Collaboration and equality of access will be key if universities are to ensure that all parts of society can benefit from their research, a conference heard.

Asked at the Times Higher Education Innovation & Impact Summit whether higher education institutions were a progressive force for all, Michael Crow, president of Arizona State University, answered: ¡°Unequivocally, no.¡±

¡°Our products have become so significantly powerful and so transformative at such a rapid rate of speed, that we¡¯re leaving behind a trail of those not benefiting from our discoveries, inventions and access to our educational opportunities,¡± he said. ?

In terms of research, Professor Crow implied that the HE sector was still too fragmented to make a concerted push on the issues that matter. He used as an example the global problem of climate change, which he said had ¡°shot past institutions¡±.

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¡°We¡¯re still fumbling around with hundreds of institutions and thousands of faculty where there is no cohesion,¡± he said. ¡°We can¡¯t continue to do that. We have to have egalitarian access and scale to have the outcomes, for global planetary and human health success.¡±

Dawn Freshwater, vice-chancellor of the University of Auckland, spoke more positively from the viewpoint of New Zealand, which has been a world leader in using evidence-based policy to tackle the Covid-19 pandemic.

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"We¡¯ve seen the rehabilitation of the value of the expert in the last 12 months,¡± she said. ¡°What it¡¯s done is help people understand the value of research universities.¡±

Lily Kong, president of Singapore Management University, said that institutions had to look beyond the research-related goals being pushed in Asia.

¡°The models for universities that are upheld are research-intensive universities,¡± she said, warning that certain types of research might be overlooked if they were not considered as worthy in the ¡°global currency of citations.¡±

¡°The kind of work that has local impact for Asian communities can be lost in the race for a certain kind of model for university,¡± she said.

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Professor Kong also emphasised the need for equal access to teaching and learning. ¡°In the Asian context of massification ¨C and a real desire to pivot to being research universities ¨C we run the risk of doing a disservice to the larger population by excluding students from certain opportunities.¡±

¡°How can universities enrich the lives of first-generation college-goers, or those in the workforce who need upskilling?¡± she asked.

Suzanne Fortier, vice-chancellor of McGill University, said that inequalities were evident both locally and globally.

¡°There¡¯s an upward trend in education across the world. But dig a little deeper, there are a lot of differences,¡± she said. ¡°Even in our communities and cities, you see differences in the ability of people to access education. People talk about education as a ladder for social mobility ¨C but you still need to get to that ladder.¡±

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Professor Fortier said that the question was not so much whether universities could change the world, but whether they could ¡°equip our students to change the world.¡±

To do so, ¡°we must protect our freedom of expression, so that these things can be debated in an open way. A lot of changes are achieved by people with different views.¡±

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Professor Freshwater added that there must be ¡°no boundaries on imagination, curiosity, and the amusement and revelry we expect from our students and institutions.¡±

joyce.lau@timeshighereducation.com?