Government petition re: tuition fees refund.

[justasking111]

All students should be reimbursed of this years tuition fees as universities are now online only due to COVID-19, with only powerpoints online for learning materials which is not worthy of up to £9,250. Furthermore, all assessments are being reconsidered to ‘make do’ and build up credits

petition.parliament.uk/petitions/302855

Lol. You mean the student loans company (publicly funded - so the Government) should receive a refund. Which will mean that your kid's uni won't be able to pay its lecturers and your kid'll get nothing but PowerPoints next year.

Go you.

Excellent, I guess I can stop all the overtime I'm doing then to move all my teaching online (which is not, incidentally "only powerpoints") as you don't want to pay me. I won't bother setting and marking the online exams either.

No, no...they really shouldn't. I work for a university and staff are working night and day to move mountains to make sure that students aren't disadvantaged. Universities are going to lose incredible amounts of money, with the loss of income from accommodation, from tuition fees from overseas students, from loss of staff-time and from providing funding to support students in need. What else can they do to support students?

with only powerpoints online for learning materials

That would depend on the course and the university, surely...

I actually find this really upsetting tbh.

I also work in a university and we have been working overtime night and day to assist teaching staff to move to virtual lectures or workshops. I understand that this is very disruptive for many students but it’s disruptive for the entire world so I disagree that there should be tuition fee refunds. Many students pay the equivalent fees for entirely online courses.

The uni I work for (Russell Group) only moved two weeks teaching online, we were nearly at the end of our teaching year which I would imagine is the same for many others.

We have released all clinical staff to work in hospitals and have converted labs into NHS Covid testing, they are allowing other staff paid time off to be NHS Volunteers all whilst losing income from accommodation.

So, absolutely not in answer to your question.

I'd like to add that I am working right now (OK, I have stopped to post this), and won't finish for the evening until 11.00. On my birthday. DH (also a lecturer) and I have cancelled the annual leave we'd booked over Easter because it is going to take so much work to move our remaining teaching and our exams online. Our universities are looking into the financial abyss as a result of this pandemic and we know that redundancies and course closures are coming down the line. But our priority at the moment is ensuring that our finalists complete their degrees and the rest of our students get to progress to the next level.

Given that exam boards are probably more likely to give students the benefit of the doubt in the circumstances, I'd be interested to know how the petitioners would respond if universities were to say 'no you're absolutely right, it's been a tough year, we'll pretend it never happened and you can retake the year, free of charge...'.

We're all getting shafted economically, OP.

Seems like tuition refunds = fewer universities of any sort in future, because they all went bankrupt in 2020. Most are carrying large debts already.

I'm supposed to start a big new contract at Uni I work at, but there's admin delay & any bridging funds are now frozen, so I'm in limbo starting next week. I might be volunteering for next 6m before I actually get paid again.

Maybe I should drop all the covid19 science work I'm doing & go to work in a supermarket. It would be a refreshing sabbatical in a way. I'll weigh the options up.

Really nice. Thanks.

My staff have moved heaven and earth to get teaching online. Many including me buying their own IT equipment - better laptops etc. paying for a Zoom subscription ourselves. What I giant kick in the teeth.

I suggest that individual students use their institutional complaints procedure to register issues with particular programmes/academic staff.

Or you can just drive the sector to bankruptcy or maybe we will just pay for this for even poorer terms and conditions for our staff. Maybe we will just start working the hours we should do and stop being available at all hours?

And what does this even mean: ‘assessments are being reconsidered to ‘make do’ and build up credits’.

We have been through a massive evaluation process of module assessment. It’s not just made up as we go along you know.

I've just got to bed after working until after 10 pm to get one piece of online teaching ready. But apparently I shouldn't be paid for this as it's "only a PowerPoint" and the additional notes wrote themselves, and the narrations I'll be adding tomorrow morning will voice themselves, and the completed materials will upload themselves to the virtual learning environment that pays for itself, and the questions students then post on the VLE will answer themselves. And the next cohort of students will teach themselves because their lecturers have lost their jobs because the university had no income for a third of the previous year.

Oh, sorry, I misunderstood. @justasking111 was actually suggesting that universities should have no income for any of this year, including the 6 months in which regular face-to-face teaching did take place.

Maybe someone should tell the OU it shouldn't be charging any fees as it's all online OP - that's how things work isn't it?

I'm a lecturer in Ireland. Can I just say to my UK colleagues that you have my utmost sympathy if this is the attitude you're dealing with. While our students are understandably stressed and frustrated, they do seem to appreciate what we are doing to complete their semester in terms of teaching and assessment.

I think if you want a refund then this year shouldn't count and you'd resit it.
Either you've gained the knowledge you needed or not.
(And you'll have to find accommodation and expenses for another year)

Er no, lecturers are working really hard to provide the content etc electronically, it's not ideal for them either, but it's working. PowerPoints are fine in the middle of an unprecendented global pandemic.

Another No vote here. You’ve completely misunderstood the phenomenal work underway to
make learning and teaching and end of year assessments available online while also
Supporting individual students at this very difficult time.

All our staff are working every hour to find the best way for students to continue their learning in order to progress through their courses. Including those who are trying their best to ensure a steady supply of well trained and competent HCPs, teachers, scientists, planners etc over the next few years to look after people and systems throughout this crisis and the aftermath. This, in the face of daily changes to policy and services who understandably can't offer placements because they are dealing with a pandemic.

I have colleagues who have worked 12 hour days through Covid-19 to ensure that all our students were supported, well informed and well educated.

Demanding money back will lead to universities closing and many of the professions that people have been out there applauding tonight becoming even more poorly staffed in the future because they won't have the places to train. But you know, the rest of the world is going to shit, everyone is doing the best they can, but you focus on sharing petitions to bring it even further to its knees.

^
That wasn't very clear, they were laid in bed with covid-19, dealing with hundreds of emails and creating online teaching whilst struggling to breath.

Yes @justasking111 - you can see from other threads on here that I am working through with a possible Covid-19 (GP diagnosed). I am living and working in one room. I am laying down every couple of hours for a rest - my students don’t know. I am putting a cheery Zoom face and having a cry in between.

Please come back to this thread and explain you position further.

I can't believe over 270 thousand idiots signed this.

Certainly not.

They were at least 2/3 of the way through the academic year when this really bit, so there's certainly no case for demanding the reimbursement of a whole years fees.

I'm the parent of a 3rd year student, by the way, not an academic. My DD is hard at work revising (not now, she'll be sensible asleep I expect) having ensured she has reams of paper before going into lockdown. She's confident her department will sort out a online exam format, and then work out an alternative to the lab-based projects which should have followed.

So I'll use this ridiculous thread to say thank you to all the academics trying to deal with this horrible situation and continue to deliver teaching and work out how to do exams etc.

As a (mature) full time student I think this is ridiculous. I’ll be missing four weeks of face to face teaching. BUT my work has been adjusted to ensure I can still access it all, tutors are emailing us with help and support and they’ve provided online lessons and Q&A forums, as well as extending deadlines. To suggest my year has been a waste is absurd. We are all making the best of a horrible situation, this is not necessary.