Hefce unveils teaching cuts

I have just seen this story and I note that the Open University loses £2.5 million, the University of Manchester £1.4 million and the University of Leeds £1.3 million. But I see no full breakdown or Excel file attached! Can't the other 6 just be named, with the amounts stated, so we have a simple overview oris that asking too much?

I can see all the other universities targetted for cuts and the sum. What is foolish for Lammy or the Lord is to include the soft subject are a "Business Studies" which produces graduates with no strong skills. It is ministry of Business and presumably they included it with Engineering! The new universities most of the weak students to Business Studies who come out with all talk and no skills to show.

@Alan - I don't know if the Excel file was not yet posted when you tried to find it, but at this point, you can locate it on the right part of your screen, just beneath the section of the page where the THES subscription ads are situated.

'“It is right that when the nation is tightening its belt in a tough fiscal environment, we ask the higher education sector to do the same,” she said.' Just like banks, MPs, ministers and civil servants are tightening theirs, eh?

I agree with Charlie. With increased competition in the job market, students should be trained with a skill and how to work not all talk only.

Protecting Economics - Labour supports mystery religions now eh?

Protecting Economics - Labour supports mystery religions now eh?

The message is clear. Whichever party is elected to power in 2010, these types of cuts will go on for the next 4-5 years at least. The courses which impart hard skills are to be supported . In this light Business Studies is an aberration.

We should go back to around 50 well funded universities and slowly close the rest down as they are clearly a luxury we can not afford.

I believe your propostion is valid particularly on new universties such as Liverpool John Moores University which jeopardise the quality and standard of the academic products. It would also be useful quangos such as HEFCE and QAA to be phased out as they clearly not fit for purpose. When staff at Liverpool John Moores University raised concern about quality and standard-in a School with the highest RAE (5*)and highest Teaching Quality rating (24/24)-they were trampled on and sacked. HEFCE and QAA failed in their duties to investigate the staff concerns and instead diligently endeavoured to cover it up and brush the issue under the carpet. The evidence of plagiarism at Liverpool John Moores University is already publicised on the House of Common website and will be included in the IUS Select Committee full report (Students and Universities) to be published on 2nd August 2009. Close down failed universities along with the corresponding quangos; HEFCE and QAA.

To whippet In this blog we constantly read about a delinquent university and afew other with lesser but yet serious problems. But yet there is no talk of rationalisation of these non-delivering universities-forget RAE 2008 which is nonsensical. If you look at the Times ranking all the 50 universities are pre-92 universities. The rest are post-92 former polytechnics. We are a small country and do not need more than 50 universities. The rest should be rationalised and should be technical institutes which they were doing god job.

Thank you THE for the prompt publication of this table. I've just done various statistical analyses based on the numbers reported to obtain an impression of the overall picture of cuts. A data distribution analysis presented as a graph (say, across bands of £250,000) is quite informative visually. A significant number of HEIs appear to 'expect' cuts of half a million and above.

The information in the spreadsheet would be more useful if expressed as "per head student taught" (i.e. divided by number of registered full time students or equivalent) and / or "% of University's overall budget". Personally I would also like to see the calculation "% of University's overalll teaching income" ------------------------------------------------ Within the Russell Group it looks like the cut is broadly proportional to student numbers. It should be obvious that the institutions that will be WORST hit, though, will not be the big research-intensive Univs; even though they are losing the most income, they also have the biggest budgets, the largest reserves, their choice of students, and the most money from NON-teaching sources. Of course, the cuts will probably spur their VCs on to yet another surge of trying to make the staff they don't rate redundant, but that will be policy, not financial necessity. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- The places who will really take the hit are Universities where: (i) teaching accounts for most of income; and (ii) filling courses is sometimes problematic. Of course, the Govt has cynically given them a partial solution; take 200 extra students with NO HEFCE-funding, and you will get an extra £ 0.6 M in top-up fees to try and close that hole in your accounts.

