Nick Hillman

Hillman studied as an undergraduate at the University of Manchester.^[2] He taught English at the University of Bucharest in Romania in 1992, then gained a PGCE in history at Christ's College, Cambridge^[3] before teaching history at St Paul's School, London from 1995 to 1998.^[4] He received a master's degree in contemporary British history at Queen Mary University of London.^[5]

Hillman worked for Conservative MP David Willetts, first as a Senior Research Officer from 2000 to 2003.^[4] Hillman stood for the Conservatives in the 2002 local elections in Hammersmith Broadway Ward, coming sixth in a three-seat election with 528 votes.^[6]

He worked on pensions policy for the Association of British Insurers from 2003 to 2007, before returning to politics.^[4] From 2007 to 2010, Hillman served as Willetts' chief of staff.^[2] He was the Conservative parliamentary candidate for Cambridge in 2010, selected from six candidates in an open primary in December 2009 after Richard Normington stepped down as candidate.^[7][8][9] A fundraising dinner was supported by Clarissa Dickson-Wright.^[10] He represented himself as a "liberal Tory", but The Independent reported he was "not getting much help from the party's big guns".^[11] Hillman came second behind the Liberal Democrat Julian Huppert with 12,829 votes.^[12]

From 2010 to 2013 he was a special adviser in the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills when Willets was Science Minister. As a special adviser Hillman helped introduce higher university tuition fees.^[13][14]

Since January 2014 he has been the director of a think tank, the Higher Education Policy Institute in Oxford.^[13][2] Since 2016 he has been on the board of governors of his alma mater, the University of Manchester,^[15] and he became a fellow of another alma mater, Queen Mary University of London, in 2016.^[16] From 2015 to 2018 he was a school governor at Haddenham St Mary's.^[17] He has been a trustee of the National Foundation for Educational Research since April 2018^[4][18] and he is a member of the Higher Education Policy Development Group at the British Academy.^[19] He was previously a research fellow with Policy Exchange.^[20]

Hillman grew up in Banbury. He met his wife while they were undergraduates^[20] and they married in Cambridge.^[21] While a teacher in London he lived in Covent Garden.^[20] They have children^[2] and live in Haddenham, Buckingham.^[22][23]

• Adam Bogdanor, David Willetts MP, Nicholas Hillman, Left Out, Left Behind. Policy Exchange, 2003
• David Willetts and Nicholas Hillman, Tax Credits: Do They Add Up? Politeia, 2002
• Nicholas Hillman; Edited by Dr Oliver Marc Hartwich, Quelling the Pensions Storm: Lessons from the past, March 20, 2008
• The Guardian columnist
• Nicholas Hillman, "Public schools and the Fleming report of 1944: shunting the first-class carriage on to an immense siding?." History of Education 41#2 (2012): 235–255.
• Hillman, Nicholas (1 December 2010). "The Public Schools Commission: 'Impractical, Expensive and Harmful to Children'?". Contemporary British History. 24 (4): 511–531. doi:10.1080/13619462.2010.518413. ISSN 1361-9462. S2CID 154446106.
• Hillman, Nicholas (February 2008). "A 'chorus of execration'? Enoch Powell's 'rivers of blood' forty years on". Patterns of Prejudice. 42 (1): 83–104. doi:10.1080/00313220701805927. S2CID 143681971.
• Hillman, Nicholas (2013). "From Grants for All to Loans for All: Undergraduate Finance from the Implementation of the Anderson Report (1962) to the Implementation of the Browne Report (2012)". Contemporary British History. 27 (3): 249–270. doi:10.1080/13619462.2013.783418. S2CID 154321565.
• Hillman, Nicholas (2016). "The Coalition's higher education reforms in England". Oxford Review of Education. 42 (3): 330–345. doi:10.1080/03054985.2016.1184870.
• Hillman, Nicholas (2001). "'Tell me chum, in case I got it wrong. What was it we were fighting during the war?' The Re-emergence of British Fascism, 1945-58". Contemporary British History. 15 (4): 1–34. doi:10.1080/713999428. S2CID 143994809.

• HEPI profile
• 2010 election page (archived version)