Using the Socratic Method to enhance student engagement and reduce the BME attainment gap

Teaching standards in UK higher education institutions are under unprecedented scrutiny. Following the Minister of State for Universities and Science's rather scathing observation at the UK Universities 2015 Annual Conference that the quality of University teaching is not only 'highly variable' but that 'there is lamentable teaching that must be driven out of our system', the government has pressed ahead with the introduction of a teaching excellence framework (TEF), currently outlined in the 2016 white paper 'Success as a Knowledge Economy: Teaching Excellence, Social Mobility and Student Choice.' Under this system Universities will be required to publish the gender, ethnicity and social backgrounds of their student intake, and will be assessed according to their institutional performance on student satisfaction, retention and graduate employment rates. Alongside this initiative, the Prime Minister has committed to 'increasing the number of BME students going into higher education by 20% by 2020?. However, to date, gentle taps at the door to the higher education sector, which have highlighted both the inequality of educational experience and the need for reform, have been largely ignored leading, ultimately, to the introduction of the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF). The authors suggest that the time has come for higher education institutions to fundamentally rethink the way in which curriculum delivery should take place for the benefit of all students. Consequently, the authors assert that the proper and effective implementation of the classical Socratic Method could provide a viable response to the TEF's call for reform