In brief - the overall teaching income for HEIs is tabulated on the HEFCE web site. See http://www.hefce.ac.uk/finance/recurrent. The accounts of each institution are public documents (or should be) and the breakdown of expenditure against income will be within these documents (historical record). UCU and UNISON at the institution with which I remain associated, receive this kind of information regularly (historical and current budget) as part of the Trades Union Recognition and Procedure Agreement with the Employer through the University Employment Committee (which is where members of Council meet with the collective bargaining groups - VC in attendance). In respect of 'alleged redundancy', there are statutory requirements to supply information (including financial information).

@To whippet Why is the RAE nonsensical? And BTW. the UK is not a small country. Only an idiot would recommend shutting down universities in a time of recession. It's precisely the cognitive and creative skills nutured by higher education that this country will need. Technical colleges don't give you those.

These forums are increasingly overrun with reactionary idiots ill-advisedly prosecuting a culture war against HE particularily the new Universities. God help us if any of them have the ear of the incoming government.

@Knackered academic: I don't think anyone here is suggesting shutting down real universities, rather their pale imitations. As I have said above I believe that they are a luxury we can not afford.

I agree with knackered academic, re: 'reactionary idiots'; who do they think are sustaining widening participation in this country? because believe me it isn't the old universities - Institutions like London Met, Leeds Met, Liverpool JM, etc, etc, are rubbished by whippet and his ilk and yet, if you actually go to London Met (for example) you see large numbers of home-grown, local, ethnic minority students (not wealthy Koreans) going to their local uni. Of course whippet would probably like to go back to the good old days, when only people from suitable backgrounds, and grammar schools, or the 'brightest' of the poor could aspire to a university education...

@whippet and who will be the judge of that? What criteria are you using? I mean real criteria informed by something more than mouth frothey?

sorry should have been "mouth frothery" suffering from swine flu.....

@another tired academic: I believe universities should be places of learning, where students can get an excellent education and where top class world leading reseach is done.

@ whippet Yes we all believe in Mom and Apple pie. I happen to work at 2 universities - one a famous old uni, the other a london based "new". The new one got a higher RAE rating for the research area I work in. Many of its students are equally as intelligent as those in the old uni but haven't benefited from expensive private school educations. How do you make the distinction, I'm genuinely interested given the social and economic variables that each juggle.

I agree with you. All the others who crop up are from the post-92 universities. They will be rationalised through merging within 5 years at most.

So many of new universities, the Mets, the Banks, the Hopes, the John Moores are shaky with the first two barely surviving. I agree with "To whippet", any one who bets against it does not want to know the situation.

... I, too, agree with Whippet, although not in the way he intends. I would go even further: before downgrading post-92 institutions into technical colleges, let them swap their best researchers for the worst ones that manage to survive in traditional universities (such as those complaining about the RAE just because their own scores are low). Perhaps Whippet himself may end up being traded against one of the 3-4* lost in the Mets or the Brookes ...

@Ludwig: I agree, but is it not already the case that good researchers at poor institutions can apply for positions at more established universities. I happen to know a couple who have 'traded up'.

I work in a new university. I collated and submitted the research output of our group to the RAE 2008. The work was not brilliant as the pioneering work in the area was being carried out in a research group in a top university. To our dismay and uter shock we got the highest star rating and the other group a rating one less than ours! First we thought there was something of a mix up but the rating stood. Our work cannot be classified in anyway as much superior to theis. My university is allready talking it up high, our group is treated as a bunch of Nobel prize winners! It is so embarassing, RAE 2008 and the engineered star rating!

@To Ludwig: Are you part of the group at Liverpools John Moores University? See' Response to Whippet' above.

