What is education? Guest lecture 7

Today we had a lecture on collaboration vs. competition in education from Olvive Hopker who is head of planning and development in our university. She talked to us about why the governbment is pushing for more collaberation of education settings. It covers:

• Higher education
• Local education authorities
• Further education/ 6th forms
• Schools

She also spoke to us about current collaboration happening in universities:

• External examinar
• Validation panel membership
• Research projects
• Library access
• Purchasing
• ICT
• Academic development
• Quality and standards assurance

She then moved onto the benefits of collaboration:

• Shared experise and knowledge
• Greater efficiency
• Cost saving
• Greater effectiveness
• Enhance reputation
• Value of 'external eye'
• Collaboration groupings flexible

And the benefits of competition:

• Promotes efforts to do better
• Provides choice of alternative products/services

She also moved on to speak about the benefits of small and large universities and they change with collaboration.
I found this lecture useful as I didn't know much about collaboration of education settings and what it means. However there wasn't much discussion and it was hard to take in.