Uni and foreign students would you say anything?

[thebraispink]

My DD is at uni doing a creative subject and basically she is having to help and support all of the foreign students with their work.

The uni have taken on so so many students who don't speak English over 60% of her course and put no translators in place, so my DD is having to help explain everything to those poor students who have broken English at best.

The uni has literally just taken all the money, it's making my DD course really dumbed down and keeping her back, it's not great for the foreign students as they are pretty out of their depth and miserable.

From my stance we are paying a shit ton for this course, and its teaching is poor and the overall experience is a bit shit.

All of these students will leave after 3 years, and take this education to their countries which is great but it leaves the UK students with a sub standard experience and shitty degree.

Should there be a limits on how many students can be from overseas? Should the uni have to provide interpreters? Is anyone else's kids in the same situation?

We are considering moving her from the uni on these grounds as she spends more time helping her peers than she does being taught.

@thebraispink What you are saying is what I live through every day in my work.

Students from abroad are meant to get a high IELTS score. We have a code to check that it was the student who did the exam, with a photo and everything. Even with this, there is no way some of the students have achieved this.

We can say nothing as we are ignored, or worse made out to be unreasonable. Universities have sold themselves to the higher fees. It has made me question what I will suggest to my children when or if they want to go to uni.

Universities are big business.

I don't have it. She scrolled on her phone and showed me over coffee as I actually doubted her slightly dramatic "60% of my class are Chinese of which the vast majority can't speak basic English."

I won't need to share this register either as it will be my DD who will be asking on Monday to only be grouped with students with a level of English that is sufficient for the course they have been accepted on.

She is really well armed with what needs to be done here massive thanks to all whohave highlighted the fact some have even cheated their way to this course (potentially) something I wasn't even aware of.

So annoying for you too.

Im starting to wonder if she shouldn't bother but unfortunately she needs a degree in this industry to be taken seriously.

@Cantstopeatingcakea "It has made me question what I will suggest to my children when or if they want to go to uni."

It needs to be spoken about openly because it does impact greatly on the university experience and also on the education received.

In our case DS is looking at Glasgow which doesn't have the same issue as I guess it's not seen as a desirable location for an overseas student in the same way that say Edinburgh and London might be. So I guess the trick is picking a uni in a less picturesque location or perhaps less obvious, that still has a good reputation for the course the student wants to do.

Whether it is 0.6%, 6% or 60%, I think you should say something. For the sake of the students not just your DD.

Yes, exactly my DH's experience (uni lecturer of 27 years).

Of course she does, it’s probably called differently but the essence is the same - list of students in her group. My DD has it on her college Teams for each subject.
OP didn’t claim that she’s got a list of names for the whole uni.
But the whole uni list actually doesn’t matter. OP’s daughter attend lectures in a particular group and paired to work on projects with people from a particular group. She claims that a lot of students in her particular group have poor language skills and need help which is expected to be provided by her. She also claims that it affects lectures as lecturers have to do a lot of repeating/ additional explaining. If it’s not someone’s else experience it’s neither here nor there. It’s her experience. And it does happens in real life.
A lot of PPs have explained that the financial situation at universities is dire and one of the ways to get extra money is through overseas students, not all of them have good language skills unfortunately.

Yeah I know @pizzaHeart (nice username 😁)

@mathanxiety

Your comments about GDPR are absolute nonsense.

It would only be a breach of GDPR for an university employee to circulate a list of students and their email addresses to someone not affiliated with the university and/or with no legitimate reason to need the information, without the permission of the students involved.

For a student attending the university to have access to the names and contact details of her coursemates is of course not a breach of GDPR. Most courses now use shared platforms such as Google Classroom where contact details are visible to all users as a matter of course. Students are required to communicate with each other and collaborate on projects as part of courses and so having access to contact details is essential and students must consent to this when enrolling. Neither is it a breach of GDPR for a student to share the names of her classmates in conversation with her mother, for heaven’s sake! If this were the case, anyone mentioning the name of someone they worked or studied with to someone outside of the organisation would apparently be committing a GDPR breach - everyday conversations would suddenly become illegal, according to you!

