RSC Response to the Scottish government consultation on the Future of Higher Education

The RSC recently responded to a Scottish government consultation: "Building a Smarter Future: Towards a Sustainable Scottish Solution for the Future of Higher Education".

The key issues raised in the response were:

• Greater support for STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths) subjects in Higher Education must be provided to generate a steady supply of talented, highly-skilled individuals.

• These STEM graduates will become the next generation of scientists and engineers, as well as being members of a wider, more scientifically literate workforce. 

• Investing in the chemical sciences over the next 15 years will enable Scotland to tackle issues specific to its economy 

• The Scottish university system must allow access to a range of courses with valued learning outputs, which should include flexible, part-time and work-based learning  

• Access to the study of chemistry and chemical science based courses should be irrespective of the ability to pay 

• Collaboration between the universities involved in the ScotCHEM partnership demonstrates the advantages of a pooled approach, with greater access to resources and high quality research