system, universities and university colleges  1994: from 98 to 26 university colleges, but ‘no new universities’  Late 1990s: Differences between universities and university colleges reduced step by step  University colleges: professor title, master and doctoral degrees

Recent changes in Norway’s HE system (2 )  2002: the Quality Reform, Bologna implementation combined with other measures  2005: new common legislative act for all HE institutions  More autonomy, choice between elected and appointed leadership on all levels  National QA agency (NOKUT) decides category of institutions  Two university colleges and one specialised university have become universities  January 2008: government commission report on future structure of the HE system

Consequences for public governance of HEIs  From detailed monitoring of input factors to monitoring of results  Reporting on a growing number of performance indicators causes frustration

Consequences for institutional strategies  Two main tendencies: 1) Market-orientated thinking has intensified competition  diversity 2) Performance-based budget model with common incentives  similarity

Consequences for institutional strategies (2)  Concern that the goal of university status will cause HEIs to become copies of each other  However this has not happened so far; the new universities are different  The education reforms have generated debate, especially on consequences for research  Most institutions continue to work within the binary model, but networks and co-operation  Present situation: institutional structure determined by HEIs, not the ministry

UHR: the HE sector’s organisation  Separate rectors’ conferences for universities from 1958 and university colleges from  2000: merged to form the Norwegian Association of HEIs (UHR)  UHR has earned respect and trust from within the HE sector and external actors

UHR: the HE sector’s organisation (2)  At least three reasons for this ‘success story’: 1) UHR has won support for its viewpoints on crucial issues, eg financing of Bologna implementation 2) UHR serves as a vital arena for academic development, co-operation and co-ordination 3) UHR offers services to the HEIs, eg leadership development  Membership is voluntary, but all accredited HEIs in Norway are today members of UHR  A key challenge for the future is to succeed as an interest organisation, eg on research funding