New monograph published on realising the educational potential of mass higher education

A new monograph, Realising the Educational Potential of Mass Higher Education, has been published, based on a seven-year international longitudinal research project that followed undergraduate students in chemistry and chemical engineering in England, South Africa, and the United States, through their degrees and for up to four years after graduation.

The study forms a major part of the Centre for Global Higher Education’s (CGHE) research programme on the purposes and value of higher education.

The monograph challenges dominant policy narratives that frame higher education primarily in terms of graduate salaries and employability. Instead, it argues that higher education’s educational potential lies in how engagement with structured bodies of knowledge transforms students’ understanding of the world and expands what they can do within it.

The book also shows how this understanding can be used to counter the growing disillusionment with mass higher education evident in many countries.

The international author team comprises of Paul Ashwin, Mags Blackie, Jenni Case, Jan McArthur, Nicole Pitterson, Reneé Smit, Ashish Agrawal, Kayleigh Rosewell, Alaa Abdalla and Benjamin Goldschneider.

Professor of Higher Education Paul Ashwin said: “This book represents the outcomes of over seven years of work in a fantastic international research team, which was only possible because of the many forms of support that CGHE provided. We were also incredibly fortunate that the students/graduates and academic staff participants were so generous in engaging in the study.

“We hope we have done justice to this support and engagement by showing ways in which undergraduate education takes students inside structured bodies of knowledge and how this transforms what they can do in the world as graduates.”

The monograph is available to download here.