A Third Of Universities To Charge Standard £9,000 Fee

[StainlessSteelCat]

I am astonished most degrees seem to cost so much. Assuming something like 800 hours of teaching per year eg roughly 20 hours/week at 40 weeks (plus a grand or so for incidentals) - that's £100 an hour per student and being pretty generous in terms of the level of contact (one of my Dad's classes simply involved the lecturer spending 1 hour outlining what was required and telling him and the rest of the class where to hand in the assignment 10 weeks later). Frankly I bet there isn't much degree level one-on-one tutition that you couldn't get for less than £100/hour - . and let's not forget that an awful lot of the teaching in the first couple of years will be to dozens if not hundreds of students at a time.

Admittedly, some of the more practical stuff might be quite expensive - but that might be mostly capital cost. We were often using 30 year old equipment in our biochemistry practical classes (and they were often all day with the lecturer disappearing off for most of the day, especially since they were usually on a Friday).

If you are a humanities student with 10 hours of classes a week, it all starts to look even less value for money.

[fluffy666]

No burden as they don't actually want the capital to be repaid. As has been stated already, this is just a graduate tax for the poor.

No.. the poor (or at least those who don't earn much post-uni) pay very little.

The high flyers pay it off quickly, so don't pay a lot of interest.

It's the middle who will be paying till they are 50.

Seems to be that instead of funding it through general taxation - whereby those who gain most from university pay most - we are just transferring payment from rich to middle. Mind you, this does fit in with the general thrust of neocon policy..

[The Ayatollah Buggeri]

I am astonished most degrees seem to cost so much. Assuming something like 800 hours of teaching per year eg roughly 20 hours/week at 40 weeks (plus a grand or so for incidentals) - that's £100 an hour per student and being pretty generous in terms of the level of contact (one of my Dad's classes simply involved the lecturer spending 1 hour outlining what was required and telling him and the rest of the class where to hand in the assignment 10 weeks later).

The myth has become firmly entrenched that the only costs to universities of delivering undergraduate teaching is of contact time with fully qualified lecturers, and that the volume of this contact time is the sole criterion by which the quality of the resulting degree should be judged. It isn't and it shouldn't. About ten hours a week of formal, structured contact time is about right for my students (modern history in a mid-ranking Russell Group institution). However, their tuition fees also buy them the following:

1. Extensive student support services for everything from disability issues to dealing with unscrupulous landlords.

2. Membership of one of the ten largest academic libraries in the country, which would cost £500 a year for someone who is not a student or staff member of the institution.

3. Access to 100 or so academic journals and other electronic resources relevant to their study online, each of which would cost three figures if subscribed to as a private individual.

4. The ability to buy computer software at heavily subsidised prices.

5. Other tutorial support, e.g. language courses, if students choose to take advantage of it (most of them don't).

6. Tutorial support via a virtual learning environment.

7. Assessment, and most importantly the opportunity to earn a degree with our institution's name on it. Ultimately, this is what most institutions will stand or fall on in the era of higher fees.

And furthermore, to those who perpetuate the 'all lecturers are lazy' myth (though I'm not denying that some are), I would point out that undergraduate teaching constitutes about a quarter to a third of most academics' workloads. Postgraduate teaching and supervision, research (and the fundraising to support it) and administration make up the rest.

[Tiger Woods?]

However, their tuition fees also buy them the following:

1. Extensive student support services for everything from disability issues to dealing with unscrupulous landlords.

2. Membership of one of the ten largest academic libraries in the country, which would cost £500 a year for someone who is not a student or staff member of the institution.

3. Access to 100 or so academic journals and other electronic resources relevant to their study online, each of which would cost three figures if subscribed to as a private individual.

4. The ability to buy computer software at heavily subsidised prices.

5. Other tutorial support, e.g. language courses, if students choose to take advantage of it (most of them don't).

6. Tutorial support via a virtual learning environment.

7. Assessment, and most importantly the opportunity to earn a degree with our institution's name on it. Ultimately, this is what most institutions will stand or fall on in the era of higher fees.

£9000 = £15-£30 per hour contact depending on subject (which seems reasonable). However, much of that contact is 1 to 100 or similar.

Savings could be made though.

1. An unnecessary luxury.

2. The depth of the library's holdings is not that relevant to undergraduates in a lot of subjects. History and some other social sciences/arts subjects obviously do need deeper levels of resources, but these subjects tend to have fewer contact hours.

3. The content of which, in many cases, is generated for free, refereed for free, typeset for free and these days, more often than not delivered electronically. Academia needs to boycott Elsevier and retake control of the literature. Some subjects, such as mathematics, physics, and economics have well established electronic preprint systems.

