AIBU to think that for £3,000 per term...

[OneHandFlapping]

DS should get more than 40 hours of lectures and 24 hours of tutorials at university?

If he went to a private school, he would get 25 hours of lessons a week for a similar sum.

Why exactly are we now paying unis such massive tuition fees? I imagine they make a profit on students now, which seems wrong.

And if they don't view the online tools as a substitute for attendance, which many do!

God, the time I send emailing and responding to emails and organising and giving tutorials and marking and planning... Out of all proportion to the two hours I might spend with a group in a week!

About time in lectures:
It has been shown that students don't learn the most from lectures.
Lectures are useful for guidance and inspiration, mainly.
Learning is better accomplished in small groups or individual work.
Just as long as the students are asked to do course work, it should be fine.

Quite a lot of work goes on preparing course work, and marking (even if electronically). This is often not acknowledged.

Distance learning is also much harder to prepare than face to face.

A very good way to learn is also through self and peer assessment. At least for formative assessments.

And good to cut costs, supposedly, but, from experience, it also requires quite a lot of work from tutors/teachers to ensure quality.

One university I worked at was establishing a satellite campus with mixed modes of delivery -- distance learning plus face to face. I was involved in a high-level pilot group for the humanities portion of the one mixed Liberal Arts degree the University was proposing. It was aimed at a regional area of socio-economic disadvantage and at mature age students. (This was not in the UK, but in a university system based on UK systems).

What became absolutely clear was that, in order to offer the same quality as on our main campus (at a University which was then and still is in the top ten of the country), was going to take MORE resource in staff time and facilities than on our main campus.

Good high quality on-line learning of the equivalent to a "top ten" university is not cheap. Nor should it be.

I come from three generations of Oxbridge graduates, and I passionately I work at a Russell Group university, but I believe passionately (and to the detriment of my family life ask them!) that education for all should be high quality. And especially so for those who are not from the kind of traditional university-going sort of family that mine is. That means it has to be paid for. It costs the whole experience costs. And it should cost. These are our children -- aren't they worth investing in?

Now, how it's paid for is a political question. But stop trying to blame the universities and their staff. I have friends and family who work in the private sector and the waste and excess I see there could run my Department, easily.

TheCollieDog, I could not agree more. I have also been involved in creation of of distance learning courses and can say that high quality distance learning is an expensive and time-consuming exercise. Any institution that claims that distance learning is a way to deliver the same quality learning as on campus but with much lower costs is deluding itself.

I really wonder how we got to the stage where we regard the universities as the source of financial problems and not how politicians (or we as citizens) decide to spend out money. It is also interesting how education is regarded as something that only benefits the graduate and only in financial ways and not as a cornerstone of society.

" But stop trying to blame the universities and their staff. I have friends and family who work in the private sector and the waste and excess I see there could run my Department, easily."

so, if a university blows the budget on a flashy project, and cans three important subjects, i should blame the private sector??

High quality education will never be cheap. As well as money there is a finite number of high quality academics. A university education where you get to mix with the greatest experts on earth in your field is well worth 9K a year of fees. However not all universities are equal.

There are now a vast array of course providers. You can even do a degree at our local sixth form college. I am sceptical how a college of further education can provide world class teaching. Are better attending a glorified sixth form college with limited resources or doing an OU course?

"Now, how it's paid for is a political question. But stop trying to blame the universities and their staff. I have friends and family who work in the private sector and the waste and excess I see there could run my Department, easily. "

Not about blaming the universities or staff, but asking the greatest minds on earth to solve a real practical world wide problem. If we have a population of 7 billion and if 1 million of those people are capable of a university education, how do we as a planet afford it. (Especially when we don't even have world wide primary education for every person on the planet)

If we want to stop war and destruction then we need to think about everyone on the planet and not just the UK. If we want world peace then we need to have world wide eduation. We need to think how troubled counties like Aghansistan and Iraq can have enough doctors, plumbers, etc to meet their needs. (Ok, I think its a sad day when you need a degree to be a plumber.)

At the moment there is simply not enough academics on earth to educate everyone who is capable and willing to degree level.

hmm colliedog on one level I agree with you but I work in education where it is common place to shortlist 14 applicants for two low graded suspport jobs and have a panel of three to interview; where it is common place to implement state of the art photocopiers so costs can be monitored - for the paper and the ink and the number of copies but which discounts the time it takes to walk backwards and forwards a 100 yards a time every time something is printed; where it is common place to equality impact assess every policy by a panel that is representative of at least three to five protected characteristics. None of that happens in the private sector and it is entirely representative of a disgraceful level of waste. Please do not start me on CRB checks which record the offences of those who have been caught and are a mere sinecure for those who have no judgement or who do not wish to take responsisbility for their decision making or exercise common sense. Jimmy Saville would have had a clean CRB I imagine.

YABU OP. Schools and universities are not the same.

I've studied part time with the OU, which is a fantastic institution. I've just started studying at a bricks and mortar university, and I love it.

I'm doing a humanities subject so have around 8 hours contact time a week, made up of lectures and seminars. I'm expected to read and conduct research for a further 30-40 hours a week.

The library facilities are incredible, and contain so much more than I had access to as an OU student. The lecturers are knowledgeable and enthusiastic, and my fellow students (who are mostly >20 years younger than me) are keen to learn. There are loads of societies, and tutors make themselves available for questions and additional support.

