Here is a short item on recent developments with tuition fees and student loans in Hungary (University World News).
Emigration is one potential problem for all income contingent repayment loans. For instance, the UK student loan scheme is driven through HMRC – graduates going abroad fall out of the automatic deduction of repayments through payroll and therefore an alternative method for debt collection is needed.
Hungary has decided to limit the ability of graduates to leave the country:
Most new entrants to Hungarian higher education institutions will have to pay fees of between HUF50,000 and HUF100,000 (US$232 to US$464) per semester from next year.
Students will also have to sign a contract with the government under the student loan scheme, Diakhitel 2.0, pledging to stay and work in Hungary for at least twice as long as their studies lasted. If they leave Hungary, they will have to pay back outstanding tuition fees. This clause will apply for 20 years after graduation.
Update:
The relevant repayment threshold for those embarking courses in 2012 using student loans is £21000. If you do emigrate, that threshold varies depending on the country you base yourself in. The relevant table can be found here. (Thanks to David Malcolm at NUS for pointing this out to me).
Degrees of Profit at London Metropolitan University
Editing of the article has slightly confused the relationship between ‘shared services’ and equity investment.
The subsidiary company in a shared services initiative can be set up as a private or public limited company allowing shares to be sold to prospective investors. Profits made by the subsidiary can then be distributed to those investors.
The university transfers assets and non-academic staff to the subsidiary, but then must pay rent and fees on those same assets and services under monopoly conditions. In this way, the subsidiary can turn a profit from the management of the university.
The basic structure can be tweaked to enable a ‘buyout’ depending on the distribution and type of shares involved. See page 7 of the Universities UK report, Developing Future University Structures, for an illustrative diagram.
The new issue of Red Pepper has an article by me on London Metropolitan University, which tries to set what has been happening there in the broader context of the new terrain of English Higher Education.
Significantly, it has now been confirmed that the partnership agreement struck between London Met and London School of Business and Finance, which was central to certain aspects of London Met’s travails with the UK Border Agency, has now been dissolved.
The press statement reads:
London Metropolitan University (London Met) and London School of Business and Finance (LSBF) have reached a mutual agreement to discontinue their working relationship.
In April 2012 London Met and LSBF began working together to deliver quality, industry-relevant, higher education to students.
Both parties have agreed that, although much had been achieved during this period, given the basis on which the partnership had begun, and the changes in the Higher Education market, it would be better for each institution to take independent paths.
I have received from the Student Loans Company a breakdown of the student support associated with designated private higher education courses in England for the academic year 2011/12.
Student support covers loans for tuition fees, loans for maintenance and maintenance grants. In the pdf below – the relevant figures for each participating college is displayed along with a total.
Designated courses at private institutions need not abide by the maximum tuition fee set for publicly-funded universities, nor are they subject to any recruitment controls.
In 2010/11, the total amount of student support issued was £40million. In 2011/12, this had climbed to £100million. From 2012/13, the available tuition fee loans increase to £6,000 per year. There are now over 100 private providers with designated status for one or more of their courses. Can we expect this total to then hit £200million?
BIS is currently leading a consultation on how to integrate private providers into the student numbers controls (recruitment controls). The more students they can attract before that consultation concludes and is implemented, the stronger position they will be when integration occurs.
The latest issue of the Danish higher education publication, Forsker Forum (Researcher Forum) has four pages on England including an article on the launch of Council for the Defence of British Universities and an interview with me.
It’s in Danish and only available in print copies at present, but information can be found here.
I have returned to the theme of University of Law Limited in a comment piece for The Guardian. It’s in Thursday’s print edition or here online.
Times Higher Education are covering the same story this week: the legal vagary at the heart of the sale of College of Law to Montagu Private Equity.
Dennis Farrington, visiting fellow at the Oxford Centre for Higher Education Policy Studies and co-author of The Law of Higher Education, said it did “appear unclear…how the DAPs granted to one body with a Royal Charter have transferred to Col Subco No. 1 Limited, then The College of Law Limited, then The University of Law Limited”.
I will be joining Aaron Peters on his radio show, Novara, today at 2pm.
Resonance FM is available in London on 104.4FM or there is a live stream here.
We will be discussing the financialisation of English higher education for an hour.
Update
A podcast of this radio broadcast is now available here.
I’ll be speaking at an event organised by the Univeristy of Liverpool branch of UCU on Thursday.
Title: Directions in Higher Education: what’s behind changes to statutes and corporate form?
Time: 4pm
Venue: Room 1.15, Centre for Lifelong Learning Building, 126 Mount Pleasant
The event is open to non-UCU members, but please contact Mark O’Brien (mtobrien@liv.ac.uk) so he has an idea of likely numbers.
At the University of Liverpool the entire statutory framework is being revised. The UCU has raised fundamental concerns regarding the changing of statutes, not the least being the implications for academic freedom. The University of Liverpool UCU is now launching an Academic Charter as part of the ongoing efforts to defend academic freedom. This Charter outlines fundamental principles of institutional commitment and practice required to maintain academic freedom as a reality in our working lives.
I’ll be providing a talk on the general background of English HE reform and how it pertains to proposed changes to university corporate form and statute. It will be followed by an open discussion.
I will be joining Aaron Peters on his radio show, Novara, today at 2pm.
Resonance FM is available in London on 104.4FM or there is a live stream here.
We will be discussing the financialisation of English higher education for an hour.
Update
A podcast of this radio broadcast is now available here.
College of Law has been granted use of the university title and will now be known as University of Law. This follows the government’s decision to lower eligibility criteria for the protected title.
I’m sure the academics deserve it, whatever concerns there are about awarding such a title to a monotechnic covering only a single subject area.
There are bigger concerns though. The new status has been awarded while the institution is in the midst of being acquired by Montagu Private Equity, which means that it will shed its charitable status and become a profit-distributing entity.
Right at the bottom of the press release we find a statement mentioning this point:
In April 2012, the College announced that it was to be acquired by the investment firm Montagu Private Equity, which is investing in the business to help facilitate its development and international expansion. The acquisition is expected to be completed later this month.
Ironically, one of the reasons for this long purchase process depends on a legal fudge.
Since you cannot sell a charity, the sale depends upon the creation of a limited company, separate to the original charity, into which the teaching business is to be transferred. But, degree awarding powers cannot be sold or transferred and would remain with the charity were they not also have meant to expire in August (College of Law’s powers were granted in 2006 on a six-year licence).
No one has said publicly how this hitch is to be resolved. No doubt some hack will be stitched together with the help of the Privy Council and BIS, since the advent of Universities of PE (private equity) is favoured by those currently in government. But statute is being bent to suit a radical agenda.
Is the University of Law unlawful? No one has given a clear answer as to how it would be able to award degrees following its ‘purchase’.
Critical Education 