Collaboration between public and private universities - what are the benefits?

CER Report

History shows that in respect of most private-sector tertiary institutions not controlled by the state or quasi-state organizations, collaboration with public sector counterparts tends to be isolated to particular cases and has not usually resulted in longer-term relationships.

At first sight, there appears to be much to be gained from collaboration as far as research and scholarship is concerned. Most private-sector institutions are deliberately excluded when it comes to the dissemination of what is often pioneering research conducted under their auspices or submitted by independent scholars for the purpose of assessment for an award. Learned journals are restricted to those associated with publically-funded institutions regardless of the merits of work conducted outside the academy, and that this discrimination is effectively justified on the basis of a cartel of vested interests rather than on genuinely scholarly grounds. This means that the academy loses out on the potential for genuinely innovative and unconventional approaches which are all the more at the heart of intellectual inquiry for their rejection of the mainstream.

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