University Fees for on-line Lectures

[Kastanien]

Latest this morning(sorry if it is already on here, I checked and could not see a thread)
www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-52506283

Just wondering how those of you with DC due to start (or return to Uni) in the Autumn feel about full tuition fees for on-line learning?
I feel there should be a reduction as the teaching is not the same on-line as face to face.

The argument has always been that the £9k covers not just the teaching but the access to libraries, subscriptions , lab facilities etc . The lack of access to library is significant , of course a lot of the library is online now with digitisation of materials but if these are not available that would be significant .
I also think it would be very difficult for first years to start online ,

I guess lecture halls vary, but certainly in all the ones at my university, as the lecturer I would be about the most sociallt distanced person in the room, standing up at the front a good 4-5 m from the front row. I don't feel any need for PPE personally, but each to their own.

My university is currently working on the model that lectures will be online while seminars, labs, group work etc. will go as normal. Time will tell if that is what we end up with or not.

Certainly, sitting in a room of 200 students and getting an hour's lecture a week without the tutor ascertaining your understanding would not merit much of a tuition fee at all. But, fortunately, that is not what university education consists of. And if you were receiving such poor quality teaching and minimal contact in breach of what you signed up for, there are mechanisms for you to be refunded.

I went to a Russell group uni. Most people I knew at other uni's had similar experiences unless they took a course that required labs.

It's a running joke within the people I know that we paid 9k a year to teach ourselves a degree.

The standard of uni teaching isn't worth the 9k a year even in person. You sit in a room of 200 people, get talked at for an hour, learn almost nothing and have to go and relearn everything yourself

If that really is all you got then of course you should complain.
However, that's not how it works at any of the universities I've worked at.

I struggle to believe that an RG uni in the last 10 years would have one lecture a week and no other contact time, and students “teaching themselves a degree”. Which subject, if you don’t mind me asking?

@NameChange84 I am the FD if a charity , you can furlough staff if you are a charity . The reason they cannot furlough is because they are in receipt of public money to fund those jobs so the theory is that their funding has not been withdrawn so they do not need to furlough staff , as that would just result in the money going around in a giant circle .

I guess lecture halls vary, but certainly in all the ones at my university, as the lecturer I would be about the most socially distanced person in the room, standing up at the front a good 4-5 m from the front row.

What about seminars and tutorials where i'm in a small room and definitely less than 2m away from my students? I teach postgrads and have around 20 people on my course. We get given the smallest rooms on campus.

I struggle to believe that an RG uni in the last 10 years would have one lecture a week and no other contact time, and students “teaching themselves a degree”. Which subject, if you don’t mind me asking?

Sorry, I didn't mean I had one lecture a week, I had multiple lectures a week but it all followed the same pattern of being in a massive hall, with a lecturer talking alongside PowerPoint presentation, with no ability to ask questions. Course material was printouts of those PowerPoint presentations. You learnt nothing and went off and tried to understand it yourself.

I did Mathematics.

I struggle to believe that an RG uni in the last 10 years would have one lecture a week and no other contact time, and students “teaching themselves a degree”. Which subject, if you don’t mind me asking?

Exactly - it doesn't happen.

The truth is that different courses cost different amounts to run and add varying amounts of value to a student’s future career.

Students would be well advised to look for value. Why should Arts students subsidise lab-heavy Biotech degrees? Biotech students have wildly better prospects than History of Arts grads.

There is no need for courses to have this parity in fees. Students should have better transparency of costs.

Differential fees don't work. The students find them confusing and it doesn't impact on choice.

Providing online tuition and support is more resource intensive because you have to factor in academic and tech time to implement. Those who advocate a fee reduction have no idea of the effort involved in digitising a curriculum. If you don't have the technology to facilitate online learning then perhaps you should defer. Quality monitoring and evaluation remains exactly as it would be for face to face but with focus on assessing how or if the delivery has altered quality. An online assessment of medical school finals has shown there is no difference in outcomes and universities must also continue to demonstrate they are meeting requirements set by external regulators. Education is not cheap and should not be cheapened by opportunistic bargain hunters. The government should provide grants to enable students to obtain tech for online degrees. This won't go away and this model will likely be in place for a while. I would like to know how the SU will reconfigure their organisation for remote students and try to ensure they are representative.

The problem is that many universities if not all are going to make deferring difficult and at the upper end many students will worry that despite their top grades this year ( which may very well reflect their work ethos and potential more accurately than the exam would have done) they will lose out to those doing exams next year.

I think there's two separate issues. One is the hard work of staff, and make no mistake, staff have worked really hard to get material online, alter teaching methods, alter assessments, and help students who are having difficulties. Online teaching (this year) will not have used less university resources, so from the supply side, if you like, the argument against reducing fees would seem to win.

