The Rector’s Away Day opened with a presentation by the College Secretary, Dr Rodney Eastwood, on tuition fees and financial support for students.
The tuition fee landscape
Rodney gave an overview of the current landscape for higher education funding (see slide). Any university wanting to charge tuition fees in excess of £6,000 will need the Office for Fair Access (OFFA) to have approved their new access agreement, which should include details of initiatives to broaden access to higher education. Rodney noted that:
- It is likely that if too many institutions seek to charge a fee in the region of £9,000 the government will regulate against this. Similarly regulatory force will be deployed if universities fail to invest sufficiently in Outreach and Widening Participation activities.
- There is some uncertainty over whether students will be able to pay fees upfront.
- The regulatory systems around Higher Education require some reorganisation. The Browne review proposed a single independent Higher Education Council to replace HEFCE, OFFA, QAA and OIA, but no further details have yet emerged.
Submission to OFFA
The Management Board has established a working group to look at the College’s submission to OFFA. In March the group will submit the proposed access agreement to the Management Board, ready for submission to OFFA in mid-April (see slide).
At the time of the Away Day universities had yet to receive official guidance from OFFA (guidance has seen been published on the OFFA website).
At the Away Day there was a general expectation that OFFA requirements would include:
- Increasing investment in outreach activities, which may be regarded as a higher priority than spend on individually targeted financial aid to students.
- Setting benchmarks for widening participation and demonstrating progress in meeting these.
- Providing more information to prospective students on a range of factors including contact hours and graduate starting salaries.
Bearing in mind these likely requirements, the principles steering the work of the Management Board’s Student Fees and Financial Aid Working Group include:
- Our courses’ costs should always reflect their value.
- Charging the maximum fee and recycling some income into financial aid is preferable.
- The same fee should be charged across all courses.
- Various models for fees and the financial aid package have been considered.
The government is keen to ensure more students from poorer backgrounds are going to the best universities. Part of the College’s agreement with OFFA will be to increase the proportion of students from such backgrounds, together with increasing the proportion of students from state schools.
Statistics on Imperial’s student profile were presented (see slide). Rodney stated that there is a broader context to be aware of concerning the levels of uptake in science, technology, engineering and medicine (STEM) subjects in independent versus state schools:
- The uptake of STEM subjects at A-Level is far higher in independent schools (and pupils in these schools have a higher level of attainment). The general picture for the UK sees 38% of those students who achieve A* in Physics coming from independent schools – the equivalent figure for Maths and Further Maths A-Levels is 37%. This is coherent with the proportion of students from independent schools at Imperial: around 37%.
- Imperial generally does well against HESA access benchmarks (see slide). One metric in this is the proportion of students who were eligible for free school meals. Imperial is ranked 27th in this table, by rising percentage, with 2.9% students having received free school meals. Oxford and Cambridge share first position, with 0.8% students having had school meals.
- OFFA will probably look at absolute numbers but chiefly will focus on these HESA benchmarks.
Rodney concluded that the College has a strong story to tell on outreach. The College cannot be complacent though, and must strive to ensure it does not miss prospective students from the state sector.
Financial Aid
Information on the current financial aid package offered to Imperial students and considerations for the future were presented (see slide).
Under the new arrangements Imperial will have to take part in a National Scholarships Programme which will see HEIs’ contributions to the scheme matched by government. One outstanding issue for the College is how to best structure financial aid, e.g. when delineating need. According to the figures calculated by Imperial College Union average living costs for students at Imperial are £10,500.
Rodney concluded his session by stressing that higher fees will mean higher expectations from students.
Discussion
The following points were made during a discussion that followed Rodney’s presentation:
- The option of allowing students of a broad range of abilities to take a first year at Imperial as a way to widen participation, before narrowing down to admit the strongest to the next year, is not a feasible idea. Research shows that this would leave individuals who did not progress in a worse situation than if they had not chosen to attend university.
- Building up relationships with certain schools is a viable outreach option, however formalising these links with these schools only (i.e. through formal scholarships) could be considered elitist.
Conclusion
The Rector closed the session noting, “We don’t want to lower our academic expectations but we’ll be competing with other universities to target the most able students. It is a challenge we should not underestimate.”