new gov policy of restricting student numbers in some degree courses

[justanotherdaduser]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-66216005

Wondering how people feel about it?

I am unsure - in one hand, it feels needlessly prescriptive. People should be free to study what interests them without government's guiding hand

But also, not everyone signing up to such courses fully understand the degree outcomes.

Or, why should tax payers fund courses that are not good value for money? But by that logic, over time, we can lose many other valuable courses (IMO!)

Confused!

Depends what you think the purpose of HE is.
-If it's a route into careers, especially professional careers, this would seem on the surface to make sense. It's so expensive to put yourself/your offspring through university; why wouldn't you want value for money? I wouldn't spend £37k+ on a car that didn't run.

-If it's education as a way to enhance life for as many as possible (education for its own sake), this seems like a bad idea BUT education at HE level costs an absolute fortune. If this is the purpose, HE needs to be heavily subsidised to allow it to fulfil its purpose.

-If it's to keep unemployment figures down (clue: this is the view of government) it's a crazy idea. The more people in HE, the lower unemployment appears to be. Why scupper this? Keep the BSc in 'Adventure' and keep young people in 'education'. (Years ago, I looked through UCAS lists and this was the most bonkers degree I could find).

Unemployment is low, and voters respond to dogwhistle politics. We react to shite positively, we get served more shite. This is a policy for dyed-in-the-wool Tory voters to get frothy with joy about. Until we don't have these attitudes, these policies will keep being announced.

Honestly, there are jobs and careers that need degrees and there are degrees that are pointless and there are plenty of careers that don't need degrees. Everyone knows it; not everyone wants to acknowledge it.

If (as it should be IMHO), education should be valued for its own sake, rather than the job it 'gets' you, it doesn't matter one shiny shite what you take as a degree course.
As it stands, degrees are usually seen as routes into careers. Hence: make them fit for their current purpose.

Based on results, let's stop people studying PPE at Oxford. Look who that's given us....Boris Johnson, David Cameron... in fact this country is run by Oxford PPE graduates and we are not getting good value from them.

I don’t know if many of you are on the WIWIKAU Facebook group, but I have been reading a number of posts from parents of students who have failed their year or been kicked off the course for non-attendance and failing their year. It makes you wonder how many young people are seeing university as the default when really they aren’t ready for higher education or they university wasn’t for them in the first place.
I think university shouldn’t be seen as the default option for school leavers, and there should be a wider availability of options post 18 than there are currently.

They quite openly ask "will this be on the exam/assignment?"

Someone asked this of a lecturer when DD was in her first year. The lecturer was quite curt and replied “this isn’t school do all the subject reading required. We don’t give you the heads up of what to expect in exams”

Based on results, let's stop people studying PPE at Oxford. Look who that's given us....Boris Johnson, David Cameron... in fact this country is run by Oxford PPE graduates and we are not getting good value from them.

I was just about to say this. I was listening to Jeremy Vine at lunchtime and someone rang in to say this. I laughed and agreed with the sentiment.

If we see degrees as something that benefits society, because we pay for them up front, then surely an audit of which ones are of benefit is overdue. HE has expanded beyond belief.m, even in the last 10 years. Nearly everyone who wants to do a degree does one now. Years ago more did diplomas and were trained by employers with no detriment to their prospects. Now we have degrees for everything but not enough jobs.

Starting out as an architect is never well paid. We do in fact train too many architects. Nurses earn well enough when they graduate. Better than plenty and are guaranteed a job. Therefore their employment stats are great. 100%. With too many courses we do run the risk of huge numbers of grads not getting the jobs they expect, from architecture to zoology.

Unis can, and do, work with all sorts of employers. Education in a broader sense does matter but not if the grad works making coffee afterward whilst searching for the dream job they don’t get. The country has paid at least £40,000 for that grad and possibly more. It’s fair the state gets value for money and we cannot always have what we as individuals want. Never could. There are other educational routes.

However we need the government to act on apprenticeships. There are not enough snd 18 year olds do not get many of them.

@HereBeFuckery yes! I think education should be valued for its own sake. It's a poor do, it really is, if someone who is in charge thinks that students should not be allowed to study xyz because it won't lead to a high-paying job! That's not the only thing that matters to some of us.

@StillWantingADog commented that even a history or English graduate may eventually "do well" _ i take that to mean get a high salary (apols if that was not the intended meaning). Sorry to keep harping on my DD but her job does not need a degree (and is unlikely to command a high salary) - however I happen to think that her degree, which involved reading a lot of books (!) and thinking about and analysing them, might actually be helpful for her role in a library. Evidently her employers thought so too.

My career in writing has never actually needed a degree - but I like to think that my level of education has informed and inspired some of my work.

