The Office for Students (OfS) regulates higher education in England. It ensures that having committed time, effort and money to attend university, students can have a fulfilling experience during their studies. It requires registered universities to ensure students’ courses equip them with skills for work or further study, to improve equality of opportunity for disadvantaged students and to demonstrate they are well-managed and financially sustainable. Currently over 400 higher education providers are registered under its regulatory framework. The Office for Students disburses public funding to registered providers (e.g. to deliver high-cost courses like medicine or to support particular policy areas and government priorities such as equality of opportunity). It is OfS that gives providers the power to award degrees. It also does outreach work to students such as through representative boards or the annual National Student Survey to make students’ voices heard in decision-making. It was established in the Higher Education and Research Act 2017. This statute sets out its general duties as well as the procedure to become registered by the OfS. It is sponsored by the Department for Education (DfE). When performing its various regulatory duties, it must, among other things, have particular regard to protecting freedom of speech in higher education and the need to protect institutional autonomy of higher education establishments.
