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Higher education

Talk to other parents whose children are preparing for university on our Higher Education forum.

Funding for a masters.

74 replies

Sadusername · 28/11/2015 19:23

My eldest DD deferred doing a masters. (my advice in part). I had read that the government were going to introduce student finance for masters degrees. The article below refers to it and I am sure at the time there was information on the .gov site
www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-30293964
However I haven't really heard much since. Does anyone know if this is still going ahead or have any more information?

OP posts:
Molio · 01/12/2015 16:13

Bobo kalidasa's post doesn't address your point about questionable ethics in recommendations. kalidasa do you think Bobo is right to worry that academics might somehow recommend expensive institutions purely to feather their own nest?

Molio · 01/12/2015 16:14

somehow

disquisitiones · 01/12/2015 16:18

I agree with kalidasa that it is important to take into account why you are doing the masters:

  1. To get a specific well paid job which is masters or higher entry level
  2. To go into a profession which is masters entry but is not particularly well paid
  3. To become an academic

If (1) then a very expensive course which gets you where you need to go might well be worth it: that's why financial maths courses can get away with fees of £14k+ per year! The considerations for (2) and (3) are different.

Not sure why Bobo would think any academic could gain from pointing students to masters courses at institutions outside their own. There's no commission involved!

BoboChic · 01/12/2015 16:42

You are rephrasing my point, Molio, and overstating it.

BoboChic · 01/12/2015 16:44

"There's no commission involved!"

No, indeed not. That's was Molio's idea, not mine.

SquadGoals · 01/12/2015 16:49

I'm currently doing mine distance learning whilst I work and it's costing me £6k in total.

I think I'm getting good value for money and by doing it distance learning, you get back as much as you put in.

I'm able to pay for mine without funding/loans etc because I took a few years after my undergrad to work and save. I would definitely recommend this route as it's given me a great insight for my Management course.

Molio · 01/12/2015 18:02

Bobo your suggestion was that university tutors might have 'an agenda'!! I'm quoting that verbatim. You also suggested that university tutors might have 'loyalty' towards 'friends/ colleagues and their own career as well as to passing students (my emphasis)'. I'm picking my (your!) words carefully. I don't think I'm overstating the thrust one little bit. Anyhow, the long and the short is that tutors recommended a particular institution to my DD (and gave her very plausible political reasons for why academics in the field might have migrated to this institution) and since she knew and trusted the advising academics, having been taught one to one by them, she's opted for it and got an unconditional. Unfortunately it's bloody expensive and there are absolutely no scholarships for home students but at least there is the new loan facility. Thank God. She's a hard worker in terms of getting-hands-dirty type jobs (she's worked in those sort of jobs since she was 13) as well as being academically hard working and she can cut her cloth with the best of them, but there are only so many hours in a day and only so much cloth you can cut, especially in London. I really do feel a more sophisticated, weighted loan system would be better.

I'm still curious about the position for less well off students who got fee waivers against the £9k fees, as far as the 2015 bursaries went. Does anyone know the answer? It would be really ironic (and of course not good) if they didn't qualify on account of that.

titchy · 01/12/2015 19:06

What's your query about students who got a reduction on UG fees and the Masters bursary in 2015 Molio? They'll have finished their masters by 2016 so won't need the masters loan... So not sure what you're asking .

Molio · 01/12/2015 19:18

The query was about the masters' bursaries you said were available for 2015/16 titchy. You said the bursaries were for those paying £9k for their undergrad ie those doing three year degrees 2012/15. I'm wondering if students who got a fee waiver because of low parental income were excluded from the bursaries because of paying 'only' £6k a year (or whatever the fee waiver was for a particular uni)?

HocusCrocus · 01/12/2015 19:21

I just clicked on this thread because Ds has expressed a vague interest in a PG qualification - not covered by the funding as has been answered upthread.

Bobo

As for integrity - tutors have loyalty to their friends/colleagues and their own career as well as to passing students, surely? Is this how it works in France? I am not an international HE consultant so I wouldn't know .