I don't like paying £9k per year, but I see it as exceptional value for what I actually receive. Studying as a distance learner is valuable and doable, but so far uni has been far more exciting and challenging.

marriedinwhite, yes, due to pretensions to industrial democracy there is much of what can, from some perspective, be described as waste in the higher education sector. But at least we do not create giant oil spills in the middle of gulfs of Mexico and such that cause untold global-scale environmental damage that will be felt by countless generations to come. I really think the cost willy-measuring contest between the private and public sector is not very productive unless things are discussed in their specific geographic, historical, social, etc, contexts.

ReallyTired, there may not be enough academics now to educate everyone on the planet who wants good education, but nothing (besides war, corruption, etc.) is stopping us from creating them. Also, I do not think that good education can be delivered only by world-known academics working for established world-class universities. I have been taught by some "famous professors" who were very uninspiring, and also by some lowly rank-and-file lecturers at very low-grade institutions who completely transformed the way I looked at the world. The top-class academics are also not working in isolation. The knowledge we have now is created collectively by teams of people from a variety of institutions and countries. Yes, top academics are often great and fascinating intellectuals, but even they are supported by teams of other researchers. The key function of a professor is to lead a team of researchers.

So I don't think the number of academics is a problem. We can create great teachers as long as we are willing to put resources into it. Anybody wants to pay more tax?

There is no point in creating great teachers if we cannot change the perspective of many many people in the UK and do something to help them to embrace education rather than to cock a snook at it.

I remember arguing about this when I was at uni (although it was the state paying the fees, not me)

I think some subjects are 'cheaper' to teach than others. However the value of the degree is not (necessarily) less.

Making something free generally makes is easier to embrace.

"ReallyTired, there may not be enough academics now to educate everyone on the planet who wants good education, but nothing (besides war, corruption, etc.) is stopping us from creating them. Also, I do not think that good education can be delivered only by world-known academics working for established world-class universities. I have been taught by some "famous professors" who were very uninspiring, and also by some lowly rank-and-file lecturers at very low-grade institutions who completely transformed the way I looked at the world. The top-class academics are also not working in isolation. The knowledge we have now is created collectively by teams of people from a variety of institutions and countries. Yes, top academics are often great and fascinating intellectuals, but even they are supported by teams of other researchers. The key function of a professor is to lead a team of researchers. "

I agree there is a world of difference between a great researcher and a great teacher. We lack good teachers as much as we lack good researchers.

The biggest problem that prevents us creating more academics is time. I am sure that in a couple of centuries time there will be enough university staff to provide enough university education to those who desire it. The third world is very education hungry.

At the moment many brilliant brains are trapped behind a berka and too scared to even attend primary school for fear of being shot. There are projects like Khan Academy designed to deliver a secondary school eduation to anyone with an internet connection. However the internet is useless if you have no access to electricity yet alone a computer.

Humm, I went to Oxford. In 1999 £3k for a YEAR bought 48hrs of lectures (or so), 24hrs of labs and 24hrs of tutorials.

4 days work. In a YEAR. Glorious days. sorry, completely off topic

If you want to moan I would look at US universities, because they seem to give more "teaching time" for most students. They also layout their fees quite clearly, and usually have a breakdown of:
Fees + Course costs (eg. books) + cost of living + rent,
which unlike the UK makes it much clearer all the relative costs of attending different institutions. So you can see, that some places are much cheaper in terms of cost of living. I wish something similar happened in the UK, it might encourage some Universities to stop building so many luxurious (and expensive) Halls; and some people to realise that Oxford and Cambridge can still be something of a bargain.

American universities are often divided into teaching vs. research Universities. The Teaching ones focus more on giving the students practical job skills and more time with lecturers, the research ones focus more on theoretical grounding and more time with tutors (grad students).

Research Unis confer the more prestigious degrees. I suppose the closest comparison in UK is ex-poly (teaching) vs. pre-1991 (research) Unis.

Part of the problem is that unis are not exactly honest about themselves when advertising or interviewing students.

Having just had a quick look at several uni adverts and youtube channels not one mentions the extras that you are expected to pay above the fees.

From when I went to uni, not one mentioned the lab/workshop fees and not one mentioned that they required work to be handed in on a specific format that was not available at the uni.

If unis where more honest about what students where getting they wouldn't end up with people moaning at them.

I think that the level of teaching hours a student needs decreases as the student progresses through their university education.

For the first year at least a student needs someone who is a good teacher rather than a good researcher where as a final year student doing a project needs someone who is an expert in research. A university should be weaning a student off the spoon fed enviroment that they had at school. A graduate should be capable of learning from a book with minimal support.

If someone is not capable of automenous learning then they should not be awarded a degree of any description.

Teaching at US universities is often done by grad students, not by the professors. So you're not getting access to the best minds, just the minds of some people the best minds are teaching.

My DS has only just received his timetable, 5 weeks into term. He is a 3rd year student. Not sure who to speak to about this.

Emma your DS needs to raise a complaint with the university himself. First person to contact is the faculty tutor - if they brush him off, there should be a formal complaints procedure to follow, and if that doesn';t work/exists you can go to the universtiy ombudsman.

Teaching at US universities is often done by grad students, not by the professors. So you're not getting access to the best minds, just the minds of some people the best minds are teaching.
Same goes for UK universities - at least as far as tutorials and seminars.

Thanks TiAAAARGHo! Will prompt him. He is a journalism student, so quite articulate!

It takes the best mind to be a good teacher.

Good teachers and good researchers have different ways of thinking. Both should be respected. Sometimes the best researchers simply cannot see the difficulty.

It is a rare combination to have someone who is an outstanding researcher and an outstanding teacher.