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Tory liars

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Original post by WelshBluebird


The thing with the oxford admission stats are also partly down to a lower % of state school pupils getting AAA than private school pupils.


That is perfectly true but of the ones that exist a large number try to climb the highest walls.



Not benfetting the graduate financially does not mean not beneftting the graduate though.
And infact, university being about getting a well paid job after a few years is quite a modern idea really.


Are you a more rounded person if you learn a vocational skill that you are never able to practice?

And if it is all about meeting new people, seeing new places and having a life changing experience, then why don't we bring back National Service? It would be cheaper.

The personal development argument works very well for the traditional academic subjects but not for the modern highly vocational degrees.
Original post by Lewis :D
So much for only 'a selected amount of universities will able to charge £9,000"


When did anybody say that? :confused:
Original post by nulli tertius

The personal development argument works very well for the traditional academic subjects but not for the modern highly vocational degrees.


The main subject I had in my mind with that comment was Philosophy, which surely does help your personal development?

Although I do agree that the same principe cannot be applied to more vocational courses, as I said, you quite often find that the highly vocational courses do offer good job opportunities in that field (I'll repeat the example of Golf management studies).
(edited 13 years ago)
Original post by tripleeagle
When did anybody say that? :confused:


The government have been saying it all along?
That £9k would be the exception and not the rule, and that the universities would have to justify the high fees?. All BS of course. But the government still said it.
Original post by WelshBluebird
The main subject I had in my mind with that comment was Philosophy, which surely does help your personal development?

Although I do agree that the same principe cannot be applied to more vocational courses, as I said, you quite often find that the highly vocational courses do offer good job opportunities in that field (I'll repeat the example of Gold management studies).


You would need to assess on a course-by-course basis rather than applying ultra-strict rules.

Its very doable though.
Reply 65
Original post by HistoryRepeating
Make Universities bid for funding of courses based on the excellence, importance and worthiness of the curriculums they want to teach. Have an independant body assess these factors and dish out funding accordingly.

Seriously, **** mickey mouse degrees and 10,000 "Computer Games Design" and "Fashion Studies" students competing for 6 jobs.


QFT

+rep
Original post by HistoryRepeating
As I said, independant body, decides on discrimination criteria, applies funding for university places accordingly.

In particular, funding for more vocational courses than there are said vocations jobs would be pretty illogical.


Although I don't agree with everything you say, I am with you on this.

We are churning out four times the number of full-time law graduates every year than the number of training places available in the legal profession. No-one knows how many joint honours graduates have qualifying law degrees and no-one keeps count of the number of conversion course graduates there are.

People rightly say that a law graduate can do many other careers but I am not sure how many sign up for an LLB on the basis they can do something else for a living.

There are plenty of vocational degrees which are worse than law.
Original post by WelshBluebird
(I'll repeat the example of Gold management studies).


Presumably you learn how to count ingots. :smile:
Original post by HistoryRepeating
You would need to assess on a course-by-course basis rather than applying ultra-strict rules.

Its very doable though.


Would that be at all realisitic though? Considering the huge number courses offered by different insitutions, how many people / how much time would you need to go through every single course? And what about contentious issues? Would you just say that because person x in this government body thinks the course isn't worth it then that is the final word? I am sure the lecturers and professors in those areas would be very angry. Would you put a cap on the number of people who can do a particular course in a year? How would you regulate that "cap"? Etc etc. I just don't think it is at all realistic.

Original post by nulli tertius
Presumably you learn how to count ingots. :smile:


Meant "Golf". :tongue:
(edited 13 years ago)
Original post by WelshBluebird
Would that be at all realisitic though? Considering the huge number courses offered by different insitutions, how many people / how much time would you need to go through every single course? And what about contentious issues? Would you just say that because person x in this government body thinks the course isn't worth it then that is the final word? I am sure the lecturers and professors in those areas would be very angry. Would you put a cap on the number of people who can do a particular course in a year? How would you regulate that "cap"? Etc etc. I just don't think it is at all realistic.




I think for anything vocational, you could simply say twice the entry level positions in the industry plus the number of postgrads in that discipline and then have universities bid to offer those courses.

You would still have a meaningful surplus. A growing industry could ask for more.

And of course anyone could entirely self-fund and not be subject to the cap.
Original post by WelshBluebird
Would that be at all realisitic though? Considering the huge number courses offered by different insitutions, how many people / how much time would you need to go through every single course? And what about contentious issues? Would you just say that because person x in this government body thinks the course isn't worth it then that is the final word? I am sure the lecturers and professors in those areas would be very angry. Would you put a cap on the number of people who can do a particular course in a year? How would you regulate that "cap"? Etc etc. I just don't think it is at all realistic.



Meant "Golf". :tongue:


Well part of the beneficial effect of the system I am proposing is that Universities would hopefully whittle down the number of courses they offer and instead offer more optional modules to more standardised courses (more courses = more cost / time / effort spent 'presenting' that course to the independant body assessing funding and more difficulty demonstrating value).

This would benefit students as it is hopelessly naive to suggest that even a fairly dedicated 18 year old sixthform student can realistically make anything other than an arbirtrary decision between such courses as Medieval History (early period) and Medieval History (early-mid period)... and shouldnt have to until they know a lot more about the subject (eg optional modules in second/third year).

Yes, there would be a cap, because the independant body would only fund a certain number of places. For example, Hull university could "pitch" its Mechanical Engineering course to the independant body, demonstrate that they are currently getting 1000 adequately graded candidates applying and that there are plenty of graduate jobs which regard such a course well, and therefore recieve funding for all 1000 places (provided facilities in the university could handle such a number). On the other hand another university offering a course in Golf Course Management would not be able to get funding for 1000 places because they would struggle to demonstrate graduate jobs (or other benefit to the graduate) for that many people, but may be able to get funding for 5 - 10 places.

