Session Information
22 SES 05 A, Inclusion and Diversity in Higher Education Settings
Paper Session
Contribution
The new coalition Government in the UK has introduced reforms to the student financing regime in England- Securing a Sustainable Future for Higher Education - that include allowing a higher education institutions to set their own tuition fee rates up to a maximum of £9,000 per year of study (€10,600) (currently they are a maximum of £3,290 or €3,800). At the same time the government has made drastic cuts to the higher education teaching budget that will reduce income to institutions that do not charge at least £7,000 (€8,250) per year of study. This has potentially damaging ramifications for inclusion and diversity within HE settings, particularly among applicants from underrepresented groups (such as mature students, students with lower socio-economic background, some Black minority ethnic groups and those from backgrounds in the social care system) unless they can be persuaded that the newly enhanced income-dependent deferred repayment regime reduces still represents a return on their investment.
In total over two fifths (43%) of 18 year-olds enter higher education (HE) in England. However, while people from lower socio-economic backgrounds make up around half of the population of England, they account for just 29% of young, full-time, first-time entrants to higher education (NAO 2008) - a proportion that had remained unchanged for over a decade but has begun to rise over the last five years. For individual students who are unable to access higher education the consequences are potentially lower returns in terms of career and earnings, partly because students from underrepresented groups are more likely to enroll on vocational HE programmes at less prestigious universities (Archer, 2003; Sutton Trust, 2004).
This paper will explore the theoretical underpinnings of the avowedly market-driven reforms and locate them within marketing theory (Gibbs and Knapp: 2002, Maringe, 2005) and the development of higher education policy in England (McCaig, 2011a) and internationally with specific reference to the development of self-financed tuition fee regime in Australia (McCaig, 2011a).
Method
Expected Outcomes
References
An Independent Review of Higher Education Funding and Student Finance (2010) Securing a Sustainable Future for Higher Education (The Browne Report). Archer, L. (2003) Social class and higher education, in L. Archer, M. Hutching and A. Ross (Eds), Higher Education and social class: issues of exclusion and inclusion published by Routledge Falmer, London and New York Gibbs, P & Knapp, M (2002) Marketing Further and Higher Education Research: an educators guide to promoting courses, departments and institutions, London, Kogan Page. Huisman, J., L. Meek, and F. Wood. 2007. Institutional diversity in higher education: A cross-national and longitudinal analysis. Higher Education Quarterly 61, no. 4: 563–77. Maringe, F (2005) Interrogating the crisis in higher education marketing: the CORD model, International Journal of Educational Management, Vol. 19, No.7, 2005 pp.564-578. McCaig, C (2011a) Access agreements, widening participation and market positionality: enabling student choice? in Molesworth, M, Nixon, L, and Scullion, R (eds) The Marketisation of Higher Education and the Student as Consumer, Routledge, London and New York, Chapter 10, pp115-128 ISBN 978-0-415-58447-0 McCaig, C (2011b) "Trajectories of higher education system differentiation: structural policymaking and the impact of tuition fees in England and Australia", Journal of Education and Work, Vol. 24, Nos. 1–2, February–April 2011, 7–25. National Audit Office (2008) Widening Participation in Higher Education, (London, The Stationery Office). Schuetze, H.G. & Slowey, M. (2002) Participation and exclusion: a comparative analysis of non-traditional students and lifelong-learners in Higher Education, Higher Education, Vol. 44, No.3/4, pp.310-325. Sutton Trust (2004) ‘3,000 state school students each year missing from our top universities’, http:/www.suttontrust.com/news.asp#linkone (accessed 11th December 2010)
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