What's your opinions on the CBI report out today?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/8263672.stm

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2009/sep/21/cbi-university-fees-funding-crisis

I wholly agree with the need to focus on more economically important courses such as maths and engineering - how else is the uk going to generate any kind of wealth... by becoming a nation of BTL landlords?
It will be a SAD day if they start charging more for University education. I come from a working class family and I can't tell you how proud I am to have graduated from Edinburgh uni with a 1st in electronics & electrical engineering. I almost never went as I was scared of the debt (which I do have, but it was worth it). I WHOLEHEARTEDLY agree that uni should be for those who have the desire, passion and determination to do well and should NOT be based upon ability to pay whatsoever.
I feel very, very strongly about this.

Hi Sneaks,

I don't know about having it too easy! I don't get any funding at all.

I think if the government wants 50% of the population to be graduates then they have to facilitate it in some way financially, or create situations whereby students can afford to pay for themselves. More student debt, plus a massive mortgage will make having a family practically impossible: the government is pushing women to reproduce before they are 30! How on earth can they do that with masses of student debt and a whopping great deposit too save for?

The Uni funding situation does scare me though - I'm no economist or politician, so I don't have any great answers to this problem - but I hope someone comes up with something good and saves our universities - I have no idea how teaching could be cut any further, most people I know (in new universities) are literally having nervous breakdowns already.

This is a good thread, I'm looking forward to reading the other responses. A great way to procrastinate... usefully.

if tuition fees had been any higher when i was at university, i wouldn't have been able to go, it's as simple as that. university should not be for the privileged few; it should be accessible to everyone. if my sister and i had been closer in age, neither of would have been able to go as our times at university would have overlapped and my family simply could not have afforded two sets of fees at the same time. the introduction of fees has ruined the chances of so many, as the fear of surviving on so little money for the duration of the degree and then being landed with thousands of pounds worth of debt has scared many people off the idea. being a postgrad means that at the age of 26 i have barely paid off any of my student loan, and the thought of paying it off makes me feel physically sick (so i just try not to think about it ;-) ). how any could possibly think this is a good idea that will benefit future society is beyond me.

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I think the real worrying thing for me is the "commercial rates" on loans and the emphasis on Science over the Humanities.

The current income contingent repayment loans is probably one of the most balanced deals that students and taxpayer can get. The student only pays when they earn above a certain income threshold and the interest payments are absorbed by the taxpayer. There is a partnership between State and Student and to me the balance of the burden seems reasonable in that the Student repays much of the cost of their education but the State provides a safety net and prevents the total money owed spirally out of control.

I think if we start down the road of charging commercial rates and emphasising the "economically useful" subjects - this will do considerable damage to this student-state partnership. At the moment, people who study the Arts and Humanities already find it tough but, if we get into a situation where students take on the majority or all the risk for their tertiary education, I cannot see why anyone would want to study the Humanities at all!

No matter how tight the State's purse strings are it is necessary to maintain funding in these areas and we should not dismiss them as economically irrelevant.

(PS I'm a scientist!)

You've got to admire the CBI's balls. They come right out and say they want more and more people going to uni precisely because that sort of well-educated workforce will help them make pots and pots of cash; but do they go on to suggest they might therefore be prepared to invest a bit more in educating that workforce, e.g. via an increase in corporation tax? Do they arse! The students are supposed to stump up themselves.

I think getting 50% into higher ed is too general a view to try to increase the future economic position, rather than focus on all these mickey mouse courses (feel a slating coming on:$) like foundation degrees in almost every subject you could think of just to get more people into HE, like a degree in hairdressing management - for goodness sakes, you need work experience for that not a degree, its just churning out more people that cant get a job when they have completed, or when they have completed if they are already employed (as is the case with many foundation degrees) then they feel dissatisfied that they are now qualified to a level 4/5 with no extra pay to show for it.  The focus should be on the type of degrees that would produce a more viable economic climate such as science, maths engineering etc. Also perhaps over 50% of the population are more suited to other types of work, this country needs the plumbers, builders, hairdressers, dustbin men, shop workers and such like, and I expect good plumbers are earning more than your typical teacher/accountant anyway.  And capable people that are claiming unemployment benefit should automatically be enlisted to do community service - sorry changing subjects.

