Cuts of £200m to each UK university budget will mean 10,000 fewer extra places……..
24 May 2010 Last updated at 10:00 GMT
University places in spending cut
By Sean Coughlan BBC News education correspondent
The chancellor's spending cuts will mean fewer extra university places
Extra university places and school services in England are to be cut in the coalition government's drive to reduce public spending.
Cuts of £200m to the university budget will mean 10,000 fewer extra places than had been announced.
The Department for Education is to be cut by £670m - including £311m for council spending on schools.
The savings are intended to be part of public spending reductions of £6.25bn.
The spending cuts were announced by the Chancellor George Osborne and his Chief Secretary David Laws.
"We need to tackle the deficit so that our debt repayments don't spiral out of control," said Mr Osborne.
The cuts in university expansion come at a time of unprecedented demand for places - up 16.5% on last year.
There could be 100,000 more people looking for university places this autumn than last year.
Struggle for places
The last Budget of the previous goverment had promised an extra 20,000 places - with the Liberal Democrats then offering 15,000 extra places.
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EDUCATION CUTS
• 10,000 fewer extra university places
• £200m further cuts for universities
• £311m less for local authority education services
• £47m from one-to-one tuition
• £60m from vocational qualifications
• £1m from school food trust
• £16m from national college for head teachers
• Becta technology agency scrapped
There will now only be another 10,000 extra places - the number promised by the Conservative party.
It will mean an extra 8,000 full-time undergraduate places and 2,000 part time places this autumn.
But the funding will only be for one year, the second and third years will have to be funded by universities from other savings.
The cuts of £200m in university spending will be in addition to £449m already announced for next year.
The UCU lecturers' union said the decision would "dash the hopes" of many young people - and the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition "should stop pretending that 'we're all in this together'".
The Million+ group of new universities says the "real losers are the 10,000 extra students who would have had the opportunity to go to university".
School transport
The core spending on schools is to be protected for one year - but there will be £311m cuts to the funding given by the government to local authorities for education.
This covers services such as school transport - and will mean local authorities cutting education services or else finding savings from other budgets.
Becta, the government's agency for improving the use of educational technology in schools, is to be scrapped.
It has running costs of £65m per year - and savings this year are expected to be £10m.
There are a raft of other cuts from school projects - including £47m from one-to-one tuition, £60m from diplomas and other vocational qualifications, £1m from the School Food Trust and £40m from "Every Child" schemes, such as Every Child a Writer.
The Qualifications and Curriculum Development Agency faces efficiency savings - and its long-term future will be decided later this year.
The announcement includes a promise that core school funding, Sure Start and 16-19 funding would be protected for one year.
There will be £150m more to fund 50,000 new apprenticeship places and £50m extra for further education colleges.
"We are very pleased that today's Treasury announcement identifies college provision as one of the few areas where savings are being re-invested," said Martin Doel, chief executive of the Association of Colleges.
Head teachers' leader, John Dunford, welcomed the protection of frontline spending.
"School and college leaders will be reassured by today's pledge to protecting education funding. However the commitment is only for the next financial year," he said.
But Chris Keates, head of the NASUWT teachers' union, said: "Despite the Chancellor's claims, the cuts announced today will hit jobs not only in the public sector but also in the private sector. These cuts could also seriously undermine education provision in schools."
By Sean Coughlan
BBC News education correspondent
The latest figures on university applications in the UK show a substantial increase - but at a lower rate than earlier in the year.
The figures from the Ucas admissions service show a 16.5% increase in applications for higher education courses beginning in the autumn.
An earlier set of provisional figures showed a huge surge of 23%.
This could still mean over 100,000 more applicants than last year chasing university places.
The final figures for applications in 2009 showed almost 640,000 total applicants - with 482,000 eventually accepted on to courses.
These latest figures for 2010 indicate an even higher level of applications - and a rising number of young people who will be turned away.
Extra places
This growing demand comes on top of record numbers of students, with 45% of young people now going on to university. For the first time ever, more than half of all young women are going into higher education.
These latest figures from the admissions service, which will be updated later in the summer, are expected to be close to the final level of increase.
A Ucas spokesman says that the much higher figure of a 23% increase reported in January had been inflated by changes in some course deadlines, which meant some students had applied earlier, pushing up the year-on-year comparison.
Even at the reduced rate of 16.5%, universities face a big increase in applications.
It comes alongside the the tightening of university budgets - and a brake put on their expansion - as part of the pressure on public spending.
There have been promises of between 10,000 and 20,000 extra places from Labour, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats - but such an expansion will not meet this growth in demand.
