My tale of me - Chris Jenkinson

“Dear Tony Lloyd,

As an officer in the University of Manchester Students’ Union, I was shocked at the recent announcement by two-thirds of vice-chancellors, speaking anonymously, calling for an increase in the cap on tuition fees to at least £4000 per year, with some calling for it to be £20,000.

I strongly believe that this would be a very regressive move for Parliament to take, and will put off many people from applying to university. Students already graduate with thousands of pounds of debt, and the National Union of Students have estimated that if fees were to rise to £5,000 per year, students would graduate with upwards of £30,000 of debt, a magnitude of debt which is really only on a par with a mortgage on a house!

I am also disappointed that the vice-chancellors are speaking anonymously on this issue, and are not coming out publicly to ask for funds. I support their argument that higher education is underfunded, with class sizes out of control, underpaid staff and a lack of learning resources, but the solution cannot be to pass on the cost to the students.

I would like a debate on funding for higher education, but its terms of reference cannot just be ‘how much more should students pay’, and it cannot be conducted anonymously.

I urge you to oppose any plans by vice-chancellors to increase the cap on tuition fees or pass on costs to students, and I call on you to push for increased funding, from general taxation, for higher education, which must be a priority for this country in times of economic recession.

Yours sincerely,
Chris Jenkinson”

Please write to your MP about this issue as well. Feel free to use some or all of my letter for inspiration or the financial facts within.

The recent announcement that two-thirds of vice-chancellors across the country are lobbying for an increase in the cap on tuition fees is shocking and regressive. What’s worse is that the vice-chancellors are doing it anonymously. It isn’t just a small increase - it’s at least £4000 a year, with many arguing for £20,000 a year and one in ten demanding the ability to set any level. I don’t understand how more debt for students is going to be good for this country, especially in times of recession - students could be graduating with over £30,000 of debt.

It’s ridiculous that vice-chancellors are hiding behind anonymity and making these kind of statements. I want a debate on higher education funding - I don’t believe that higher education is funded well enough -  but I want it to be open and transparent. I want to discuss why universities don’t receive enough resources to pay their staff a decent salary, or why class sizes are out of control, and why there aren’t enough books in the library. I don’t want it to be restricted to ‘how high should the cap be’, or done in the shadows.

I want a debate - but not this debate.

The lack of funding for higher education is not solved simply by raising the cap on tuition fees, as the Economist believes. If the cap were raised to £7,000, an average student may end up owing around £25,000. A key lesson of the current financial crisis must be not to take on unmanageable debt. Putting people off education – the great equaliser – because of this legitimate fear is surely wrong.

Nor will it allow for a fair market as “prestigious” universities, such as the University of Manchester – my own – will be able to charge higher fees than a less prestigious one, such as the University of Loughborough. This is despite students in the National Student Survey rating the quality of courses at Loughborough a whole 10% higher than those at Manchester; and Loughborough students rate their feedback from academics a staggering 20% better than Manchester’s students. Studying at the best research institutions is no good if the best researchers are not actually teaching students.

Before 1997 universities were funded through government taxation, largely because the universities claimed (rightly or wrongly) that they provided a useful public benefit and were spending taxpayers’ money wisely. Successive governments trusted them, and let them get on with the business of providing higher education. The general consensus has been that universities were underfunded, particularly under Conservative governments, still did a decent job, but could always use more money to better educate students and conduct more research.

However, things have massively changed since then. With the introduction of tuition fees and increased focus on comparative league tables, students and public fund scrutiny groups have looked more closely at the “value for money” aspect of higher education - i.e. whether universities are actually delivering what they promise, and whether they are doing so without pouring money down the drain.

One of the consequences of paying for something is that it is viewed more of as a product. Students have started comparing the quality of their education with others, and the results have been surprising to many higher up the university academic ladder, including vice-chancellors. That has prompted reviews of the way teaching has been delivered, including the radical teaching and learning undergraduate review currently being prepared for implementation at the University of Manchester, which has received national press coverage. This is clearly a good thing, and openness about successes and failures should always be encouraged.

However, a less beneficial consequence of tuition fees, and one I will graciously assume was unintended, is that it gives a government less supportive of the public sector the political advantage that it can point to poor quality teaching and argue that public money is wasted on such institutions. When over half the population do not attend university - even with the current government’s drive to increase student numbers - cuts in higher education funding to appease a populace which increasingly perceives itself as overtaxed seem inevitable, especially if the Tories form the next government as is looking likely.

This analysis, if valid, is worrying indeed. Even if tuition fees are abolished and higher education becomes taxpayer funded, the pressure upon universities to ensure their teaching is of good quality is not going to decrease - it is too late to shut the stable door. Ensuring universities are educating students well would seem to be a good thing if it were not the case that the way quality assurance is done for such large numbers of individuals using it is through bureaucratic tick-box exercises, where minimum standards eventually become the actual standard.

It is clear that ensuring the continuation of well-funded higher education instutitions is going to be a difficult battle, especially among the hearts and minds of those who did not and do not attend university. We need strong arguments in favour, particularly that everyone benefits from a more educated populace, not just those who have been educated more. I’m sure I will return to this over the coming academic year.

Another review of the Liberal Democrats’ policy on higher education funding has come up and it’s vital that we maintain our commitment to higher education being accessible to all regardless of background. With an increasingly debt-averse society, it’s clear that the only way to do that is with access to education funded through general taxation.

There’s a group on Facebook created to show the support amongst grassroots Lib Dems for this policy. Please join it and add your comments.