Whether a University is 'ancient', 'civic', 'Robbins' or 'post-92' , a good university experience surely requires good teaching, underpinned by research and scholarly activity. Indeed the academic contract for post-92 universities specifically requires 'research and scholarly activity' to be undertaken as part of the annual balance of duties. I’m a former (retired) member of staff from a post-92 university. It has a ‘proud history’ of former colleges and institutes which goes back two centuries into the early 1800's, and over that time fulfilled a social and educational need. I refer you to one measure of teaching quality which is the National Teaching Fellows scheme - http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/ourwork/professional/ntfs/ntfs_directory_results

Sorry, there were some typos in previous posting. As an ex- John Moorean myself, although I agree with ' the general comments Response to Whippet', I know that the staff cannot escape their share of the blame. The staff concerns became vocal after every one management and staff tried to brush the dirt under the carpet, and only after realisation that things were going bad to worse the so called staff concerns surfaced. I left the place to the proper university nearby ( Ludwig, note), but cuts and rationalisation looming here too., but I can at least continue with my research. Staff very often blame the management and when this happens you will know they have a plethora of excuses lined up. Things do not happen in isolation and for every problem in these new universities staff are also implicated. It is that they do not want to aknowledge, but the public , our customers, know this too well.

Sandra wrote "Indeed the academic contract for post-92 universities specifically requires 'research and scholarly activity' to be undertaken as part of the annual balance of duties." The contracts require it. But do they do it? No, and there is no way currently to enforec the contract.

Decisions about where to cut should be based on the greater good. On that basis economics as an academic discipline should be expunged from every HE institution. I doubt that the mess we are in could be any worse if there was not one single economist anywhere in the world. Things might actually be better without these guys and the crystal ball gazing they dress up as a rigorous academic subject.

Decisions about where to cut should be based on the greater good. On that basis economics as an academic discipline should be expunged from every HE institution. I doubt that the mess we are in could be any worse if there was not one single economist anywhere in the world. Things might actually be better without these guys and the crystal ball gazing they dress up as a rigorous academic subject.

'In a letter to Hefce on 23 July, David Lammy, the Higher Education Minister, said the priority areas for the [extra university] places, which will be part-funded, are: -Biological and related health sciences (excluding psychology, sports science and those that are primarily practice-based) -Physical sciences (excluding geography) -Mathematical and computer science -Engineering -Technology -Economics -Business studies' A month ago, David Lammy was quoted as saying that he wanted 'to affirm the fact that education in the arts and humanities, no less than in the sciences, is among the main factors that define British culture and British identity in the 21st century', and that 'It is an indispensable component of the glue that holds this country together and without which we cannot truly flourish' ('Arts are as vital as sciences says Lammy' THES 24 June 2009) Er...have I missed something here...?

If anything these cuts do not go far enough. Forexample, the OU stays fattened and the cuts should have been double the figure . Similarly the new universties should have faced the axe deeper and we need a proposal starting from London for the merger these institutions.

To 'To Clueless': my posting referred to David Lammy's stated priorities in June (the arts and humanities, which he described as 'the glue which holds this country together') and his way of expressing this set of priorities...by announcing, in July, additional student places for the sciences. I'm a little puzled by his logic, and by yours.

What are you talking about? - I'm fed up with all these pick-pickings at post-92 university academics. I'm in a research active dept. - unlike our lucky colleagues in the old unis, we publish (monographs, edited books, surveys, articles in high impact journals etc etc etc) as well as teaching ridiculous amounts of hours, admin,etc...of course there are some people in new unis who do nothing much, but frankly I'm sure there are a few academics sitting on their arses in Oxbridge. And I know of a few old university academics in my field who didn't pull their weight in the RAE - god, knows why because they had bugger all else to do.

To Dr Know You mean RAE 2008, the exercise in Social Engineering by Brown's govt? Sure you were better than Oxbridge needless to say!

