Political context

In 1999, former Prime Minister Tony Blair had set out a target whereupon 50% of young people should attend universities. This has been achieved as figures released by the Department for Education showed that 59% of people were studying for a degree for 2018/2019 entry. Despite never explicitly announcing support for Blair’s target, the Conservatives government has encouraged students to consider higher education as seen with its 2015 decision to abolish the cap on the number of students each university in England could enrol. However, it was announced in the summer of 2020 that the Education Secretary Gavin Williamson has decided to abandon this 21 years old consensus.

Reasons for abandoning the scheme

One reason for abandoning the scheme is because of an over-saturated labour market filled with a relatively high supply of graduates who attended universities with declining quality of teaching and over-filling facilities due to the overpopulation of students. It is estimated that nearly 1/10 graduates are unemployed a year after leaving university and in 2019, the ONS has revealed that almost ⅓ of graduates are ‘overeducated’ in their jobs, suggesting these graduates’ degrees and knowledge are not used.

Also, it has been reported that students at Russell Group Universities have been rejected from popular lectures and directed to online platforms whilst paying the typical £9,2500 per year. Although this is the norm for this COVID-inflicted year, it is certainly not the most effective method of teaching (loss of concentration, confusing overload of content and less opportunity for clarification), highlighting a rising problem in stretching the capacity of facilities and an increasing reliance on online teaching. Undoubtedly, the university’s finances run in parallel with the quality of teaching at universities hence why in 2018/2019, 20% of the total student population at UK universities were overseas and are charged far higher tuition fees.

The never-ending loop of universities trying to catch up and accommodate the numbers of students may be broken with Gavin Williamson’s shift of focus to their mantra which “must be further education, further education, further education.” To further support Williamson’s view is Alistair Jarvis (Chief Executive of Universities UK) who has said that: “Increasing support for further education is an important move but it would be a mistake to view post-18 education as a binary choice between supporting either higher education or further education.” This appears to show that besides attending universities for the sake of receiving a certificate, undergoing vocational training at a higher-level apprenticeship would be beneficial for a proportion of students who prefer a much more practical approach. If the government truly believes this to be true, then funding should be directed to non-traditional pathways to help alleviate the university’s pressures.

by Ke Thie Kiew

Overpopulation at UK Universities