Published: 21/02/2002, Volume II2, No. 5792 Page 9 11
What will the NHS University look like?
What will it do? These questions have dogged the NHSU since health secretary Alan Milburn announced the idea.
In their most damaging form, they surfaced as a turf war between the government and established universities.
Newspaper leaks of the NHSU prospectus triggered warnings from bodies representing senior academic staff that the NHSU could duplicate existing courses, undermine existing relationships and cost a good deal more.
A considerable amount of horse-trading has obviously taken place since then.
When Bob Fryer was announced as chief executive designate of the NHSU in early December, a memorandum of understanding between the government and Universities UK was also unveiled. This says that all degree-level courses for doctors, nurses and dentists will remain with the universities and will not be offered by NHSU.
Professor Fryer - who formally took over the NHSU on 1 February and was, when interviewed, its sole employee - is mildly uncomfortable with the term 'horse-trading'.
'It was all going on before I was appointed, but I know what you are getting at, ' he says. 'There was a lot of concern that the NHSU would seek to usurp the role of other universities in preregistration degrees, and I think that was unfortunate.
'It would never have the capacity to do that, and if it did, why fix something that ain't broke? There are many other things for it to do.'
In fact, the prospectus suggests that the NHSU is going to be much more like a corporate university than a traditional, academic one. It says everyone in the NHS will start their career with induction courses covering 'core responsibilities, behaviours and values'.
Other 'development areas' boil down to courses on implementing government policy, courses on behaving decently to patients, basic skills and IT.
Corporate universities are a very American idea. Walt Disney established the first, soon after Disneyland opened. All 'cast members' receive a one-and-a-half day induction programme called 'Traditions'. They can also take a wide range of courses or attend college at Disney's expense.
The idea has spread slowly to Europe as companies have become more interested in defining their core values and communicating these to employees, while presenting themselves as good employers.
Professor Fryer says the corporate university model is 'a good one'. Though they are now very diverse, he says corporate universities have helped make learning a 'core principle' of their organisations and been 'valuable' in promoting core aims - both things the NHS can learn from.
Some have also helped to develop specific skills - an idea picked up in the NHS skills escalator. And some - those linked to cutting edge technology firms - have done impressive work in professional development, often in tandem with the traditional university sector.
But Professor Fryer would like to 'blaze a few trails' as well. 'I do not want to get away from the idea of the corporate university, but I want to build on it, ' he says. Indeed, he would like the NHSU to 'enrich and enlarge our conception of what constitutes learning in this country'.
Britain, he says, tends to think of education and training as 'coming to terms with a body of knowledge' and then being tested on it. As a country, it has tended to ignore the 'tacit learning' that people do all the time.
Professor Fryer would like the NHSU to help people recognise this tacit learning and build on it - for example, by providing them with 'small chunks of learning appropriate to their needs at the moment'.
Linked to this, he would like to get away from the idea there is a necessary gap between further and higher education - and, indeed, that all education is 'onwards and upwards'.
Even people with PhDs, he points out, will have areas in which their knowledge is at higher education level, at best.
The NHSU should be able to offer courses - in teamwork, management, IT etc - that fill these gaps.
Given Professor Fryer's interest in and influence on government employment policy (see box), it is not surprising that he would also like the NHSU to bring new people into education and work altogether.
'I would like to work back into schools to help them channel ambition, so that more young people see education as continuing beyond school and into the NHS, ' he says.
'In fact, I would like people who do not want to stay in full-time education to come into the NHS and develop their careers through workbased models.
'I think this is very, very exciting because there are many, many young people whose talents are never realised by themselves, much less by the wider society.'
But how is this going to be done? Universities have been pacified over pre-registration degrees, but the NHSU has other relationships to negotiate.
It has to decide how it will fit with similar organisations, such as the Open University and UfI Ltd, for example.
One of the thornier areas may be NHS management training. In November, the government issued a lifelong learning strategy for the NHS.
The section on the NHSU deals with management training - an overhaul of the management training scheme, plus new programmes for chief executives and others are promised. This suggests that the Leadership Centre has had some turf battles of its own to fight. Asking how the NHSU and the Leadership Centre will fit together provokes Professor Fryer to wry amusement.
'That is a very good question, ' he says, indicating that the NHSU will expect to work 'very closely' with the centre as it develops.
The government is a great enthusiast for e-learning.
Professor Fryer is more realistic. E-learning has a place, he says, but it can only work as part of a package of learning methods.
The learning materials must be 'very good', the technology 'utterly reliable' and the learning support 'excellent' if students are not to receive a 'disappointing experience'.
Professor Fryer hopes to be doing 'tasters and trails' later this year. He is 'fully committed' to launching the NHSU next year - probably in the autumn.
But it will not launch as a university. There are many hurdles ahead of the new institution being given a royal charter - and Professor Fryer supports this. 'You must not devalue the name 'university', ' he says.
On the other hand, if scepticism about the NHSU can be overcome, there is a demand for what it offers and quality can be demonstrated, he believes it could gain its royal charter in just four or five years.
'It can keep you awake at night worrying about how to do this or that, ' he admits.
'But the sheer excitement of setting this up can do that as well.'
Bob Fryer CV
Bob Fryer went to Oxford High School for Boys, but did his undergraduate degree at Cambridge University. He returned to Oxford to do a postgraduate diploma and became involved with trade unionism through his brother, a shop steward at the Cowley car works. He later worked for NUPE and was senior academic adviser for the formation of Unison.
He held a number of academic posts in Oxford, London, Manchester and Warwick, where he was head of sociology, and undertook academic research in employment, trade unions and union structure and policy. This 'led naturally' to working in adult education - for 15 years, from 1983 to 1998, he was principal of the Northern College for adult residential education.
He joined Southampton University as assistant vice-chancellor and director of its New College three years ago, developing its strategy on lifelong learning and widening access.
He has also been involved with a number of key government initiatives. In 1997, he was asked by then education secretary David Blunkett to chair the government's national advisory committee on continuing education and lifelong learning. He was also on the 'skills' policy action team set up by the Social Exclusion Unit that led to the establishment of neighbourhood centres for IT in deprived areas.
He was very involved with the formation of UfI Ltd - originally the University for Industry - and is still a non-executive director. He is also a member of the national learning skills council and a board member for several educational charities and trusts.
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