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As is our custom, The É«ºÐÖ±²¥S has invited guests to contribute leaders for the next six weeks of summer. This year these will be open letters to the Dearing committee of inquiry into higher education. The series starts next week with a reading list for the committee suggested by David Packham, senior lecturer in the school of materials science at the University of Bath.

He will be followed by Robert Skidelsky, historian and chairman of the Social Market Foundation, Tony Wood, vice chancellor of Luton University, Colin Flint, principal of Solihull College of Technology, Patrick Coldstream, retired director of the Council for Industry and Higher Education, and, to give a students' view, Jamie Darwin, chair of the National Postgraduate Committee and Ghasan Karian, driving force behind the New Solutions student funding initiative. We hope readers will join in with their own Dear Ron letters.

The É«ºÐÖ±²¥S will also be running a competition to find a mission statement to supercede the four-point definition of the purposes of higher education set out by the Robbins Committee 30 years ago. Please do join in.