There is no breakdown of this overall figure for 16.5% growth across all universities - with Ucas saying it would not give any detail or analysis during the general election campaign.
This decision to withhold detail was attacked by the Million+ group of new universities - which wants to know more about which courses and institutions are experiencing this growth.
"Students have a right to know what is happening and politicians on the campaign trail should be asked what more they will do to ensure that all those who are qualified get a place at university in September," said chief executive, Pam Tatlow.
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Majority of young women in university
By Sean Coughlan
BBC News education correspondent
The numbers of women at university have surged this decade
A watershed in university participation has been reached - for the first time a majority of young women in England are going to university.
Provisional figures, showing university entrance for 2008-09, show that 51% of young women entered higher education - up from 49% the previous year.
The overall figures also show an all-time high of 45% going to university, including 40% of young men.
Both Labour and the Conservatives are promising even more university places.
Showing the scale of the social change - 20 years ago only about one in five young women went into higher education and 30 years ago it was about one in 10.
In the early 1960s, only about one in 20 young people were going into higher education.
Soaring applications
This latest record high has been driven by a decade-long surge in the numbers of women going to university.
A decade ago, although a slightly different measurement was used, 41% of women were going to university and 37% of men.
The figures published by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills show the proportion of people aged between 17 and 30 who were entering higher education in the autumn of 2008.
It shows that there has been an increase from 43% to 45% in the overall figure - with an increase of 2 percentage points for both women and men.
There had been a longstanding target for 50% of young people to go to university, which has never been achieved - not least because of a relatively slower growth in male numbers.
Until the early-1990s, more men than women were going to university - but since then women have taken an increasing proportion of places.
'Great investment'
Political opposition to expanding student numbers has also faded - with all the major parties supporting the principle of more university places.
In the Budget last week, the government sought to double the Conservatives' promise of university expansion, by announcing a further 20,000 places for this year.
But this increase will still not keep up the soaring demand for university - with admissions authorities reporting a 23% year on year increase in applications.
There have been warnings that this will mean tens of thousands of well-qualified applicants will not get a place this autumn.
This growth in student numbers reflects international trends - with the number of graduates in industrialised countries almost doubling in the past decade, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
Business Secretary, Lord Mandelson, whose department is responsible for universities, welcomed the continued push towards 50% of young people going into higher education.
"This aspiration is important not for the sake of a target, but because Britain's economy needs skilled graduates to innovate, grow and secure the recovery. A university education also sets students up to succeed across their lifetimes and a British degree is still a great investment for any individual."
But responses from the university sector reflected fears over funding.
Pam Tatlow, chief executive of the Million+ group of new universities, warned: "No-one who has the ability should be deprived of the opportunity to go to university... the opportunity to go to university is a question of both social justice and ensuring the UK's economic competitiveness."
The head of the UCU lecturers' union, Sally Hunt, said: "The government should be rightly proud of its efforts to get more people into our universities. However, it needs to be brave enough to back its policy and provide the necessary resources the university sector, and record numbers of students, so desperately need."
25 January 2011 Last updated at 01:20 GMT
Graduate job outlook 'recovering'
By Sean Coughlan BBC News education correspondent
Almost a quarter of a million people applying for university this year are going to miss out on a place, university leaders are forecasting.
Spending cuts have reduced extra university places at a time when there has been a huge surge in demand.
The number of applicants not getting a place will have doubled in two years.
Professor David Green, vice-chancellor of the University of Worcester, says it will mean thousands of "unnecessarily blighted lives".
With the spending cuts stopping university expansion, this summer will see an unprecedented number of applicants failing to get a place on a degree course.
'Tough on young'
"Many highly-qualified young people with good A-levels will not get a place at university," says Professor Green.
"The same students, with the same qualifications, applying for the same university two years ago, would have got a place."
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“Start Quote
The same students, with the same qualifications, applying for the same university two years ago, would have got a place”
End Quote David Green Vice-chancellor, University of Worcester
He says this is "tough on young people who are entirely blameless" of the financial problems that are putting a brake on university places.
Professor Green is also forecasting that because of spending restrictions designed to curb numbers there will be an actual drop in overall places available this year, despite the announcement of a small number of extra places.
He argues that universities have the capacity on courses to offer a further 40,000 places, if the funding was made available.
Last year, there were 158,000 applicants who did not get a place - up from about 120,000 in 2008.
Professor Green is forecasting that this will rise to 225,000 this year and could edge towards 250,000.
