Leading Article: Listen to students

John Denham, the Universities Secretary, is right to ask the Quality Assurance Agency to respond quickly when standards in higher education are being questioned – as they were this summer. But we hope this isn't simply to shut up the critics and sweep criticism under the carpet. What matters is that students' concerns about the support they get from their tutors, and whether, for example, they are taught too much by postgraduates and not enough by experienced academics, are addressed.

Universities need to pay closer attention to the teaching that undergraduates receive, especially in the run-up to the review of the £3,000 fee cap.