I wounder if it's more restricting the types of degrees so they are more suitable to applicable companies and useful to those companies.

Although originally I always presumed the pursuit of education was not restricted by how useful the degrees would be to the corporate world ?

To clarify my position I do agree that if your in the corporate arena, then it helps to have a good grounding in your studies to be able to understand the corporate or which ever industry you choose.

I follow the group, another point which doesn't help some that have studied or are studying at oxbridge is the point of being expected to be told whats on the exams.

Some students seem to think that Oxford/cambridge will be how it was at college eg remember this, this and this and here's your 1st.

DD's degree certainly helped her walk into a job straight away, but the post grad degree she wants to do will guarantee her work wherever she lives as there is a shortage of people qualified in what she wants to do.

@clary I agree! I did post-grad degrees for the pure joy of it, but (crucially) that was back when it didn't saddle you with a massive chunk of debt to do so.

I also agree that how much one earns isn't the right measure of 'value'. It's just the easiest and laziest measure.

Unfortunately we have a Dickensian government, who would happily bring back the workhouse and dispose of the surplus population.

Yes I agree. But at the moment employers can just recruit graduates as there are so many of them.

If we shut the substandard universities then employers would have to train people themselves.

@trysophona Regarding these types of degrees (musical theatre at specialist institutions), the fact that they are degree courses as opposed to diplomas (as they used to be historically) ensures that they are accessible to talented students whose parents do not have a spare £50K to pay for the diploma courses.

The Wilkes musical theatre degree course provides excellent professional training to performers and their outcomes are good (west end shows, tours with musicians, performing on cruise ships). It’s very intense (5 days per week) and prepares them well. Have you seen the Wilkes students perform at events such as Move it? Their standard is very high.

I would argue that courses at some universities are not as useful as the students don’t get the same level of training and therefore it’s very unlikely that the students will be able to perform professionally - and the students should be made aware of this before they start. However, the specialist institutions such as Bird, Performers, Wilkes that offer degree courses enable talented individuals the opportunity to develop regardless of their parents income.

Who is measuring by how much a grad earns? No one remotely mentions being highly paid. All grads were never all highly paid. However it’s reasonable for grad jobs to meet the repayments threshold. That is now pretty low.

It’s interesting that all the people who have had a higher education when far fewer were able to, think it should be free for everyone and never mind the outcomes or the cost to society. All those with jobs in HE do need to pause and think about how students are treated and how so many don’t get close to a half decent job, never mind a well paid one.

The idea that uni is a “right” at someone else’s expense seems to prevail. The degree is taken just for the sake of it. A sort of one upmanship and natural
progression because you have attained a certain level at school that’s good enough due to the huge number of uni places available. Just take the money anyway with nothing in mind and no plan. It’s even worse if you have a plan but are rejected for jobs time and time again because you don’t stack up against the opposition. However mn parents never have Dc who find that. Others, in the real world, do.

The reason there are fees and loans was to allow greater access. It did. Phenomenally so. It allowed more than the privileged posters here to get to uni. However the state pays first. Us. Why should people have the luxury of having a great time studying something three years snd then contribute little back to society, including non repayment of most of their loans. Why do they have jobs that any school leaver could do and be bitterly disappointed by that? Never mind the money spent by their parents. We do need a rethink on value for money and what we really want to achieve.

Media studies and gender studies could do with capping , I should imagine there’s a few other courses where the course provides no added value in terms of skills , critical thinking, improved communication skills.

in fact we could do with a one year diploma in skills for life rather than a degrees

Yes, I heard the Labour politician who had got the new loans scheme through saying it was actually one of their most successful policies (in their view) as the fact the maximum maintenance loan was so high and I believe an original cap on numbers was lifted meant many more now can go to university.

So the interesting questino is has it worked? Has 50% rather than 15% going meant (i) less well off people have more chance of the higher paid jobs and (ii) everyone in the 50% ends up doing a lot better financially than had they left school at 16 (although nowadays in theory you cannot leave at 16 unless doing an apprenticeship,going into the army etc I suppose).

The issue is in difficult economic times, highest tax burden in 70 years, biggest debt compared to GDP since the year I was born (1961) and given most students do not repay the whole loan what do tax payers think is fair in terms of what they fund?

As a PP has said, it all depends on what society thinks the point of education is, and there are several conflicting answer.

I'm not sure what this announcement is actually announcing, though.

On the main point, I think it's a shame that diplomas were replaced by degrees. Forcing vocational subjects into degree-shaped courses doesn't always work. (DD, doing a design subject, is a little indignant about having to write essays, with Harvard Referencing no less.)

I dont know about this - there are fields that are low paid but require a degree for knowledge etc so the criteria would not be fairly applied without losing some important areas.

