POSTGRADUATE RESEARCH IN ARTS AND SOCIAL SCIENCES
Convenor, SCASS Steering Committee
On behalf of the SCASS Steering Committee, may I welcome representatives to our annual Public Conference, which this year is on the theme of postgraduate research: a subject on which our organisation has lobbied long and hard in recent years with Funding Councils, Ministers and Opposition Spokesmen. May I welcome too our first Keynote Speaker, Professor Martin Harris, author of the recently issued HEFCE/CVCP/SCOP Review of Postgraduate Education, who is no stranger to SCASS meetings and needs no formal introduction. All of us present know of and are grateful for the sterling work he has done in his various capacities over the last fifteen years of change in higher education, trying to make sense of current policies. I cannot, I am afraid, welcome our second speaker, Professor John Westergaard, with whom the sector is equally familiar, who was taken ill a few days ago and is now recovering — I am glad to say speedily — in hospital. We send him our very best wishes. John has, however, with his characteristic commitment to maintaining the debate, supplied me with his impeccably handwritten analysis to read to you; and Dr Sara Delamont, Deputy Convenor, who was active in the drafting of both ALSISS and SCASS responses to the Harris Report, will join us on the platform to help answer questions during discussion.