Right, I really do not know this but I, possibly naively, believe that most good academic individuals / institutions have a jealous eye to their reputation and would recommend what they believe to be in the best of the student's interest. Disquis, I very much like your 16.18 post.

titchy · 01/12/2015 20:08

Oh right! Yes they were available to those who received fee remission, as long as they were subject initially to the 2012 fee regime.

kalidasa · 01/12/2015 22:03

Bobo I can't really imagine why an academic would actively mislead a student re where to go for an MA but I think it's important to appreciate the probable basis of that advice (e.g. that's a dept with a cluster of say three leading scholars in x whom I really rate) vs how it may be interpreted (that's an excellent MA program from the point of view of the MA students). Most academics will not know much if anything about the detail/day to day arrangements of MA programs at other universities. The scholarly expertise of specific dept members is not necessarily very relevant to the quality of an MA program unless you are sure you are going to be taught or supervised directly by those members of staff. For instance, dept x might include the world's most exciting and influential scholar on Goethe but if she has no part in teaching on the MA that year, there is no Goethe module and she won't be available to supervise MA dissertations as she is on sabbatical/has too many PhD students/is running a big project then the budding Goethe scholar may be better off doing an MA somewhere else.

lljkk · 01/12/2015 22:33

another reason to do a Masters is to get wider experience, a specialism for a first degree (like maths students switching to health or biology or information systems). This can be fab background to get onto many PhDs.

Academics are prejudiced in favour of other academics like themselves. That's who they'll recommend. They tend to only think inside familiar boxes. There is also a prejudice that academics are best to not get all their degrees from one institution, that said...

Unis like to keep the very best undergrads on to be next yr's PhDs. Who may actually go work in industry or public sector, not academia at all.

BoboChic · 01/12/2015 22:52

Thank you, kalidasa and lijkk.

hefzi · 02/12/2015 15:46

I recommend my students where to go based on what I know of the student, and also their character, and their future goals. I have come in for a lot of stick for encouraging my students not to stay with us, despite favourable fees, in favour of broadening their exposure to alternative viewpoints and opening up a greater number of choices for them. This year, I have 2 applying to Cambridge, 3 for Oxford, 1 for Salford, 1 for Manchester, 1 for Liverpool, 1 for LSE and 2 for Edinburgh (we are post-92, with a disproportionate number of students from low-income families).

Obviously, at this stage, we don't know about Oxford and Cambridge, as those have only just closed, but essentially, the other universities will offer places to pretty much anyone, despite what they're blurb says: this is why so many now ask for a) a fee on application and b) a fee to hold the place within a month of the decision. Master's programmes are, in essence, free money for the university - the staff are paid for through the block grant that comes out from HEFCE, so it's nearly all "profit". So they talk about high 2:i and all that, but in practice, it means little. In the same way, overseas students can pretty much have any place they want. One thing it's vital to remember is that Professor X who's the world authority on such and such a topic, whose books you've read repeatedly etc etc is almost certainly not going to be teaching you: I've worked in places where the "big names" are used as the draw, but in fact, the reason they are big names is because they are round and about speaking at conferences, have huge research grants to write books and generally are not doing the daily university business: one place in particular, there was a certain (absolutely delightful) prof who brought in about 20 overseas students every year who wanted to study with him - he'd see them, on average, twice a year. (For comparison, we are contractually obligated to have supervision with our PhD students every month at a minimum) This is why, as a PP said, speaking to the current students and recent graduates is so helpful and important.

Molio I think what you need to remember is that MA fees have always been something of a struggle for people to find - and now that the market sets the rates, that will only continue. I had a student last year choose an Oxford course over a Durham course, because the Oxford one was "only" £1000 more expensive - but s/he felt that this was a worthwhile investment given the relative values of the final product for the field s/he was intending to go into (and is now having a brilliant time at Oxford).

I don't know whether it will still be possible, with the new loans for people to apply for Career Development Loans - though I'm sure your daughter's tutors will have already discussed this with her.

