UK universities have historically been considered as either: A) the obvious passage for any academically capable person aspiring for “big things” B) multitudinous centres for debate and analysis of society-improving ideas C) a way to fundamentally advance earning potential and employability, or D) all of the above. Perhaps such lofty expectations were always flawed or inaccurate, but if they weren’t in days gone by, then they certainly are now.
The moment I advanced into sixth form back in 2018, a conversation topic suddenly surfaced to which I’d had negligible prior exposure: university. Head of year(s) began urging us to start UCAS applications, while universities’ marketeers lauded the vibrant social lives we were ostensibly guaranteed. No one in my school explained in detail to us what is, or at least was, part and parcel of every degree: academically styled writing, contact hours, and the shortcomings touched upon later in this article. Why? That’s the first problem: sixth forms are judged largely by quantity of students siphoned off to university, irrespective of whether it’s the right choice for them.
Let’s talk about Unconditional Offers. I needn’t explain what they are and why universities utilise them. They are a direct consequence of the financialisation of universities in the 2000s—little more than a ploy to maximise universities’ tuition fee revenue. However, many graduates don’t fully repay their tuition fee loans, meaning the government picks up the hefty bill for this education. What impact can we expect on the overall quality of university discourse if sixth-formers are admitted before they’ve even taken their A-levels? Would the average taxpayer support unconditional offers at all, considering that impact?
From a humanities perspective, it cannot be denied that many courses offer a miniscule number of hours compared to the corresponding tuition fees. Humanities courses place emphasis on independent study, yet with many offering well under ten fifty-minute sessions a week, it’s extremely questionable whether the £9000+ per year fee reflects this. I think many of us wonder where all that money goes... That said, it doesn’t help that student engagement in seminars across the board is low; each one of us knows all too well that crippling silence looming in the room following a lecturer’s question. The fewer students contribute, the less they benefit and the more course quality plummets. We have the decisive role to play in preventing our unis from becoming intellectual wastelands, dictated by often pervasive and predictable lecturer ideologies.
There are many more issues at play: students expecting (and hence being given) secondary school-esque experiences, horrendous budget misallocation, or the swathes of bureaucracy relenting the simplest of university processes. But I’d need more articles to unpick those.
In summary, it would be beneficial to see institutions and students alike conduct more honest, healthy discussions regarding the state of 21st-century universities, and whether today’s youth, economy, and labour market actually benefit from the funnelling of 18-year-olds en masse into the academic bubble, which is already showing signs of bursting.