To Dr No: No not remotely do I think we are better or even match Oxbridge; but I'm angered by the growing assumption on many of these threads that anybody who works in a new university is useless; and anyone who works in an old university is top-hole. Most of the excellent researchers in this country are in Old Unis. However, it should be recognised that firstly, they do not always head into that sector simply because of their inherent intelligence; i'm afraid privilege and background does affect who ends up where. So for example, many old unis will only recruit from Oxbridge postdocs. Secondly, not all, but many of the old universities have the time and resources to enable them to stretch their research. Hence, they may just teach one lecture course over a year as opposed to teaching 8 to 12 hours per semester. Old uni students are generally taught seminars by postgraduates, which again lightens their teaching burden. Most Old unis have some sort of automatic sabbatical system; so they know they are guaranteed research time. Academics in new universities do have work a lot harder to try to reach the same standards. There are many reasons why people work in New Unis, and many academics have worked in both old and new, but this is not simply because they are crap, as a number of contributors to the THES forums seem to suggest. I agree with many of the criticisms of the new uni - beliieve me working at the coalface in a new uni is a no picnic. And the reality is, much as I believe in equality of education, I would rather be in a Old uni because I would be able to get my research done, rather than having to work through weekends in the summer to manically produce before the onslaught of autumn teaching. As it is I'm probably stuck where I am as I'm now too expensive, and yes sadly, not quite a 'star' enough to trade up - despite having produced a monograph, edited collections, several 'good' journal articles and so on in my career. So this means I have to focus on the good things about being in a new uni, and one of these is the students who are both the great strength and at times weakness of the sector. We see a lot of our students, because we teach them rather than simply doing lecture courses. We have some bloody weak students who frankly shouldn't be there - and I put that down to Blair, and the whole management 'bums on seat' mentality, but also to pre-university education which is clearing being pressurised to award qualifications to students who simply would not have got an O'level let alone an A Level 15-20 years ago. On the other hand the strength is the many working class/lower middle class students we deal with; first generation to uni; who lack confidence, but actually are really bright. Often underachievers at poor schools, it takes them the journey with a new university who has given them a chance, to push their ambitions and show their abilities. So please, all you posters who presumably are sitting in your ivory towers, and sneering at the plebs below, perhaps just take a moment to think about it, and to realise that Old and New are clearly not quite as black and white as you seem to assume.

"On the other hand the strength is the many working class/lower middle class students we deal with; first generation to uni; who lack confidence, but actually are really bright. Often underachievers at poor schools, it takes them the journey with a new university who has given them a chance, to push their ambitions and show their abilities" I should say first that I came from a working class background, and was the first one to go to university either side of my parents for a generation. Let us not harp on this "widening access", " disadva tage background " etc. Almost all Russelle Group universities bend over backwards to admit poor students, hence disadvantaged but the only criterion is the academic ability. The problem with the new universities is that they take students who are not ready academically to do degree level courses direct and expect them to complete the course in 3 years the way students in old universities with good academic ability do. Hence you see high drop out rate ( in many courses in excess of 40%) in 1st year and these universities resorting to "creative progression" etc.. to adjust paper numbers for the other two years. I have no problems if these new universities take these students and put them through HND and then channel them to 2nd degree courses as appropriate so that the students pick up knowledge and expertise in a step-wisw way. The direct degree course entry in these universities should be restricted to a very low number based on their sixth form or IB academic achievements only and these days anything less than 300 UCAS points is pointless. Arguing as the new university academics do as Brammell did and Lammy does that " there are many ways of determining academic achievements for entry" is pure social engineering. The new universities who all call themselves "global universities" and trumpet their so called achievements would not listen and are the ones in trouble in various ways, ripe for merger. Their VCs like Lee and Roper have lead the way to their ruination. The expt in the name of "widening access" has singularly failed. By routeing these students through HND and to 2nd year degee course would improve the situation to an extent. Not all students are cut out to do academic courses and the front end HND to a degree would give them time to asssess themselves and giving them opportunities to come back and complete the degree courses after work experience.

I actually agree with most of what you say here, though I'm not convinced about the 'bending over backwards' of the Russell Group. Maybe they do, but arguably the problem with access starts much earlier. Like many other working class students who end up going into higher education, then on to academia, I pretty much opted out of my crap comprehensive, and did it all later (at first degree level thorough a poly, and then in a Russell group university). However, my wider point was the vitrol and unpleasantness that is aimed at many of us academics working, for better or worse, in new unis. Many of us agree with many of the criticisms of the sector. But we don't appreciate reading sniping comments on our lack of intelligence/hard work etc. And I repeat - yes there are academics who do no research, but they can be found all over the sector, not just in the new unis.