I self-funded my degrees, I worked all the hours I could to pay my masters, didnt get a loan, I just paid as I went along, and I know I should have had funds secured when I started, but I didnt, i just when along to my lectures, expecting to get thrown out within the first few weeks, and as soon as I earned a bit of money i paid some fees.  I do think HE should be open for all, and the ones that have enough determination will get there regardless of the fees; perhaps they should expect to have to earn some of the money themselves rather than relying on totally on loans, parents etc.

hmm - I agree its the type of degree, but didn't the conservatives come out and say they were going to league table the courses, giving 'proper' courses more points. But I worry about this because I do psychology, which is often seen as a soft subject. It does however, provide you with a balanced range of skills with an equal amount of literacy/numeracy/critical appraisal skills. It is also a science (i.e. not just body language and dream analysis like so many people think).

Who would decide what was a 'proper' subject?? I would consider film studies a complete waste of time, but I am sure a film director may consider it differently! Who knows!

Maybe a better way would be to change the class system (not the posh vs common lol but 1st vs 2:1). If you had a greater range of degrees, then you could single out the 'elite' i.e. you wouldn't end up with 90% of people getting a 2:1 and therefore employers might value the degree class a little more.

Hey Sneaks, I'm a film studies person! Why is it more of a waste of time than literature, or art history? Don't get that...

I agree that my reserach is not likely to save many lives, but where would we be without culture and art - there is scientific research which has proven that our capacity for art is ie sophisticated communication is what helped us human survive when other human like species did not. we need culture to retain our identities, bring in revenue, explore our experiences. My reserahc looks at national identity in British film, so it impacts on how the UK perceives itself as well as how our country is seen by the rest of the world.

As for psychology, I'd say that was pretty essential, and where would psychology be without the arts (Freud for example???)? Where would science be without science fiction? The arts are about possibilities, and cinema, television and the other arts are often where our culture explores its anxieties and dreams - we need them in order to advance.

In my opinion the complete wastes of money and time are in reserch into space travel and nuclear weaponry, but that's just my opinion.

To me, a 'proper' course is something like science, engineering (that's me), maths, medicine, veterinary, perhaps business. If those go, the country would feel it.

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P.S. I love my culture & the arts etc!
I have to TOTALLY disagree about research into nuclear and space travel being a waste of time.... :o :o

My field is media and comm, so, in agreement with Eska, I think it is absolutely pointless to say one subject is important while another isnt. Society, and the economic climate of specific times may position certain areas of inquiry to be more urgent than others, this however, is regardless of their value and importance.

PS: Arts, culture, literature, the media are sites of great tussles of power, politics and similar and their impact on society is more than profound. Hence the research.

But this will now blow up into a mess, i fear :-) So, bye!!

PS: also, I dont find it worth my (our) while to stop to disagree with viewpoints that find science subjects more important and 'real' than humanities and social sciences.

This is clearly a wrong view, and hence does not merit debate.

(perhaps my strongest feeling ever, on this forum, from the day I joined)

I'm actually really p'd off with that comment about film studies sneaks! I can only assume it was made in a level of ignorance I find shocking coming from a psychologist. My first degree was 50/50 Literature and Film, and my MA in art history, and all three disciplines contribute to essential elements of our culture. What do you mean by 'proper' courses? because the film studies element of my BA was far more difficult than the literature element, and I had to get much better A'level grades to get on the Film and Literature BA, than if I'd just gone for Literature - three As in fact. Are you suggesting we scrap all arts courses? or make them nigh on impossible to get without rich parents? Because that would lead to deep and damaging inbalance of culture in our country - it would leave poorer people out of the equation, and probably throw us back to pre-war quasi wildlife film style representation ala Chumly Warner on Harry Enfield. What do you think got us through the second world war without throwing ourselves off the white cliffs of Dover? Oh yes! the arts - cinema, music and other weapons in the arsenal of moral building/propaganda! I'm going now, to get on with my film studies research, with the clear knowledge that I do so in spite of such ignorance and opposition.

Well I'm also in Psychology (clinical psych) and I agree that a lot of people think that it is a 'soft' subject without having any idea of what it entails. I took it as BSc then MSc (as opposed to BA and MA) and now PhD and my friends and family have been amazed at how 'scientific' it is. When they realised that I was spending a lot of my time studying neuroscience, brain anatomy, brain imaging, biological psychiatry etc and learning complex statistical techniques required for the research component of the courses they soon changed their views of psychology! And for the most part it is considered a science at university level anyway now. But most people seem to think it is a degree in counselling or mind-reading or something, and the use of psychologists on TV 'analysing' body language on Big Brother or whatever does the profession no favours at all....Ah well, rant over. Slightly off the point, sorry guys!! KB