MORE APPLY TO UNIVERSITIES DESPITE FEES HIKE
UNIVERSITY applications have risen by nearly three per cent, official figures showed yesterday.
Experts hailed the rise following a drop last year and welcomed an 80 per cent hike in applicants from poorer backgrounds over the last decade.
Business secretary Vince Cable said: "These figures confound the pessimists predicting that the new system of student financing would deter young people.
"What is especially striking is that students from poorer backgrounds are not put off."
Ucas, the admissions organisation, said the 2.8 per cent rise in British applicants was "encouraging" following a 10 per drop last year due to the controversial trebling of tuition fees to £9,000.
By the January 15 deadline, 475,587 people had applied to start degree courses this autumn, up 13,080 (2.8 per cent) on last year. An overall increase of 3.5 per cent was boosted by a recovery in overseas applicants.
"This is an encouraging report, with no double-dip for applications," said Ucas chief Mary Curnock Cook. Applications were up seven per cent in Northern Ireland, three per cent in England, two per cent in Scotland. But they fell by two per cent in Wales.
Paul Holmes Chesterfield - Comments
Ref the rise in University applications (less than the headline figure when overseas students are taken out, but still an increase) there is an obvious point or two that needs making:
Over the last 10 years the % of 18 year olds attending university in the UK has risen overall and the % of students from lower income households has risen from around 9 or 10% in 2004 to around 18% now, whilst the % from more affluent households has risen from around 48% to 54%. New Labour kept telling us that this increase was proof that their introduction of Fees after 1997 and their later trebling of them had no detrimental effect on applications. Now the Coalition are saying the same (about their trebling of Fees to among the highest in the Western World).
But this ignores all the other factors at play:
1. Schools have been under constant pressure to 'up their game' from Callaghans 'Great Education Debate' of the 1970's, through Kenneth Bakers introduction of OFSTED and league Tables in the 1980's and on through New Labour's 'naming and shaming' etc from 1997-2010. Pressure and standards led to major improvements in performance and work rates by teachers and pupils alike, some good and some like teaching to the test not so good. The numbers/% of pupils leaving school with higher grades at 16 and staying on until 18 to study A Levels (and similar courses) is now massively higher than it ever was at any point in the past. This is especially so as compared to the mythical 'golden days' of Michael Gove's fantasy world in the 1950/60's when the majority of 15/16 year olds in reality left school without sitting or passing any academic qualifications at all. My age cohort was the last, in 1972/3, when you could leave school at 15 with no qualifications at all - many did even then.
2. The zeitgeist has shifted over the last 30 years in that Government, society, parents, all have much more expectation that those capable of doing so should 'stay on' at 16 and then go on to University at 18/19. This shift has been general (for example the massive shift in attitudes as to what girls futures held for them other than a temporary job followed by marriage and staying at home to bring up children), and more specific as in New Labour's massive publicity crusade that 50% of 18 year olds should go to University (still less than many of our Western competitor countries). Also of course the simple fact is that most unskilled jobs have disappeared. I lose count of how many times as a Head of Sixth Form 1988-2000 (recruiting entrants at 16 and advising job/Uni applicants at 18) I used the simple example of coal mining -one million miners in 1970, no academic qualifications required for a dirty, dangerous but after the 1972 strike a well paid job; under 6,000 today. As a result whole (ex)mining communities, such as those I know very well in and around Chesterfield, have discovered education as a route to jobs. The same case can be made for other industries and communities such as my home City of Sheffield where almost all my adult relatives worked in the steel industry whilst many of the women (like my mother) worked in jobs such as packing cutlery for the once mighty Viners.
The overall % attending University and the % from working class backgrounds has been rising all over the OECD countries -and the UK is generally behind the curve. Simplistic headlines really do not do the issue justice. What increase would there have been if we did not now have some of the highest Tuition Fees in the Western World? Are we happy that university entrants from lower income backgrounds may be increasing but mainly go for the shorter and therefore cheaper courses rather than for example medicine or law? How many will go on to yet more debt in postgrad work? The evidence I studied in Canberra and Sydney on a visit to Australia (where their, then 10 year old, Fees system was the model for the English one) was very negative in those respects.
Paul Holmes.
PS We are also in the worst economic recession since the early 1930's - and it is already longer than the Great Depression was. Go on the 'dole' in 2013 or go to University in the hope things have changed in 3 years time?
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