For this episode, we talk to British social artist, designer and researcher Helen Storey about a career that has taken her from runways to scientific collaborations to refugee camps in the Middle East and Africa.

Storey is a professor of fashion and science at the London College of Fashion in the Centre for Sustainable Fashion at the University of the Arts London (UAL). In May, she donated her 30-year Helen Storey Foundation Archive of about 2,000 digital and physical pieces to UAL. In this interview, she details her journey – how she transitioned from award-winning commercial fashion designer to working with scientists on projects that, among other explorations, translate the first 1,000 hours of human life into textiles – and how she hopes the archive will benefit students.

Storey, who was awarded an MBE for Services to Arts in 2009, also shares insights from her humanitarian work, from creating Dress 4 our Time to becoming the UNHCR’s first designer-in-residence, and how these experiences are now intertwined with her work at UAL.

The conversation covers what the arts and science bring to each other, the value of the tactile, and how art can be a conduit for people to connect with overwhelming issues such as climate change, plastic pollution and global displacement.

For more insight into the global higher education sector, visit Campus. 

Indigenous knowledge has historically been marginalised or actively excluded from higher education. However, universities around the world are now recognising that First Nations’ wisdom and culture can enrich education and are giving these communities a greater voice. Of course, with deep-rooted issues such as decolonisation and lack of parity to be addressed, there’s still a way to go.

In this episode, Indigenous university leaders – in Canada and New Zealand – explain how their institutions support First Nations’ participation in higher education. First, we talk to Angie Bruce, a Red River Métis woman who is vice-president (Indigenous) at the University of Manitoba. Prior to taking up her post, Angie had extensive experience working with First Nations, Inuit and Métis people in public sector organisations. She discusses the historical and systemic barriers to Indigenous involvement in Canadian higher education and what institutions can do to break these down.

We also meet Te Kawehau Hoskins, who is pro vice-chancellor (Māori) at the University of Auckland in New Zealand. A professor in Māori and Indigenous education and philosophy, her research interests are Indigenous Māori political philosophy and practice, Indigenous–settler relations and Treaty practice. She tells us about her journey into higher education and how spaces on campus allow First Nations and non-Indigenous students and faculty to come together in a meaningful way. 

For more advice on how to amplify Indigenous voices in higher education, visit Campus. 

Learn from the winners in three very different THE Award categories how they developed the strategies and projects that saw them take home a trophy in 2023 – and how these have evolved in the 12 months since.

We speak to:

With world leaders gathered in Azerbaijan for the COP29 climate change summit, this week’s podcast focuses on universities’ role in advancing sustainability and reducing carbon emissions.

As centres of teaching, research and innovation, universities are uniquely positioned to educate on environmentally aware leaders and help find ways out of this crisis.

We spoke to two academic experts in this space to find out how they and their institutions are driving action on climate change.

Tripp Shealy is associate professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Virginia Tech. His research looks at how climate and environmental issues are handled in land development and construction.

Liz Price is deputy pro-vice chancellor for sustainability at Manchester Metropolitan University and a professor of environmental education. She is responsible for driving sustainability across education, research and partnerships and developing Education for Sustainable Development, Carbon Literacy and Net Zero skills at the university.

For more inspiration and advice on how to advance efforts on climate change within your own inspiration, take a look at our latest spotlight guide: A greener future for higher education.

Universities are public service organisations, educating and researching for the broader societal good. Yet in many countries, the UK and Australia among them, public funding for these institutions has been stripped back forcing them to take a more strategic, commercial approach to generate the income needed to support their work.

How can institutions balance social responsibilities against the need to maintain sound finances? How can they improve the quality of teaching and research while driving efficiency and streamlining spending? And how can they remain competitive in an ever-changing global higher education sector?

We spoke to two vice-chancellors about how they navigate these challenges.

Alex Zelinsky has been vice-chancellor of the University of Newcastle, Australia, since 2018. He a computer scientist and systems engineer by background who has previously worked in government as Australia’s Chief Defence Scientist.

Anton Muscatelli has been principal and vice-chancellor of the University of Glasgow since 2009. He will be retiring next year after leading the university through a period of impressive growth. An economist, Anton was chair of the First Minister’s Standing Council on Europe and a member of the Scottish Government’s Council of Economic Advisers until 2021. He has been a special adviser to the House of Commons Treasury Select Committee on fiscal and monetary policy, and has advised the European Commission and the World Bank.

