Apparently, today has been chosen by the NUS and other activist groups as the "National Day of Action against Fees and Cuts", protesting both the planned rise in undergraduate tuition fees (from £3,000 to £9,000 a year) and the cutbacks in education and research funding.
For reasons I already explained, I'm vehemently opposed to the cuts in research funding - which will, inter alia, virtually eliminate public funding for arts, social sciences and humanities research, something which is a very bad idea for our society. And I don't like the government's proposals, by any means. It's also fair enough to point out that Liberal Democrat MPs have broken their express pledges to vote against any rise in tuition fees, which does not speak well of their honesty.
Nonetheless, I remain undecided about the rise in tuition costs. It should be borne in mind that Britain's generous student loan system gives British undergraduates an interest-free loan to cover their fees - which is not repayable until you're earning a salary, and is deducted automatically thereafter from your salary with the amount of repayment linked to your income. It amounts, in effect, to an extra payroll tax paid by employed graduates. In other words, it's hard to see how this proposal is particularly different from the "graduate tax" proposed by the left. It doesn't seem that it will require students to find more money up-front, so it shouldn't prevent young people from low-income households from going to university. And it's beyond doubt that something needed to be done: the status quo in higher education could not have been sustained for very much longer. With more than 40 percent of young people going to university (which I believe to be a very good thing for our society), it has to be funded somehow. These proposals aren't great, but I don't see that they are as bad as they appear at first blush.
So, despite sincere sympathy with the protestors, I won't be demonstrating today. I don't really think "You say: cut back! We say: fight back against *some* aspects of the cuts, particularly the planned elimination of arts and humanities funding, while being somewhat more ambivalent about undergraduate tuition fee rises, and acknowledging that the status quo in education funding is financially unsustainable and requires reform!" would fit on a sign.
(Addendum: This government, like the last, is doing plenty of other things which are certainly more iniquitous than education cuts - our country's barbaric treatment of asylum-seekers, for a start, and slashing housing benefit for the poor. I'm certainly not intending to praise Cameron and Clegg. But it is perhaps disheartening that education cuts get so much more political attention, and provoke so much more popular outrage, than do the British state's ongoing abuses against the genuinely poor and marginalized.)
David, I think that would make a wonderful, catchy sign.
ReplyDeleteI have a chant for your sign
ReplyDeleteApproximate cost of David Cameron's education post-2010 £27,000; Approximate cost of Dr Julian Lewis's education post-2010 £37,500; Self-funding; approximate amount £0. Subjects studies: PPE, Dphil Strategic Studies. Stop cuts to arts funding.
Alternatively, this would be an awesome "for everything else there's mastercard" advert. ;)
Well said, David.
ReplyDeleteI do have one point to pick you up on, though:
"...more than 40 percent of young people going to university (which I believe to be a very good thing for our society)..."
See, now I don't think it necessarily is a good thing, in *itself*. The rise in the number of degree-level courses, and of the number taking each is really quite damaging. I'll address each of those in turn below. More than that, though: While I agree that a large number of well-educated young adults is a good thing for the country, I don't think that university is the ONLY (or even the best) route into all professions. I'm sure you didn't mean to imply that, though. A degree in a worthless subject by someone who is pathetic ranks far, far below a good apprenticeship in my eyes.
1. The greater diversity of subjects is good, but it's leading to a two-tier system with very clear "soft" subjects for those wanting to simply drink their time at university away, while working a shorter week than even the pre-1900 Oxford cohort. I don't think that's healthy.
2. Most of us would agree that maths, for instance, is not one of the above subjects. It's relatively "hard", as subjects go. The number of students has increased so fast, though, that the system can't cope. Teaching methods and mechanisms are still optimised for year groups of 50, at Universities taking on over 300 undergraduates per year (under threat of being fined by central government if they don't).
I can assure you, with no word of a lie and no exaggeration, some students are well-regarded British institutions are not getting their money's worth.
The numbers should be increased more sensibly, at a controlled rate-- with money being provided to outfit universities with the resources required. It's better to educate a year group of 150 properly than to badly educate 200, just to improve the figures.
(Honestly, I could write pages on the "problems" with university teaching...)
"...someone who is apathetic...", that should read, of course. There are other typos, but that's possibly the worst.
ReplyDeleteBelieve it or not, at least where I live, an arts degree is neither easy nor cheap.
ReplyDeleteA degree in a worthless subject by someone who is pathetic ranks far, far below a good apprenticeship in my eyes.
ReplyDeleteWhat would you define as a "worthless subject"? I certainly don't think it's right to judge the worth of a given degree solely by its career-enhancement value in the marketplace. I would argue that education is valuable (and should be funded) for its own sake, whether or not it enhances someone's earning potential or professional skills.
And it's particularly important, if we want a democracy of informed voters, to educate as many people as possible in subjects which are relevant to an understanding of public policy - which would certainly include all the humanities, social sciences and natural sciences. Wouldn't we benefit, as a society, if more of the voting population were intellectually equipped to understand, say, climate change, or monetary economics, or the basics of the scientific method? This is beneficial to society even if they don't go on to use those degrees in their careers.
That said, there are some courses at some universities which haven't maintained a high level of academic rigour. And I certainly agree with you that universities have been made to expand too fast without adequate resources or support. (Which is, of course, what led to the current funding crisis in the first place.)
"What would you define as a "worthless subject"?"
ReplyDeleteBusiness!
:D
What would you define as a "worthless subject"?
ReplyDeleteYou know. Silly, easy subjects. Jurisprudence, for instance. :-D
But no, seriously: By "worthless", I meant "lacking in academic rigour", as you said here:
...there are some courses at some universities which haven't maintained a high level of academic rigour...
I CERTAINLY don't judge a course by its career-enhancing ability (just the opposite. That's incidental, to my mind). I judge a course for its content of specialist knowledge (i.e. things you know afterward that you didn't before) and academic rigour. It's hard to name individual subjects that fall short of my expectations with any degree of accuracy since a lot depends on the institution.
Media studies, for instance, often comes in for a lot of criticism. It's true that I know people doing such courses who work so few hours that they could be counted on the fingers of a blind butcher's hand. Other people at other places, I'm sure, have much more expected of them.
With relatively academically "light" courses around, we risk the two-tier system that I described earlier. Of course, I can see why universtities might want to sell themselves as extended sixth-forms, with the financial pressures on them.