The other possibility, as someone else pointed out, is studying part-time, and taking two years to complete: this is often the reality for someone who is committed to further study but lacks the funds to enable them to do so. (Oxford used to make you sign an agreement that if you were doing an MSt, you wouldn't take paid work, but I believe this is no longer the case) I worked full-time hours whilst doing an MA (early morning cleaning in two places, plus the annual fundraising campaign, plus a full day of the work I originally qualified in on one day a week) but it was very tough, and I missed out on a lot the social side - which can be important at MA level, since seminars etc often continue after class in the pub or coffee shop - and I had very little money to do things like go out for supper etc so I wouldn't recommend it in general, and definitely not if the student isn't academically exceedingly strong: I was studying a discipline I hadn't studied before, and though it was fine, it was very hard work and extremely stressful, to put it mildly.

In my institution, this year's bursaries were actually aimed at those from lower income families: they had first priority in the event the scheme was over-subscribed. Ours actually was - but seems to have been the only one in the country that was - with the result that one of our current Master's students didn't get a bursary at all, because she was on full 9k fees. She is the only one of this particular cohort without a bursary, and is self-funding as a result: she doesn't have wealthy family or savings - she's just part of that much-maligned and discriminated against group, the squeezed middle.

disquisitiones · 02/12/2015 15:55

One thing it's vital to remember is that Professor X who's the world authority on such and such a topic, whose books you've read repeatedly etc etc is almost certainly not going to be teaching you.

This is not true across all fields. In my field, having huge research grants and regularly speaking at conferences all around the world is not enough to buy you out of all teaching at the top places. Most professorial colleagues are in similar positions and all are expected to do some teaching, including masters level courses. I agree that it is a good idea to check this, though, which is often easy enough to do by seeing who is actually teaching the courses.

titchy · 02/12/2015 16:25

Hefzi - block grant from HEFCE - you are joking aren't you? Shock I can assure you any HEFCE money you get doesn't cover anything like your costs. Hasn't for years.

hefzi · 02/12/2015 18:18

titchy you're right - I was grossly over-simplifying the process trying to explain why many universities see MAs as quick and dirty money: sorry!

hefzi · 02/12/2015 18:21

disquis apologies, yes - I forgot that it does differ depending on fields.

Actually, in my dept now, we only have one "big name" but because of the way our system works s/he still does exactly the same number of lectures, seminars and tutorials as every other member of staff - I was making a blanket comment based on my previous discipline (I'm a mid-career career-changer) and that of one of my brothers, in which this is the case. It's the same, more or less, across our Faculty. Sorry!

titchy · 02/12/2015 19:06

Most MAs receive NO income other than fees!

titchy · 02/12/2015 19:08

Sorry my point being that HEIs CANNOT afford to cross subsidise PG courses. If your MA doesn't bring in enough fee income your job is at threat. They have to earn their keep. The grant no longer pays enough to cover staff costs by a very long chalk.

Molio · 02/12/2015 20:07

hefzi believe me I'm only too well aware of the historic funding issues for MAs. That's why I think the new system is much much better than nothing - but it still leaves very real problems with access.

hefzi · 10/12/2015 14:30

titchy I simply meant that staff costs are covered from the u/g teaching and not from MA fees - at least, this is what has happened at the 3 places I've worked for (one Oxbridge, one RG, one post-92): I've never been anywhere that anyone taught solely on the MA programme, but it is true that if you don't recruit sufficiently, your programme may well not run, because there are costs. But things like building upkeep/depreciation etc are already covered through U/G teaching - that's what I meant by "free money". Sorry - I think I just explained poorly!

Molio it's an ongoing problem, I agree - but there are, at least, more scholarships offered by universities themselves than there ever were: and there are more opportunities around DL and part-time study also. But you are totally correct - it's still not perfect. Mind you, I am a rampant idealist - I would make all tertiary education free, and all merit-based. (And yes, I am aware that this would put me out of a job!)

titchy · 10/12/2015 15:25

But they're not. Most institutions can't afford the sort of cross subsidisation you're talking about. Most staff teach at both UG and PG - if they dropped the PG teaching they wouldn't be paid as much, so the PG has to support itself.

Talk to your Director of Finance if you don't believe me!

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