However I do feel that now people go to univeristy just because and that that has fueled the 'requirement' on job adverts for a degree for jobs that never used to need one. And because you are up agaisnt people with a degree it has become a self fulfilling prohecy that you need a degree to get above a certain level.

If you dont have a degree the AI bots that sift a lot of CVs will automatically dimiss your application.

There are a lot of kids getting into big student debt to get a degree which isnt really worth it in term of furture earning power etc.

Years ago when less people went to university, adult education was broader and better funded, from pottery to a levels in academic subjects. Adult education seems have dwindled. Not sure if the two things are related. But now there’s a push for everyone to get their education done and dusted by 21. And I think this fuels the poor choices in courses that students take.
Schools and colleges are rated on what percentage of students go on to higher education , so sixth form colleges don’t care what students study as long as they go to university. Individual teachers may care, but the management don’t.

They quite openly ask "will this be on the exam/assignment?"

Someone asked this of a lecturer when DD was in her first year. The lecturer was quite curt and replied “this isn’t school do all the subject reading required. We don’t give you the heads up of what to expect in exams”

I'm a lecturer and get this all the time. I wish I could refuse to answer but the students threaten to have a nervous breakdown and say they can't revise 40 topics for an exam and then give shit module feedback. Actually had a student complain to SLT this year because there was a lengthy question in the exam on something which they felt had only been covered briefly (but was on the list of things which may be in the exam) and then no questions on something they had a 3 hour session on.

I think it’s felt as the only route now.

degrees aren’t for everyone - although my biggest regret is not going as I couldn’t afford it. However there needs to be clear viable visible routes around not having a degree. Apprenticeships, a level graduate acceptance into ground level roles and work your way up.

you should also be easier to go back and do a degree once you’ve sorted your shit out and decided what you want.

id love to do some night classes in trade skills, they used to be everywhere when I had my dcs. They’ve all been cut.

I was a fucking mess between 16-25. So I completely agree

Who is measuring by how much a grad earns? No one remotely mentions being highly paid. All grads were never all highly paid. However it’s reasonable for grad jobs to meet the repayments threshold. That is now pretty low.

Actually @TizerorFizz this is a quote from the BBC article linked above: "[The government] will also look at potential earnings when deciding if a degree offers enough value".

So that is a factor. And wrt the repayment threshold, while I imagine @£27k is lowish in London, in a lot of the country it really isn't. I was a teacher in school (a role that requires a degree) until a few years ago and that is more than I earned (though I am aware that a teacher's starting salary is now above the payback figure). I then took a pay cut to move to a Band 5 NHS role, which also required a degree.

I do agree with you though that a degree shouldn't be taken just for the sake of it. But a valid reason for higher education could be that a student has a love of the subject and wants to develop it; that they want to stretch their mind in a particular direction; that they would enjoy the challenge (for a good higher education should be a challenge).

@clary These figures are from MSE, Martin Lewis. The repayment proportion of the loan for lower earners is small. I cannot see how that disadvantages those grads. So anyone earning less and not in London is far better off when you take cheaper housing into account. It’s still pretty much a great deal for those on or about the threshold.

Did I see the threshold wax reducing in the future though?

The devil is in the detail. The sledgehammer to crack a nut analogy could definitely apply. Everybody thinks that degrees should represent a good education but how you define that purely through crude statistics on outcomes is tricky ... eg what defines a graduate job? My exh's course could fall foul of the 80% threshold because a good percentage of his students go to work in family firms, their parents want them to get an education but it's expected they then go into the family business, pay may not be a good indicator of their value to the business either because we know from personal experience they live in the family home, given a high end car, tech etc ... these young people may be running a multi million pound company within 10 years or so! But according to the governments proposal his course is worthless because it's not meeting their stats.

Secondly I know many young women in my city from certain backgrounds go to university and aren't expected to work afterwards, it's a matter of family pride they can afford for them not to - should the courses they attended enrolling them in good faith be cancelled? University isn't about masters, PhDs and graduate training schemes, it's about much more for many young people including being allowed 3 years away from fairly strict family expectations. Ok maybe I've had a lot of experience through personal situation and this set of circumstances isn't the norm but it can't be the only university with this issue. This university wins accolades for its diversity!

I am all for it. Any university degree that doesn't lead to a job which has potential to earn more than the threshold required to pay back the student loan is a waste of tax payers money. Those jobs shouldn't require a degree in the first place

I'm afraid I disagree about the standard and 'talent' of some people attending places like Wilkes. I'm sorry to have singled them out, though, as that's just an example.

I have seen events at Move it, yes.

I'd imagine cuts to degree courses will include this sort of thing anyway.