The other issue is the quality of the students' experience of learning. Unfortunately this doesn't always correlate with the expense of the resources used to provide the course. It varies by subject, but in general I would say that online lectures, particularly delivered by people who, however hardworking and dedicated, have little or no experience of online lecturing, are not going to be as good an environment as face to face lecturing and tutorials. So, if you like, from the demand side, you can see a justifiable argument for reducing fees.

No idea what the solution is though! I'm hoping we will be able to be back to face to face by autumn.

The government should provide grants to enable students to obtain tech for online degrees.

Not to mention improving the appalling broadband infrastructure in this country. A much better investment in people's futures and use of taxpayer money than HS2.

With regards to the option of taking a year off, travel or find a job...

What jobs would be available after this crisis? What travel would be safe, available, enjoyable or affordable while we and half of the world are fighting a pandemic? And for what? To compete for a place with twice as many students at their return? I would only support my child in taking a year off if he gets top grades, as I would say it would be silly for universities to approve a deferrals/save a place for average and less than average performers if they will have a much bigger pool of better candidates to select from next year.

And for what? To compete for a place with twice as many students at their return?

If you have an offer for a place in October and you get the required grades then you get the place. If the university agrees to defer then it is surely on the basis of the grades you have- it doesn't up the required grades for next year because it knows you have already have the grades so there is no opportunity for them to change. For next years new applicants the grades may get higher, but not for students who already have achieved their offer grades this year and been granted a deferral.

Labs
Practicals
Fieldwork
Observation
Experiments
Design and modelling
Science and Technology in fact

will not work over a video feed

COVID vaccine is being developed by people in labs
not on Zoom

Dd hopes to start a language degree in autumn and doesn’t want to defer. I would be happy if it was online initially but for selfish reasons. She has asthma and isn’t in great health. She’s had a string of chest infections this year and I would hate her to be in lectures. She’s staying at home anyway.
I wouldn’t care about full fees.
I also worry for all the teachers, lecturers and staff etc possibly with health issues themselves who shouldn’t be close to others.

Nicky2512- language degrees are interesting because of the year abroad. I have no idea how that is going to be fulfilled in the students who are due to go abroad in Oct 2020. It is such a big part of a language degree, living, studying or working abroad- I feel so sorry for language students I don't know where this leaves them.

If you have an offer for a place in October and you get the required grades then you get the place.
Yep, but offer of a place is for this year, the universities can choose not keep the offer for next year.

If your kid barely met the offer requirements (many are in that situation) the university may prefer not risk leaving a better student out next year over providing a place for one who barely made it and may not return next year.

If the university agrees to defer

The key word there is "if". I think it's highly likely that admissions tutors will be told not to agree to deferrals and to tell offer holders that they will need to re-apply if they want to start in 2021. Some courses have never allowed deferral, in any case.

Kastanien We were talking about that earlier. Obviously for my own dd we would hope things will be back to normal by her time to go but awful for those due to go this year.

I know a few of her friends are planning to defer but (with no knowledge at all about languages!) I would hope that first year of languages would be an easier one to teach/be taught online. I admit I don’t know and may be completely wrong.
My plan is just to make sure she’s well enough set up with technology she would need if that’s what happens.

My daughter is going into second year at Glasgow. Arts degree. She rarely goes to lectures anyway and has been using the online content for some time. She has to attend tutorials but only about 3 times a week. Because her University flat last year was about 6 grand for a pokey little room and the use of a kitchen miles from the University, she has decided to use her loan to commute from home by coach using her student discount and the 10 journey passes rather than season tickets which won't save her anything if she is not using them every day.

She loved first year and had a good birthday and freshers week but didn't really meet anyone outside her own flat that she didn't already know from school or back home. Her flatmates are all much older and wealthier (she was just 17, they were all 19) and have decided to get quite an expensive flat which she can't afford so she decided that as they aren't best buddies she wanted to do her own thing. Hence the decision to commute from home. We have quite a large house with office space. We both have degrees in her discipline. She won't want for support.

The money she saves will go towards a deposit on a flat for 3rd year. Another reason we decided not to flat hunt was 1) uncertainty about if there would be any face to face teaching and 2) the inability to view properties in person.

Not everyone can do as she is deciding but she had her year of independence and has decided to take a break and do things at her own pace. Just socialise at weekends and maybe learn to drive if that is going to be allowed.

Reasonably certain that social distancing can be maintained with a frequent coach service and tutorials which consist of a handful of people being held in much larger rooms.

If she needs to stay over for any reason (exams, etc) then Premier Inn for few days might be possible. Presumably they will reopen next year.

All of this entirely her decision and we support her 100%.

If you have an offer for a place in October and you get the required grades then you get the place.
Yep, but offer of a place is for this year, the universities can choose not keep the offer for next year.

Yes, but if you get the place and then ask to defer and the uni officially agrees, then they can't then up the grades requirement. Some people are talking as if getting a deferral is the same as re-applying. If you are granted a deferral then the expected grades being higher the following year does not matter because you have your place still.

I agree that a lot of uni's won't want to allow deferrals but that is a different matter.