For students to thrive within a higher education setting, they need to feel safe and supported. Universities’ duty of care extends from making students feel welcome and valued to protecting them from serious harm.

On this week’s Campus podcast, we discuss the full spectrum of student safeguarding and support.

Rachel Fenton, a professor in law at the University of Exeter and one of the UK’s leading academic experts in sexual violence and bystander intervention outlines the scale of the problem in UK universities and explains what can be done to tackle sexual misconduct in all its forms.

Catherine Moran, deputy vice-chancellor, academic, at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch, New Zealand, discusses how her institution approaches student support, harnessing data and tech tools alongside human connection to ensure all students get the reassurance or help they need to succeed in their studies.

For more advice and insight specific to university safeguarding, head to our latest spotlight collection, made up of resources contributed by higher education professionals from all over the world: Duty of care: making university safe for all

What underpins effective research, knowledge generation and innovation? In this podcast, we hear a world-leading biomedical scientist discuss what constitutes effective knowledge exchange and supports translational research that can, ultimately, result in innovations that change the world for the better. Plus, a data scientist outlines the opportunities and risks associated with the proliferation in, but also greater regulation of, online data and what this could mean for future research.

Chas Bountra is pro-vice chancellor for innovation of the University of Oxford – we spoke just a week before the University of Oxford was named as the world’s leading university in Times Higher Education World University Rankings, for the ninth year in a row. The university claimed the top spot once more, based on its increased income from industry, the number of patents citing its research and its teaching scores.

Chas is also a professor of translational medicine and head of impact and innovation in the Nuffield Department of Clinical Medicine. He is a director at Oxford University Innovations and has previously worked in industry as vice president and head of biology at GlaxoSmithKline and was the director of the Structural Genomics Consortium Oxford from 2008 to 2020.

Sara de Freitas is an an author, educator and researcher with extensive expertise in data science and digital technologies. She is honorary research fellow at Birkbeck, University of London and a visiting professor at the Open University and the University of South Wales.

For this episode of the Campus podcast, we talk to Eunice Simmons, who has been vice-chancellor of the University of Chester since 2020, about what works when it comes to widening participation in higher education and how to ensure students are successful in their studies and beyond. She describes how initiatives such as Citizen Student and the Race Equality Challenge Group embed the values of social capital, civic engagement and equity across the institution, and link academic learning to the real world. Her work towards widening participation, which resulted in a joint win as 2023 University Leader of the Year in the Purpose Coalition awards, includes being chair of the board of trustees of Transforming Access and Student Outcomes in Higher Education (TASO).

An environmental scientist by training, she also discusses how post-Covid changes to work patterns led to a rethinking of university spaces to boost sustainability and cost efficiency.

Effective teaching sits at the heart of higher education’s mission to advance learning and discovery. But what are the key components which make up top quality instruction? And how can these be achieved in different and often fast evolving educational contexts?

It is this latter question which makes defining good teaching so difficult. So, for this week’s podcast we spoke to two academics who have taught and researched teaching in widely varied settings to dig into the nuances of this most admirable of skills.

Leon Tikly is a professor and global chair in education at the University of Bristol, UNESCO chair in inclusive, good quality education and co-director of the Centre for International and Comparative Education in the School of Education.

Jason Lodge is associate professor of educational psychology and director of the learning, instruction and technology lab in the University of Queensland’s School of Education. He is an expert advisor to the OECD and Australian National Task Force on AI in Education.

What is an intelligent campus? How is technology blurring, or extending, the borders of the modern university? And how do you build belonging when your students could be spread across the globe?

In this episode of the Campus podcast, we talk to two experts from leading US institutions – who were both speakers at Times Higher Education’s Digital Universities US 2024 event – about how technology is redefining the university experience.

Steve Harmon is executive director of the Center for 21st Century Universities at Georgia Tech as well as associate dean of research in professional education and a professor in the School of Industrial Design. He explains how his university has created “co-learning” spaces where students can gather and interact while benefitting from the flexibility of hybrid learning, and how technology from VR to YouTube supports the “learning to learn” skills that underpin higher education.

Lev Gonick is the enterprise chief information officer at Arizona State University and chair of the Sun Corridor Network, Arizona’s research and education network. He talks about the digital infrastructure required to support inclusive digital education at scale, looking to Hollywood-style immersive storytelling to teach STEM, and why it’s vital to align digital goals with the institution’s overall mission.