4. The free software movement makes this irrelevant. I managed to do all my degrees, including typesetting without using non-free software. This was between 1987 and 1997. There is much better software available now. Indeed, one of the leading statistical packages ® is freeware.

5. Would be included in contact hours.

6. Virtual learning environments not useful and didn't exist 15 years ago. Tutorials with real people are. Again, covered by contact hours.

7. Tutorials marked by grad students (not expensive); exams once a term - more or less subsumed in contact hours.

And furthermore, to those who perpetuate the 'all lecturers are lazy' myth (though I'm not denying that some are), I would point out that undergraduate teaching constitutes about a quarter to a third of most academics' workloads. Postgraduate teaching and supervision, research (and the fundraising to support it) and administration make up the rest.

I haven't met too many lazy academics...or at least not one who has survived for long (especially these days.) A lot of their time, these days, tends to be taken up dealing with ever expanding bureaucracies' needs to justify their existence.

[StainlessSteelCat]

The myth has become firmly entrenched that the only costs to universities of delivering undergraduate teaching is of contact time with fully qualified lecturers, and that the volume of this contact time is the sole criterion by which the quality of the resulting degree should be judged. It isn't and it shouldn't. About ten hours a week of formal, structured contact time is about right for my students (modern history in a mid-ranking Russell Group institution). However, their tuition fees also buy them the following:

1. Extensive student support services for everything from disability issues to dealing with unscrupulous landlords.

2. Membership of one of the ten largest academic libraries in the country, which would cost £500 a year for someone who is not a student or staff member of the institution.

3. Access to 100 or so academic journals and other electronic resources relevant to their study online, each of which would cost three figures if subscribed to as a private individual.

4. The ability to buy computer software at heavily subsidised prices.

5. Other tutorial support, e.g. language courses, if students choose to take advantage of it (most of them don't).

6. Tutorial support via a virtual learning environment.

7. Assessment, and most importantly the opportunity to earn a degree with our institution's name on it. Ultimately, this is what most institutions will stand or fall on in the era of higher fees.

And furthermore, to those who perpetuate the 'all lecturers are lazy' myth (though I'm not denying that some are), I would point out that undergraduate teaching constitutes about a quarter to a third of most academics' workloads. Postgraduate teaching and supervision, research (and the fundraising to support it) and administration make up the rest.

I both worked and studied at a university. Believe me every expense was spared. Photocopied graph paper FFS. For many academics, students were a source of free or cheap research labour or got in the way of their real work - research. And this was a university which was well regarded for it's teaching (probably more so than its research).

1. There are other places to get most of these services.

2. OK so the £500 could come out of the £1000 incidentals

3. Agree with the previous poster. I'm amazed that many journals still exist in the internet age.

4. There are lots of free alternatives for most software. Frankly, many software companies would give them away for free to get youngsters hooked before they go into employment. Anyone who works in education or is studying can get fantastic discounts via online vendors anyhow.

5. Perhaps this could be an opt-in cost?

6. I've used better forums than some virtual learning environments (although admittedly that was around 5 years ago - perhaps they have improved since). For most, it was a case of students helping each other with the tutor curiously absent.

7. Really this comes down to branding.

Having worked at a university, I've never subscribed to the myth that academics were lazy (many were ridiculously hardworking for poor pay) - although those getting close to retirement and on tenure were more often or not to be found in their office studying the newspaper for much of the morning and power napping for large chunks of the afternoon. It does make you wonder where the money is really going. Not forgetting, of course, that students fees aren't unis only source of income.

I do think some universities will have to work a lot harder in the future to earn their keep. You've listed a few benefits and offer 10 hours of contact a week during term time (probably as a group session). Looking at it impartially - would I really think that £27K+ living costs (plus the opportunity cost of not being able to work for 3 years) was worth it compared to some of the alternatives? When it comes down to it we are relying an awful lot on branding and student/employer inertia.

Edited July 14, 2011 by StainlessSteelCat

[interestrateripoff]

Having worked at a university, I've never subscribed to the myth that academics were lazy (many were ridiculously hardworking for poor pay) - although those getting close to retirement and on tenure were more often or not to be found in their office studying the newspaper for much of the morning and power napping for large chunks of the afternoon. It does make you wonder where the money is really going. Not forgetting, of course, that students fees aren't unis only source of income.

The VC's seem to have got a nice little fiefdoms going, they usually have free lodgings, will quite happily use University porters as their own personal removal team, chauffeur etc... No luxury can be spared for those at the top.

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/2011/07/06/anger-as-senior-university-staff-claim-thousands-for-chauffeur-services-and-luxury-hotels-91466-29001874/