Would the fact uni of York is in financial difficulties put you off your dc going there?

[JennyTals]

? Would that influence you at all ?

That’s interesting. My nephew failed one module of his first year and was then in hospital very unwell on the resit date. Despite doing well with all his assignments and all other exams York have made him pay £10K to resit the year or wait 12 months to do that exam again before entering the 2nd year.

You have to wonder whether this kind of cut throat behaviour is linked to the uni finances.. yes I would think twice about going there.

Actual data is here. Sorting by Net Liquidity is interesting.

https://www.hesa.ac.uk/data-and-analysis/finances/kfi

They’re at no more risk of any other university of going bust. Yes the whole sector is in financial shit but that doesn’t mean that a university is going to “go bust”.

The university I work at has a shortfall of £50 million, I had to sit through a finance meeting the other week and the bigwigs are confident that things are on a good trajectory. Yes changes have been made, there have been redundancies, same everywhere.

Naming specific universities is really unhelpful for two reasons. Firstly your information is often incorrectly interpreted (believe me if I was going to predict some universities to go bust York would not even be in my top 5). Secondly spreading fear mongering gossip runs the risk of it becoming a self fulfilling prophecy. Word gets round, students don’t go and then the university goes bust! Whereas if there hadn’t been the gossip it would have been fine. I feel like it’s that scene in Mary Poppins where there’s a run on the bank for no good reason.

All universities are in trouble and the reality is that the majority of universities will have to take fairly drastic action to survive. I work at Cambridge and we are facing a 5% budget cut and a 2 year recruitment freeze. I wouldn’t be worried by York specifically, at least they seem to have a carefully considered plan.

@MollieSugdon is correct this was "done" earlier in the year.
Obviously anyone can say they are anything online but the poster seemed genuine regarding the finances . You could find that thread ?

And if we’re quoting numbers let’s make it the right number. It’s £24m deficit.
Think the PP who first mentioned it probably mistyped and then it was copied as correct.

Latest news:

www.timeshighereducation.com/news/york-and-st-andrews-latest-post-multimillion-pound-deficits

https://qmucu.org/qmul-transformation/uk-he-shrinking/

The government won’t let universities go bust. I think it would be wise to research the likelihood of his subject being dropped, also the financial impact of going to what is a relatively expensive city to live in.

@SatisfiedMind
For those of us without the Times, what is the deficit and is it going in the right direction.

@stubiff
(it’s not the Times any more - registration is free)

Deficit has improved:

“York reported a consolidated £9 million adjusted deficit, which was its second successive year of making a loss.
However, it said increased income and cost-saving measures had allowed it to improve its position from the £13 million deficit seen the year before. The university alone, excluding subsidiaries, reported a £6 million deficit, which was down from a £24 million deficit in 2022-23.”

York uni isn't in financial difficulty and certainly not on the verge of going bust.

The reality is, many universities are in the same boat, as are hospitals and schools! You honestly wouldn't believe the millions of pounds of debt an individual hospital can be in.

Definitely interesting to see the low end outliers in that list. Durham is a particular surprise.

Possibly this one?https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/higher_education/5164744-some-universities-will-go-bust-thread-2

External borrowing as a % of total income is surely a killer stat. Some are above 100%. It’s clear from that their borrowing is immense.

Closing buildings and turning off heating over the Uni Christmas holiday is a tale as old as time. It’s always freezing being the first ones back in the buildings on 2 January. Don’t read anything into that!

We visited York and the facilities for the courses of interest looked very dated, the presentation from the staff was uninspiring, and the accommodation was trumpeted by everyone beforehand as luxurious. It was cramped and expensive.

They seemed to trade on their Russell Group status and failed to understand some potential customers students, in the current financial climate, prioritise value for money.

But that's not really relevant to the question asked - you just didn't really like the Uni. My DC enjoyed the subject talk and like the Uni and accommodation. They didn't like one uni with shiny new buildings for several reasons. Different universities will appeal to different types and often dependent on the subject.

The whole sector is struggling as I understand it: Id be amazed if somewhere as big as york went under. I know two teens at York (different subjects; very different personalities, different years) and both have had very positive experiences overall. So no, it wouldn’t put me off.

OU is completely different. You don't get the advantage of friends and a real cohort of people to learn with, you don't get the support services, there is no library access. (Yes you can apply for reciprocal access of a local university library if you have one but it isn't the same.) In my experience they are horribly disorganised as well. I wouldn't recommend them for anyone who is able to do a degree at a traditional university - many universities are now diversifying into online courses so its not now OU or nothing if you can't attend in person.

Oxbridge has been using postgrads to teach for many decades so I don’t think that’s a sign of stress all by itself.

We have too many universities, too many pointless degrees, too much student debt. There will be a rationalisation - that is market forces (and Brexit).

@MonopolyQueen It’s obvious we have too many unis. Two in York! Why? There needs to be mergers and a few closures as universities. Some should revert to HE and offer a few degrees supported by another university. HE courses should be available for the lower grade A level students who need apprenticeships or 2 year HND type courses. Our FE college here isn’t great and dc are funnelled into a poor uni. There should be better options. Unis don’t seem capable of thinking about the finance issues in a creative way.

The government needs to sort out the visa issue. I'm in Scotland and our now shit Scot Gov also needs to accept that Scottish students should pay some fees.

@PrimalLass Is it making it more competitive for Scottish students to get to uni as other students pay more? I’m constantly surprised at the situation in Scotland which means their own students are not valued.

There's limited numbers of places for Scottish students on some courses. We are encouraging a culture of mediocrity as our students can't access the top universities. It does seem to have got better but the govt needs to smell the cheese and accept that our students need to pay even some fees.