By tim, on January 30th, 2012 at 7:35 pm … but maybe mature students have been?
Simon Hughes, the coalition’s Advocate for Access to Higher Education has just issued a press release following the announcement of today’s UCAS application numbers. He makes a series of very valid points, including that applications for University places are at an all time high (excluing last year), that young people do not appear to have been put off by the headline cost of tuition (which he appears to be arguing acts as a time-limited graduate tax rather than a fee) and that monthly repayments will be lower (but of course, many graduates will . . . → Read More: Simon Hughes: Young people have not been put off university …
By tim, on January 11th, 2012 at 10:16 pm In some ways I’m rather encouraged by today’s announcement by the education secretary that he wants to see a greater emphasis on the teaching of computer science in the schools curriculum. But I think the suggestion that he seems to be making, or at least the media interpretation of it, that teaching someone how to use popular computer programs like office suites (his definition of ICT) is no longer worthwhile and what should be taught instead is how to program them (his definition of Computer Science) is an unproductive dichotomy. Let me explain.
Back in the mid to late 1980s, . . . → Read More: ICT bad, Computer Science good – an unproductive dichotomy
By tim, on November 6th, 2011 at 4:52 pm I received the following email earlier on this week from the OU. It was in response to my many enquiries over the last year about their social science masters programmes – specifically those in psychology. Sadly, it looks as if around 8,000* potential students each year really are going to have to find somewhere else to study if they want to pursue a masters in social science by distance learning.
Dear Tim Thank you for your email This message covers your reply to <name redacted> and also the phone message that was passed here to the Yorkshire Region. Unfortunately all . . . → Read More: No more social science masters programmes to be offered by the OU for “the foreseeable future”
By tim, on October 24th, 2011 at 2:45 pm Interim data for numbers of students applying for university places in 2012 has today been published by UCAS. The 9% drop in applications has unsurprisingly been taking most of the headlines. However, just looking at the 9% decline and attempting to suggests that this is either “good news” or “bad news” for the coalition’s policies is far too simplistic. UCAS themselves say “It is too early in the cycle to extrapolate applicant volumes forward” and I’m sure that view is correct. However, there are some interesting nuggets in the data released nonetheless.
The first nugget is apparent when you compare . . . → Read More: Today’s UCAS application figures – a look behind the headlines
By tim, on October 19th, 2011 at 7:08 pm There’s an interesting article in the Derby Telegraph today concerning the city council’s decision to review its service performance indicators and to revise them. Most organisations periodically review their key performance indicators (indeed, it would be pretty odd if they didn’t) to ensure that they remain sensitive to the needs of their customers (or citizens). However in the case of the city council it appears that, controversially, these changes may include them no longer reporting the absolute number of complaints it receives.
The quotation in the article which made me think a little more deeply about this subject is attributed . . . → Read More: Derby City Council to stop measuring complaint volumes?
By tim, on July 20th, 2011 at 12:56 pm Having blogged at the start of May on the subject of OU fees in the post-2012 environment, I could be forgiven for feeling a little smug that my back of the envelope calculation for 120 credits (points) of £4,965 appears to have been not too far short of the mark. The OU has today announced fees of £5,000 per 120 credits (the equivalent of a full-time year elsewhere) for students in England. Their official press release is available here and precise details of how they will apply the new fees regime has also been published.
While the fees are considerably . . . → Read More: A headline no-one wanted to see – OU fees to rise to £5,000 in England
By tim, on July 12th, 2011 at 4:55 pm OFFA’s announcement on the sanctioned fee levels for English universities from September 2012 seems to have got rather lost in the heat of the red-blooded battles that are raging around all things News International at the moment. And yet, what is happening on University access and funding certainly has far more lasting consequences to the UK than anything that comes out of the permanently strained relationship between politicians and the media.
OFFA suffers at the moment from being a watchdog with no teeth, as well as having little bark when compared to the might of the universities and their cartels. . . . → Read More: Holding the universities to account
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