The most recent admissions service figures show an average 16.5% increase - and 80,000 extra applicants - but he believes that this could rise further with late applications.
Individual institutions have seen rises in applications of more than 40%.
A separate analysis by the Million+ group of new universities suggests there will be a "mismatch between supply and demand of 250,000".
The admissions service Ucas says there will be at least 200,000 applicants who will not end up with a place - with a full breakdown of applications due in July.
Good grades
Within this total number of people failing to get places will be some who did not reach the grades needed - and others who might apply and then get a job instead.
There could be 100,000 applicants with good A-levels missing places
But Professor Green says that about 100,000 of those failing to get a place will have good grades.
He attributes this increase in applications to young people getting the message that they need a degree to improve their career chances.
He also sees a major change in the employment market, with new jobs more likely to be created in graduate areas, rather than manufacturing or unskilled jobs.
This means that both young people leaving school and mature students who want to improve their skills are chasing places on the same courses.
This year's applications are also now competing with those who did not get places last year.
Ucas has said that more than 40,000 of this year's applicants had previously applied last year.
Spending cuts
Cuts in university spending announced this week meant that the number of extra places on 2009 levels has been reduced to 8,000 full-time places.
But Professor Green says these extra places will be counterbalanced by losses elsewhere leading to a reduction in places overall.
And in particular, he says that the fines levied on universities which over-recruit mean that they will be much more cautious about the number of students - leading to them recruit less than their cap.
The new universities and work-related courses are seeing particular surges in demand.
Alice Hynes, chief executive of the Guild HE group of smaller specialist universities, says there are particular concerns for students who might miss out on work-related courses.
Too often debates about higher education become "tangled up" in who gets into the top universities, she says.
But a much more pressing issue is about those students who might need a degree to improve their job chances, she says.
Million+ is warning that the lack of places will mean that many students from families from poorer backgrounds will be discouraged from applying.
"This shortage will only grow more acute between now and the start of the academic year," says a Million+ spokesperson.
"It's clear that the decision to reduce the number of places was the wrong one."
The Business, Innovation and Skills department, which is responsible for universities, says that "securing a place at university has always been a competitive process".
"The government wants to support people with the ability and talent to go to university - because it is good for those individuals and the future of our economy. That is why we are creating 10,000 additional places to meet the demand this year."
Nearly half (45%) of final-year students at the UK's top universities view their career prospects as "very limited", a survey suggests.
The poll of 16,000 finalists found a third feared last year's graduates would take up most of the vacancies.
One in six said they would not have gone to university if they had known how tough the jobs market was going to be, the research by High Fliers found.
In total, 26% plan further study, 16% plan to travel and 14% are undecided.
The survey of finalists at 30 leading universities found just 36% expected to start or look for a graduate-level job after leaving university this summer.
And 8% intended to take up temporary or voluntary work.
Salary expectations
The media, teaching and marketing were the top three graduate career choices for students graduating in 2010 - as they were for 2009.
Applications for jobs in information technology (IT) and engineering were down 5% and 11% respectively on last year.
For the second year running, graduate salary expectations have dropped, with final year job hunters expecting to earn an average of £22,000 for their first job - 3.1% less than in 2008.
Students with the highest salary expectations were law students who expected to earn an average starting salary of £24,800.
Next were computing and IT students, who anticipated an average starting salary of £24,300. Engineering students expected to get £24,300 and business and finance students £23,200.
Finalists with the lowest salary expectations were arts or humanities students who, on average, expected to get a starting salary of £19,700 and those studying languages, who reckoned on salaries of £20,900.
Tuiton fees
The survey found graduates in 2010 expected to owe an average of £17,900, up from £15,700 in 2009 and £11,600 in 2008.
This could be attributable to the introduction, in 2006, of higher tuition fees for undergraduates at English universities.
Managing director of High Fliers Research, Martin Birchall, said: "Final year students due to leave UK universities this summer are just as pessimistic about their employment prospects as those who graduated 12 months ago.
"The recession may be officially over, but, with a record number of students due to complete degrees in the coming weeks and tens of thousands of last year's graduates still looking for work, there is widespread concern on campus that competition for graduate jobs has never been fiercer."
The students surveyed were from the following universities: Aston, Bath, Belfast Queens University, Birmingham, Bristol, Cambridge, Cardiff, Durham, Edinburgh, Exeter, Glasgow, Lancaster, Leeds, Liverpool, London Imperial College, London King's College, London School of Economics, London University College, Loughborough, Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham, Oxford, Reading, Sheffield, Southampton, St Andrews, Strathclyde, Warwick and York.