You really need to read up on GDPR legislation before attempting to pass yourself off as someone with expertise in the area.

I'd actually heard that Glasgow has been quite proactive in attracting international students and as a result there was a huge crisis in student accommodation last year.
Dh is from a Middle Eastern country and a lot of the children of his friends and relatives have gone to UK universities. I'm shocked at how many not very bright people have managed to get into top universities like Durham and Exeter. Last month, a friend's ds received an unconditional offer for Nottingham Trent. How is this possible when the deadline for UK students is in January? It doesn't seem like a level playing field.

To get a visa they need have passed a certain level of English certification. It's more likely they are struggling with the language of the course than English more generally

The necessary IELTS qualifications are very robust- most university students in the UK have very good English.

Also, your daughter is now an adult. She might need to learn how to say "no" to helping others before she's done her own work.

Tuition fees from Uk students have massively fallen behind inflation. Of course unis are taking on international students. You can complain all you want but 1. It will change nothing, and 2. Your daughter is an adult - she needs to sort her own problems out

@EnidSpyton
Of course mentioning a few names in conversation is not a breach of GDPR, but that is not what has happened here as far as I can see.

Sharing a comprehensive list with someone who is neither a student, a teacher, nor an administrator is something I would absolutely keep under my hat. The OP should not refer to the class list in her communication with the university if she decides to convey her concerns.

@CeilingWacks
The language exam is only as robust as the measures in place to ensure it is not taken by paid proxies.

This is group work and it seems like DD has been told she needs to help others with their comprehension of the topic. How is she supposed to just get on with her own work when it's a group grade ?

Oh. Graded group work at degree level seems inherently flawed to me, language barriers or not.

I’m currently studying a conversion MA after a career in academia within a different discipline and I can’t say I recognise the experiences on this thread. On my current course I’d say 60% of the students are international with the majority being Chinese. While they have spoken English language skills to varying degrees, they are all highly proficient at reading and writing in English, to a far better standard than many posts I read here on mumsnet. Speaking a foreign language in the real world is so very different to passing an exam in the same language. There are regional accents and dialects to come to terms with and that can be very hard.

I've loved my two months so far of learning different things about our chosen topic from the international students. That element of the course alone has been invaluable. The majority of Chinese students have this amazing translator on their iPads which helps with lectures and conversations and gives them a degree of confidence that they wouldn’t necessarily have if they were processing the language fully themselves. I’d be surprised if they were spending the tens of thousands in fees alone to come here and then not make use of these transltion tools for when they’re struggling.

I feel there’s something disingenuous about this post

You're the one who needs to read up on GDPR I fear. Either that you or need to reread the comments you're referencing. No one is suggesting that the OP's DD having access to a list of her classmates' names is a GDPR breach. It's showing the list to her mum that is the breach.

Glad to know she will be tackling it and that the list was not sent to you. Please warn her about sharing it with non university parties.

It might be worth her while to ask for "clarification" of the role she is expected to play in group projects where she is the only native speaker of English, give her account of students she works with requiring translation and repetition of instructions and elements of the course already covered in lectures, as well as refusal on the part of some students to participate fully, if that has been a problem in her groups (no need to name students) all of which have an impact on her time and the final product.

Do her group projects require a single end product with no clear way to distinguish the contributions of each group member? Or is each student's contribution easy to isolate and mark?

Could we please drop the GDPR point? It’s adding sweet FA to the discussion.

@Eternalstudentbum you are having one experience, on one kind of course, (which is an MA Vs an undergrad, so possibly higher entry requirements anyway). Someone else can have a different experience without them being a liar (as we all know what you mean by disingenuous.)

But surely you could say the same about any overseas qualification of any sort? I did a maths degree, and the vast majority of overseas students had very strong maths, but there were a couple who had either cheated their grades, or their level education just wasn't quite the same - the university just took their money and let them fail! (we were never graded on group work)

@ludocris showing a list of your classmates on a university course to a friend or family member is not a GDPR breach for heavens’ sake.

Please read up on GDPR legislation before making such ludicrous claims.

Sorry it came across as if it was you who didn’t understand .

No worrie @pizzaHeart