Some universities will go bust

[GinForBreakfast]

Reported in the Times today. It must be so worrying for students joining or returning in September/October.

My question is around the regulator, who knows where the issues are. What should they be telling students and when? It seems cruel, especially to young people, to withhold information. It has financial implications as well - people moving, paying deposits etc.

Agree and the universities in trouble simply haven't got the money to do this. Good online content requires huge resources. It's not just recording a teams meeting.

Exactly. I teach a distance learning version of a degree and we have an entire team supporting the design and delivery of the programme. Not to mention the fact I have to undertake a specific module on online pedagogy. All of that is very costly.

It's far, far more time consuming than the in-person version of my course.

That WonkHE article notes a very mild correlation! Salaries against teaching satisfaction gives you a big blob, not a nice line at all!

Myself and DH were the first to go to uni in the family under the new fees regime. We would not advise our kids to do so unless it was for a highly trained job such as a doctor or research scientist where they are likely to make the money back. The way the new student loan book works for interest in recent years is shocking.

It would be better if the university sector had a graduate tax set up for UK students over a fixed number of years so they have a constant income stream coming in.

The odd thing is most UK students end up paying far more than £9250 per year for their tuition when they start paying it back as the Graduate Tax (branded as student loan) to a private company that is making lots of money off them.

@absquatulize surely the odd thing here is your complete misrepresentation of the Student Loan Company?

Neither a private company nor profit making.

https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/student-loans-company/about

We are a non-profit making government-owned organisation that administers loans and grants to students in colleges and universities in the UK.

Interest is besides the point for most grads. Repayments are income based. It’s not like a mortgage. However the big sting is the 40 years duration.

It is a problem that we have too many unis who depend on overseas students. EU students have dropped off but 560,000 are from elsewhere. LSE has over 50% overseas students. However lots have under 10%.

I would revert many of these to colleges of Higher Education catering for day release and mostly below degree level qualifications. We need training to be more job focussed - but not for all. There’s still a need for academically focussed courses. We have an unsustainable model and need to revise if. The state is owed £236 billion by students. So for those who think the state contributes nothing. Think again. It underwrites all those loans that don’t get paid off. This figure is set to double by 2040 so, without growth in the economy, it’s way too expensive.

well clearly you don't.

From that blog

To be clear, I would emphatically not recommend that vice chancellors and senior leaders determine their human resources strategies on the basis of this finding. This is a very mild correlation (r squared is 0.27, p is >0.0001) and there are a lot of other things going on under the hood.

@boys3 Whats a “hood”? Bonnet? So USA authorship?

Without reading the article, why on earth would you think more teaching focused academic staff would be at the top end of the pay scale and not those that bring in multimillion pound research grants?

This. The double standards in entry conditions for home students and international students are a disgrace.

Can someone explain to me in small words how when I went to uni (a hundred years ago) it was free, but now thousands of young people pay thousands of pounds and it’s now that universities don’t have any money?

When it was free 5% of the population went, now it is nearly 50%

I'd interpret it as bonnet.

Or maybe Welsh 😁

David Kernohan is Deputy Editor of Wonkhe. Until June 2016, he worked at Jisc as a programme manager and senior codesign manager, after being seconded from HEFCE in 2006. He has also worked for the University of Glamorgan (now the University of South Wales). As Associate Editor, David has responsibility for the development and delivery of a variety of editorial content. His key areas of wonkishness include teaching quality enhancement policy, funding policy, sector agency politics and history, research policy, and the use of technology and data in Higher Education.

I don't know his full background. But WonkHE are London based.

lol - DK (author) is absolutely not American!

Because when you (and me and anyone our age) went, the cost of tuition came from the Government. Now it doesn't. It comes from students.

https://blogs.ucl.ac.uk/cepeo/2024/07/02/frozen-out-how-english-higher-education-has-become-a-fragile-sector/ is fairly brief and partially answers your question - not the 1924 state of unis bit admittedly.

It wasn’t free when you went. Somebody else paid. They paid enough to cover the costs of delivering your education.

Now, students pay a large contribution towards the cost of their education but it isn’t enough to cover the cost of delivering that education.

More like 35% of school leavers - its never been anywhere near 50% in terms of school leavers. Apart from London of course. People aged 30 and under overall another story, .

Around 15% in the mid 80s; definitely no tuition fees back then.

@titchy Use standard English then. Hood? Honestly!

I think we’ve agreed in the past that around 38% of 18 year olds now go to uni. The overall workforce has around 50.% degree holders in it but they don’t all need degrees for their work, and that wasn’t envisaged.

@KielderWater In 1990, 19% went to uni. By 1997/98 it was 22% but 35% were part time and 41% were over the age of 25. These two figures are now reduced but we certainly should look at more part time study.

Mid 80s - yeah 18% of 18 year olds sounds about right.

Remember though, teaching and nursing weren't graduate occupations then. About 12% of the current 38% or so are doing nursing or teaching degrees, so to compare like with like you need to remove these from the 38% which comes down to say 32%.

So it's gone up from 18% to 32% in 30 years. Less than other comparable high income countries.

*Numbers are rough estimates due to wine consumption

When I went to university in the early 80s I was told it was about 10% went to university

15,500 started on nursing degrees last year. 550,000 full time undergrads overall. So it’s not a huge percentage. Someone else can do the maths! Less then 3% of under grads? . However it could be argued lots of young people don’t need to be graduates. In fact many nurses don’t. Teaching - many have a first degree then do a further course.

Just because you didn't pay doesn't mean it was free.
It just means someone else paid for it on your behalf.
Now students are paying a contribution towards something which costs far more to deliver than it used to. Also, more students means more resources are required including student support, library, tech support, careers and employability etc.

@absquatulize that data is about assessment and feedback, not teaching, and shows a small correlation. It does not prove anything.

A very good reason not to scrap Media Studies.

"Can someone explain to me in small words how when I went to uni (a hundred years ago) it was free, but now thousands of young people pay thousands of pounds and it’s now that universities don’t have any money?"

@ElaineMBenes
"Just because you didn't pay doesn't mean it was free.
It just means someone else paid for it on your behalf. "

@ClaudiaWinklepanda

Do you think that the taxpayers got good value for their money from paying for your university education?