Tuition fees
74. There has been concern about the effect of top-up
fees on undergraduate applications in high cost science subjects.
There is a danger that universities, faced with financial pressures,
will be tempted to cut courses or charge higher fees for students
in these subject areas. An alternative scenario was put forward
by the Minister of State for Higher Education, Alan Johnson, who
told the Education and Skills Committee that it was "a near
racing certainty, that chemistry and physics, where they have
high infrastructure costs but they need the volume, will charge
nothing, or next to nothing, to attract students, and cross-subsidise
perhaps from law".[84]
We raised this issue with Lord Sainsbury, who told us that this
was a matter for universities to decide and that he was more concerned
with making young people aware of how exciting and relevant the
physical sciences and engineering were.[85]
He felt that science would benefit from tuition fees since they
would ensure that science courses were funded properly.[86]
Properly funded courses are of little value, however, if insufficient
students can be attracted to enrol on them.
75. Despite the efforts of the Minister, changing
the perception of young people will not happen quickly or easily.
In the short term, we will need to buck the market or we will
lose large numbers of university departments. Lord Sainsbury rejected
any suggestion that the Government should be more proactive:
"I cannot see any value or merit in trying to
say to universities, 'You have to run courses in which you are
not getting people to do it.' In terms of the powers of the government
to do that, they are extremely limited. How can we hold universities
responsible for their finances if we start telling them they have
to run courses where there are not individuals there? The thing
that drives it has to be what the young people want to do".[87]
In recent years, the Government has recognised the
shortage of science teachers and introduced financial incentives.
The Roberts Review identified the serious problems in attracting
young people to certain scientific disciplines and recommended
that differential PhD stipends be introduced to attract students.[88]
This argument was accepted by Government and implemented in Spending
Review 2002.[89] It is
not clear why Lord Sainsbury is unwilling to consider applying
this principle to the undergraduate market. On 23 January 2004,
the Institute of Physics (IOP) announced that it would be awarding
£1,000 means-tested annual bursaries for physics undergraduates.
The IOP has recognised that increased student debt could deter
potential physics students. We congratulate the Institute on its
decision but the Government should act also. A review of maths
education, commissioned by Department for Education and Skills
and published in February 2004, has recommended that financial
incentives may be necessary to improve the uptake of maths courses
post-16.[90] The Government
should consider establishing bursaries for undergraduates to study
shortage subjects, such as physical sciences and engineering.
These should cover the full cost of the charged top-up fee.
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