The Browne Review.

Lord Browne’s review of High Education in England proposes a removal of a cap on the fees a University can charge students. The report mentions a ‘Value for Money’ ethos but value for whom exactly? George Osborne is already behind it (3.05pm in the Commons) so I think it bears examination.

Apologies if a lot of anger informs this post, but to subject education and health to market forces in a recession I think will only lead to the problem of a poorly educated workforce with poor health resulting in a massive decline in the quality of life for the majority of people in this country.

So, couple of arguments typed as fast as I come can form them:

Implications for Scotland:

As university becomes more expensive in England, perhaps potential undergrads will flock to Scotland. On one hand, as Scottish students fees are paid for through the Scottish Government, this would mean a boost to our economy with ‘external’ income from English students. However, with a higher demand for university places in Scotland (and at the risk of appropriating an argument eejits use about immigration and employment) will domestic students be crowded out of Scotland’s Universities? Bearing in mind that as our education does not run based on broad ranging market forces supply may not necessarily shift to meet a sudden new demand. Who will lose out here? Will this be compensated for? (English students are not deemed international students by Scottish universities, and rightly so.)

Ghettoization of Education:

As Russell Group Institutions and their ilk take advantage of market rates, the majority of students will be forced to attend university and college based on their ability to pay not on their potential academic ability or the quality of the institution. Maybe this reflects ‘value’ for money if you can afford £10,000 in fees at Oxford or Cambridge but for the vast majority surely the value of higher education is in the quality of the institution you attend and learning or research you can do there? How does the removal of a cap on tuition fees introduce a sense of value to the potential student? Sorry, Consumer.
I imagine what will actually happen is that the majority of students will opt for cheaper higher education institutions, student and graduate debt is already a heavy problem and people as consumers will be unwilling to simply accept more. The result is that the rich will go to the outstanding universities and everyone else will make do.

An example about how something like this would play out in Scotland:
In Scotland, your tuition fees are dealt with by the Scottish Government. What's the major implication of Universities with market based fees on this side of the border then? Over the last ten years in Scotland, more people are entering High Education, this means that SAAS (The Scottish Government) are supporting more learners. If you were to introduce unlimited fees in Scotland I can see SAAS hesitant to fund more the expensive courses at Glasgow/Edinburgh or other Russell Group institutions over cheaper courses at Caledonian, Strathclyde wherever leading to fewer domestic students at these Universities.

Granted, Browne’s review talks of looking out for students in the lowest socioeconomic brackets in the interests of promoting access to those from poor backgrounds but also talks of a ‘minimum grading board’ which will effectively disbar students from applying to Universities with high entrance requirements. With the influence of market forces, surely these will be the most expensive and exclusive institutions? How will this amount to ‘promoting access’ considering that those from poor backgrounds and communities generally do less well in examinations?

I'm running out of time to type this up. So what can be done?
Well you should be writing to your MP about how much you oppose any such review or any legislation to move in this direction in higher education. Especially if your MP is a Liberal Democrat, a party committed to lowering the cost of education for all. The Lib Dems need to know that is something they can't compromise on. And maybe as an insurance you might also want to bring it up to your MSP and say that this is something that could come to haunt us here and they should be on guard against. If you want to take it right up to direct action the National Union of Students will be organising protests against any such measures so you should give them a week look up.

David


Couple of sources that didn't paste well from Word...

http://www.russellgroup.ac.uk/our-universities.aspx

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Statistics/Browse/Lifelong-learning/TrendHEStudentSupport