This would have yet another additional beneficial effect of greatly increasing the number of places available for the truly outstanding courses in which the UK is world-leading.
Original post by HistoryRepeating
Well part of the beneficial effect of the system I am proposing is that Universities would hopefully whittle down the number of courses they offer and instead offer more optional modules to more standardised courses (more courses = more cost / time / effort spent 'presenting' that course to the independant body assessing funding and more difficulty demonstrating value).

This would benefit students as it is hopelessly naive to suggest that even a fairly dedicated 18 year old sixthform student can realistically make anything other than an arbirtrary decision between such courses as Medieval History (early period) and Medieval History (early-mid period)... and shouldnt have to until they know a lot more about the subject (eg optional modules in second/third year).

Yes, there would be a cap, because the independant body would only fund a certain number of places. For example, Hull university could "pitch" its Mechanical Engineering course to the independant body, demonstrate that they are currently getting 1000 adequately graded candidates applying and that there are plenty of graduate jobs which regard such a course well, and therefore recieve funding for all 1000 places (provided facilities in the university could handle such a number). On the other hand another university offering a course in Golf Course Management would not be able to get funding for 1000 places because they would struggle to demonstrate graduate jobs (or other benefit to the graduate) for that many people, but may be able to get funding for 5 - 10 places.

This would have yet another additional beneficial effect of greatly increasing the number of places available for the truly outstanding courses in which the UK is world-leading.



I am not generally in favour of central planning on this or any other scale.

The problem, which is only going to get worse with higher fees, is that we are increasingly putting 17 year olds in charge of our higher education policy.

Cabinet ministers, civil servants and Air Marshalls decide whether we have Harriers or Tornados.

EU Bureaucrats decide what subsides we give to agriculture.

We let 17 years olds decide whether we subsidise media studies or chemistry courses.
Reply 72
Original post by nulli tertius
Here is a lefty blog to this effect

http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2011/01/04/why-vat-is-regressive/

But it was drummed into me in A level economics 30 years ago.


There are so many asterix's by every graph ... do you use gross income, net income, disposable income, spend?. Every graph shows a different result and a lot of the ones presented can not be possibly right! This mythical low earning family clearly don't have to heat their house, have electricity and only eat hot takeaway food!
Reply 73
Original post by WelshBluebird
Certainly in my experience it is the students from working class backgrounds who are more likely to go into "useless" degrees.


Really? What do you consider "useless"? In my own experience, people from working class backgrounds are more likely to study e.g. Engineering, than people from affluent backgrounds, who are disproportionately represented in the arts. (I have a theory why, but it's not particularly interesting.)

Taking this example, I personally would consider Engineering more "useful" than History. (I don't expect people to agree on that though.)
Reply 74
I can add another to that BBC list, I am not at liberty to divulge the specific name, but a brief scan of my post should make it more than obvious.
In terms of limiting funding to some courses and having caps etc, while I can see the point, and agree something need to be done, I just don't think a scheme like that is at all realistic. But anyway, we have gone way off topic :tongue:

Original post by llys
Really? What do you consider "useless"? In my own experience, people from working class backgrounds are more likely to study e.g. Engineering, than people from affluent backgrounds, who are disproportionately represented in the arts. (I have a theory why, but it's not particularly interesting.)

Taking this example, I personally would consider Engineering more "useful" than History. (I don't expect people to agree on that though.)


Again, just my own experiences with people I know.
I don't mean sciences v arts, I mean "lesser" versions of some subjects.

Things like "computer forensics" instead of just doing a computer science degree, Media instead of doing English etc etc.
Reply 76
Original post by WelshBluebird
Things like "computer forensics" instead of just doing a computer science degree, Media instead of doing English etc etc.


Several years ago when uni's were rushing to set up forensic courses on the back of Silent Witness and CSI, a couple of police officers dropped into our university to look at re-training. They both worked in forensics and there was no future for them in their then current position as jobs were being cut back. What they wanted was ....computer forensics as shedloads of dosh was being pumped into that side of things.
Original post by wdywuk
There are so many asterix's by every graph ... do you use gross income, net income, disposable income, spend?. Every graph shows a different result and a lot of the ones presented can not be possibly right! This mythical low earning family clearly don't have to heat their house, have electricity and only eat hot takeaway food!


The received wisdom is that VAT is a regressive tax.

The IFS has challenged that.

Obviously every fallacy was received wisdom once.

The authors of the IFS Briefing are distinguished Cambridge economists but this has something of the air of a back of the envelope calculation.

I think I will stick with Livesey and Lipsey until something better comes along!
Original post by wdywuk
Several years ago when uni's were rushing to set up forensic courses on the back of Silent Witness and CSI, a couple of police officers dropped into our university to look at re-training. They both worked in forensics and there was no future for them in their then current position as jobs were being cut back. What they wanted was ....computer forensics as shedloads of dosh was being pumped into that side of things.


I am not getting at your university but it is a disgrace.

And what are your media studies faculty (I assume you have one-even Imperial has one these days http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/humanities/sciencecommunicationgroup/masters/mscinscinecemediaproduction) saying to applicants about career prospects?
Reply 79
The real liars are the Labour Party who condemn cuts. Yet before the election, they agreed to making similar cuts. At the moment, they hav not outlined any plans for reducing the deficit at all. Im sick of listening to Balls "wed reduce the deficit slower" WELL WHAT WOULD YOU CUT U HYPOCRITES.

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