Some universities will go bust thread 2

[GinForBreakfast]

Continuing as thread 1 has filled up.

https://www.bradford.ac.uk/news/archive/2024/university-of-bradford-tops-social-mobility-index-for-fourth-year-in-a-row.php#:~:text=The%20SMI%20was%20first%20published,and%20informs%20everything%20we%20do.

100% agree @YellowAsteroid

It’s a university I signpost my students to who have alternative quals. Bradford uni seems to look at the individual as a whole and that’s what my students need.

What's the feeling about the unis that are currently balloting staff for strikes? Will they be similar to 2023 where marking was delayed (or ratification of the marks delayed) and degrees awarded were unclassified.

I think strikes are a terrible idea right now, they'll cause a lot of harm to students without budging university leadership

If they lead to lower student numbers it just puts more jobs on the chopping block

We need more ideas to pressure employers than just strikes

I agree - surely strikes will make an already difficult situation even worse?

So our place has just voted and something like 80% in favour of a strike, was a 65% turn out for the vote. That was an initial, testing the water type vote. Not an official one, I think officially it needs to be done by post??? Not sure what the next stage is.

DD not bothered if degree classification later (her new employer will be fine too). I think now everything has been submitted she's moved on mentally to next stage.

Worse for those in earlier years or considering further study.

What do uni staff hope to achieve by striking? I can only see downsides - for some well known unis this is the second lot of major strikes over a 2-3 year period and it's bound to put off next year's UCAS applicants. Won't that lead to more job losses rather than fewer?

No I agree. I suspect when it comes to any official ballot there won’t be enough yes votes for it to happen. The union seem adamant there doesn’t need to be the amount of cuts the uni are talking about. So hoping to get the cuts stopped. I think the union are pissing in the wind.

I am supportive of unions and union action generally but I don't rate UCU. The role of unions during major transformational change is more difficult though, they seem hard-wired to "resist" changes that will ensure longer-term stability.

Having said that, when the future is so uncertain maybe it's a logical move.

This is interesting:

Global talent & local growth: the export and jobs benefits of international students

In 26 constituencies in the country, higher education (and directly associated exports) is the single largest export sector in that constituency, and is in the top 3 in 102 constituencies.

Surprising number of London constituencies in that top 26, but also a reflection on how rural economies are supported by regional universities.

Thanks for posting that @GinForBreakfast

there used to be, and probably still is, a breakdown of parliamentary constituency by rurality. It covered six categories from major urban through to Rural 75. It’s a shame that analysis did not include that as it would have evidenced your regional point.

a last minute mapping against recent local election voting would also have been interesting - although the report would have been finalised well ahead of those results and voting percentages at ward level being available. So not in any way realistic for inclusion.

Is this not based on pink book and ONS data? There are slight issues in that cars , as used in the comparison, don’t buy food and rent homes. There is of course value to international students and this is why universities are desperate to get them. London has always been the destination of choice, hence more economic value to London. Slightly surprised at Bangor and Sunderland.

https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/news-blog-and-events/press-and-media/ofs-analysis-finds-continued-pressure-on-university-finances/

That’s an interesting report. I see the OFS is concerned that universities do “not have access to the skills, knowledge and capacity to deliver necessary operational reform and strategic financial reform”. I agree. Judging by some utterances on this thread it’s very obvious. Anyone in business looking at the growth in student numbers the universities are suggesting must think they are living in cloud cuckoo land.

I’m actually beginning to hope my university goes bust. A colleague has left our small team and not getting replaced. So the amount of teaching time for everyone else will be increased by 33%, I’ve done the sums. Plus more marking and more personal students.

think I will just go off with stress for a year and then leave. I’m done with it, absolutely done with it.

DB did a HND in Engineering in the early 90s at Sheffield Poly. Could have done another year to convert it to a degree but was too bone idle 😀. Still, he has always had pretty good and well paid jobs from it.

I knew people at Sheffield poly in the late 80s. And some were on the degree others HND.

We’re preparing for universities to fail, regulator warns

https://www.thetimes.com/article/19125978-e44c-40ef-a0f0-5d7cec605bba?shareToken=1dad38c2b878adade29ea17b1837f350

@bigTillyMint There were loads of us doing part time HNCs and of course full
time students were doing a mix of degrees and HNDs. The whole point was that HND students (and HNC) could move up to degrees if good enough. I moved on to HR qualifications instead. Now it’s a 3 year expensive degree to get to exactly the same place in terms of qualifications. BEng is now the minimum for professional engineers. Everything has been moved up because we only have unis offering HE. We have virtually no breadth of qualifications.

I'm so sorry to hear this. Look after yourself ❤️

I think that many universities would love to be able to offer a wider breadth of courses . Unfortunately the current system doesn't make them financially viable.

Yes, the current financial problems will lead to fewer courses as the less viable ones are closed.

It's already happening.
Choice is already reduced for students. At my institution we've got rid of more than a quarter of our modules in the last year with more cuts coming. This means very few optional module choices for students.

Not to mention the closure of courses that were more than viable 2-3 years ago but now need at least double the number of students to break even. These are high quality courses with excellent graduate outcomes and student satisfaction.
I've just had to close a course that has 100% graduate employability and is one of the top courses for student satisfaction across the whole university. It's a niche course which trains people to do a particular job, a job that's beneficial to society and where there is a significant skills shortage. We average 20 students a year. It's not enough so it will close.

There are people this thread that assume a rationalised system and curriculum will mean we lose the poor quality courses leaving a higher quality higher education system. They don't seem to appreciate that it's also having an impact on high quality courses too.

Again, I really don't know how people's anecdotes from 40+ years ago are relevant to the issues of today. Unless people just like to add their own waffle.

Imagine if, in the 1980s, people said to Polytechnic students that studying (for example) business was pointless (and in fairness business as a subject of study is relatively new, the idea of a professional manager is a modern invention). Going down the mines was the answer - we'll always need coal after all.