Describes the Education Reform Act of 1988 as the most important and far-reaching legislative initiative in England and Wales since 1944. Presents the Education Reform Act Research Network, a voluntary body set up to establish ways of helping academics investigating the act to learn more about one another's work as well as disseminate their…

Since the 1988 Education Reform Act, Gloucestershire College of Arts and Technology (Gloscat) in England has lost the bulk of its higher education provision and become a smaller, poorer, and largely vocational provider. This paper presents a case study of Gloscat's response to local changes and the need for competence-based curriculum. Reviews the…