25 January 2011 Last updated at 01:20 GMT
Graduate job outlook 'recovering'
By Sean Coughlan BBC News education correspondent
University leavers face a jobs market that is showing signs of improvement for the first time since the recession, research suggests.
A survey of more than 200 employers in the UK reveals an 8.9% annual increase in graduate jobs.
But tough competition means it is still an "employers' market", the Association of Graduate Recruiters says.
The survey shows that average starting salaries have not risen for three years, staying at £25,000 per year.
This report confirms an upward trend in job opportunities for graduates, after a steep decline in the wake of the financial crisis.
The improving jobs market was driven by a surge of vacancies at the end of last year, says the survey, with a forecast of a further 3.8% increase for this year.
"It is heartening to see that after so many months of misery for graduates, the job market is finally picking up," said Carl Gilleard, chief executive of the Association of Graduate Recruiters (AGR).
But such optimism is tempered by warnings that demands for jobs is continuing to outstrip supply and that employers are receiving high levels of applications.
This intense competition is also allowing employers to freeze starting salaries.
Work experience
Although another jobs survey last week showed that while the average starting salaries might be kept down, there were wide differences between sectors, with recruits into investment banking starting on £42,000.
There are also indications that an increasing number of vacancies are being taken by applicants who have carried out work placements with an employer.
Ernst and Young says more than a third of places in its graduate intake have gone to applicants who have carried out internships at the firm.
Microsoft also said: "In this tough jobs market, getting access to these placements is absolutely invaluable for young people, because it is increasingly a foot in the door to a future career."
This follows a pattern identified in a graduate jobs survey last week which showed the value placed by employers on work experience.
There are also suggestions that employers are hoping to recruit the most talented youngsters by establishing links with them before they graduate.
The UCU lecturers' union warned that graduate pay was not keeping pace with the forthcoming increase in tuition fees - and that the rewards of going to university would be diminished.
Universities Minister David Willetts said: "A degree remains a good investment in the long term and is one of the best pathways to achieving a good job and rewarding career."
Increase in unemployed graduates
2 September 2011 Last updated at 09:33 GMT
Increase in unemployed graduates, survey suggests
Almost 28% of UK graduates who left university in 2007 were still not in full-time work three and a half years later, figures have suggested.
The figure, based on 49,065 graduate responses, includes about 21 % who were working part-time or studying and 3.5% who gave their response as "other".
However, the Higher Education Statistics Agency (Hesa) said about 3.5% were considered to be unemployed.
That was an increase on the 2.6% in a 2008 survey of graduates from 2005.
Sally Hunt, general secretary of the University and College Union, said it was "worrying" that the number of unemployed graduates has risen.
The agency's figures are based on a snapshot survey taken on 29 November 2010 of 49,065 students who left university in 2007.
Of the 27.7% who said they were not in full-time work, 8.8% were working part-time or voluntarily, 5.3% were working and studying and 6.5% were just studying.
3.6% gave their response as "other", leaving 3.5% considered as unemployed.
Previous Hesa surveys suggested that 2.3% of those who graduated in 2003 were assumed to be unemployed three and a half years later, along with 2.6% of graduates who left higher education in 2005.
Gender gap
It also suggested that men were more likely to be on higher salaries than women.
While 14% of men in full-time paid work who graduated in 2007 were earning between £30,000 and £34,999 three and a half years later, the same was true for 9.3% of women.
In comparison, 29.4% of women were earning £20,000 to £24,999, against 15.6% of men.
The figures also suggested that a fifth (21.5%) of those questioned did not think that university had prepared them for their career, with 6.4% saying it had not prepared them at all.
'Worrying trend'
About one in 10 (11.1%) did not think their degree course was good value for money.
Overall, 84.2% said they were satisfied with their career to date.
Ms Hunt said: "While it is encouraging that the majority of the class of 2007 recognise the value and worth of their degree, it is worrying that the number of unemployed graduates has risen.
"The jobs market is now even tougher and new students entering a system with the highest public university fees in the world deserve better prospects.
The countries investing in graduates and high skills are the ones who will prosper in long run."
The vice-chancellors' body Universities UK said the recession had hit the jobs market hard, but graduates were well-equipped to weather the downturn.
"Graduates can trust that their degrees put them in a better position to succeed and make them more employable both in the short and the long term," said chief executive Nicola Dandridge.
But the National Union of Students said the government risked "losing a generation to low skills and high unemployment" by failing to support young people enough.
President Liam Burns called for more training and learning opportunities for young people, and more financial support for students.
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