Are 5.5 teaching hours a week normal for a full-time degree?

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My dd has just been sent her timetable for her 2nd year at university and her teaching hours are only 5.5 per week. I do not understand how a full time degree can be only this many hours per week. Can anyone advise if this is allowed for the fees being charged

Is there definitely not an error with her timetable?

Or has she chosen all spring term modules and only a couple autumn?

This is not uncommon in some arts degrees

What is her degree? And as pp pointed out have you looked at her full year not just this semestre

5 lectures a week plus a seminar?

Uni is mostly self study. For each of those lectures you will have mandatory reading materials 1-2 hours for a non oxbridge uni. You then have to do extra reading for all of your assessments and actually do the assessments.

ususlly would expect a bit more, about nine hours a week for each semester. Has she definitely got three modules showing?

Is it an arts, humanities or social science degree? It's a bit light, but when I was studying/teaching 8 hours per week was fairly typical for that type of degree. Students were expected to do quite a lot of self-directed study, but there was one lecturer in the department who studied in Russia who was endlessly frustrated that students weren't in full-time getting a broad-based education across all the subjects (for example not just studying politics but also doing criminology, law, economics, sociology, philosophy etc).Tuition fees weren't so steep then, either so I suppose self-directed study is harder to justify.

Completely depends what her degree is.

My Mech Eng degree was 32 hours teaching a week. In the same uni the Comp Sci degree was 11. The difference was in self directed learning and assignments. 5.5 hrs does seem on the extreme low end though.

It does sound light. 9 hours per week is standard for humanities degrees now, and usually 3 “modules” with 3 hours of contact time each.

The rest of the student’s time is for preparation reading (at least 6 hours per module), further reading (at least 6 hours per module), and the rest is reading from independent research and work towards assignments.

Could she be missing a module, or taking something that might not show up on her timetable this term, like a work placement type thing?

She might not have selected any optional modules

English or Engineering? Normal for one, not for the other.

Her degree is forensic psychology and her hours do increase slightly throughout the year. They never go above 8 in total

And of course it’s allowed for the fees. Uni isn’t school.

For instance English degrees will require students to read many books. How productive is it to have a lecture where everyone sits in silence reading the required books?

Our part timers (engineering) do more than that!

My dd is studying politics and has 1.5 days per week in year 2 which I think is a bit rubbish tbh. I guess she has to do lots of self study. Doesn't feel like much for £9k tho!

Mine was a business arts type degree and it was about 20. My friend did English and it was about 6, I used to laugh!

Id be annoyed at 5 with the fees now.

I don't think it's unusual. A lot of self study is expected

Does she not use the library then? Or the students union? Or the VLE? Or the IT facilities? Or like to have her assessment marks recorded? Does she not have friends on science courses who use labs? Or chemicals? Or bloody expensive equipment?

5 hours seems very little . 9-12 tends to be the average .

Business and International studies was 8 hours a week for all 3 years!
An oriental language was 40 hours per week in year 1, 35 in year 2, year 3 abroad and 20 in year 4 (years 3 and 4 were during lock down and then reduced contact mostly online). Both children did the work and got Firsts - one did a lot of self study plus essays the other had a lot if teaching time plus essays and weekly tests. So it varies from course to course and uni to uni.

I did History in the early 90s and in one term of my second year had 2 hours of contact time! Had an enormous reading list and about 12 essays to write though..

Is it BPS accredited?

I did a BPS accredited degree in psychology and in my 3rd year I had four hours a week. Can’t remember what we had in 2nd year but it wasn’t that much more. Even in 1st year I think I had about 10.

So should humanities students be funding everything else? That’s not fair. Why should they not get more hours?

I think the argument that humanities have to do more self learning is a very convenient excuse by unis!