In conversation with: Professor Nic Beech on student drug use

In February, we announced new work on student drug use.

In partnership with Unite Students, Guild HE and Independent HE, we’ll set out a common approach to reduce harms from drug use and better tackle supply.

We sat down with Professor Nic Beech, Chair of our taskforce on student drug use and Vice-Chancellor of Middlesex University, to find out more about this upcoming work.

Q: Why set up the taskforce and why now?

A: Our ultimate goal as universities is to enable students to thrive and benefit from education.

We know drugs have serious consequences for students – for their ability to learn and their ability to participate in university life and benefit from it. It’s the case across the spectrum: whether students take drugs recreationally, as a form of self-help or self-medication, or become addicted.

Why now? Dame Carol Black’s work looking at the rise in drug use across the UK has shown that there’s a problem for people in the age range that most students fall into.

The Covid-19 pandemic has also clearly had an impact. We know from research by Student Minds that 52% of students feel isolated and 64% say their mental wellbeing has been affected by the pandemic.

These students haven’t had the same opportunities to socialise and learn to cope with social pressures, and have increased experiences of anxiety, stress and other mental health difficulties. That provides a dangerous context for greater drug use.

Q: The work will minimise harm by tackling supply, reducing demand and improving support. How can we balance these priorities?

A: We need to look at the connections between supply, demand and support.

Universities are about student success. We know that drugs work against this, harming students’ health, wellbeing, educational achievement, social achievement, and future careers.

Within universities, we need to have the right support for students and the right discipline where it’s needed, and work in partnership with others who can work to tackle this issue.

Q: How much do you feel that limited evidence around student drug use has prevented progress, and how will the work address this?

A: I think there have been two main limits to progress.

First, while there’s lots of evidence about drug use in the general population, there’s not so much evidence directly about students.

That relates to the second limitation: how can we learn from research to put the right policies into practice?

That’s why our work will look at what really makes a change for students in particular.

Q: How will you include students’ perspectives?

A: There’s a huge difference between research and policy development that’s about somebody and research that’s done with somebody, and we need to work with students.

We need to understand more about why students take drugs and the context that it happens in if we want to make change.

Our student panel on supply, demand and support includes a range of students on different courses, at different levels and from different backgrounds. Students are also central to our data gathering and analysis.

Students are at the heart of the whole project. The outcomes need to be meaningful to them – not just to vice-chancellors or our colleagues.

Q: Can you tell us more about the ‘collaborative’ approach to the work?

A: Lack of communication can be a real barrier to making progress.

This month, I spoke at the government’s National Drug Summit. I was delighted by the number of people who came up to me afterwards. People from the police, the criminal justice system, legal teams, health and charities, as well as researchers and students, were so engaged with the problem of student drug use and wanted to work with us.

It’s crucial that we collaborate with each other – so we can achieve together what we wouldn’t be able to achieve separately.

Q: What will be a successful outcome to the work?

A: The big answer to that is fewer students taking drugs, fewer students having harm from drugs, and consequently more students succeeding in education and their lives.

Specifically, we’re looking for a really clear set of practices that all universities can apply to reduce harm, tackle supply and improve support.

And importantly, we need a version of that which enables universities to work collaboratively with others to make change happen.

In episode 3 of our podcast, The future of higher education today, we speak to Professor Nic Beech alongside PhD student Hanna Head and Universities UK's John de Pury to ask: if current drugs policies aren't working, what would?