Lord Browne’s report into alternative possibilities for funding universities was published yesterday. Draft proposals saw recommendations for a rise in tuition fees to as much as £10,000 a year, yet the University bureaucracy has as usual remained vague about the subject, refusing to say whether, if the cap on tuition fees was lifted, University of York students would also face the burden of yet more student debt after graduation.
Browne’s advocation of a rise in fees comes as a result of two of the main options for funding universities being considered. The first is limiting the funding provided to students by the government, forcing universities to make up the difference and subsidise students on more costly courses themselves. Another is to have banks lend students the money to fund a degree, and recoup the debt through graduate loan repayments. Both of these measures are designed to lift pressure from the government over funding higher education, and move it elsewhere. Proposals of developing a graduate tax, to be paid after graduation and based on earnings, seem to have been rejected.
When questioned about the report, and what it would mean for University of York students, the university admitted that it had carried out scenario planning in advance of the outcome of the Browne review, although it refused to say whether or not it too would raise tuition fees if the cap were to be removed, only stating that it “would support proposals that provided high quality education for students and opportunity for all, regardless of background.”
Unfortunately it seems likely that, the University of York will have little choice but to follow suit if the government does limit the funding of higher education and other universities hike up the fees of more expensive courses, especially if it is to retain its place as a top university in such a competitive market. This would mean different things for different students. A second year English student admitted that he wouldn’t have such a problem with different courses costing different amounts:
“I really love my course, but it does annoy me that I’m currently paying the same as, for example, a chemistry student who’s in uni over 30 hours a week and is always using expensive equipment and materials, when I have four hours a week of lectures and don’t even get help buying books! It would be nice to know that I was paying the actual cost of my course, not just subsidising other people.”
Students of these expensive courses may feel a little differently if their fees were to rise in accordance with the actual cost of their course. There is a danger that such a measure would put off students from poorer backgrounds from paying more to do a more intensive course or study at a better university, creating a class divide within the university system.
It is as yet unclear which of these proposals will be adopted by the government, but what seems like an inevitable rise in fees is likely to be introduced around 2013.