University students in England are seeing their maintenance loans increasingly consumed by the rising cost of private-sector accommodation, with purpose-built rooms in London now averaging £1,000 more than the maximum loan. A survey of the student accommodation market carried out by the property consultants Cushman & Wakefield found that the average cost of en-suite private…
Category: Students
Next NHS staff shortages will include radiographers, as courses close
Radiography and nursing degree courses may be at risk of closure, academics are warning – at a time when the NHS is wrestling with a recruitment crisis. The Council of Deans of Health has now drawn up an “at risk” list of university courses struggling to attract and retain enough students following the removal of…
Staff warn of ‘intimidatory’ tactics at Liverpool University after strike
The University of Liverpool has told staff who went on strike over pay and pensions this week that they must catch up on missed work or risk penalties, despite already having their pay deducted over the eight-day industrial action. In an email sent by pro vice-chancellor Gavin Brown, members of the University and College Union…
Universities accused of using ‘strong-arm tactics’ to stop strike action
Universities have been accused of using “strong-arm tactics” to undermine strike action which threatens to cause widespread disruption at 60 campuses across the UK this week. More than 40,000 lecturers, technicians, librarians and other academic staff will walk out on strike for eight days from Monday over pension, pay and conditions, in a wave of…
UK academics face furious backlash for encouraging students to vote
When Carrie Paechter, a professor at Nottingham Trent University, tweeted two weeks ago that students could register to vote at both their home and term-time addresses, she didn’t anticipate the tirade of anger it would unleash. She was reported to the police and the Electoral Commission, and someone wrote to her vice-chancellor calling for her…
Student buildings still covered in Grenfell-style cladding
Thousands of students arriving at university for freshers’ week face sleeping in high-rise accommodation wrapped in combustible Grenfell-style cladding, the government has admitted. Fifty-four privately owned student residential towers in England remain clad in aluminium composite material similar to that which helped spread the fire at Grenfell Tower 15 months ago, claiming 72 lives. The…
‘Monolithically white places’: academics on racism in universities
An inquiry by the government’s equality watchdog has condemned universities for being oblivious to the scale of racism on their campuses. The Equality and Human Rights Commission’s report, has been widely welcomed for highlighting universities’ complacency on tackling racism. But the body has also been criticised by leading academics of colour and student leaders for…
‘Symbolically posh’ Bristol University expanding to wrong side of tracks
In the well-heeled district of Clifton in Bristol, with its Georgian crescents and French brasseries, 100% of school leavers go to university. Yet in the southern suburb of Hartcliffe, the figures are the lowest in the country: only 8.6% make it there. This is the divided face of Brexit Britain. Bristol University, part of the…
‘Stormzy effect’: record number of black Britons studying at Cambridge
The “Stormzy effect” has helped inspire record numbers of black British students to study at the University of Cambridge, following the musician’s high-profile backing of scholarships for black students at the institution. Cambridge said 91 black British students had been admitted as first-year undergraduates at the start of the academic year, an increase of nearly…
University league tables 2020
1 1 Cambridge 100 n/a n/a n/a 11.2 9.8 224 6 86 99 Satisfied with course n/a Satisfied with teaching n/a Satisfied with feedback n/a Student to staff ratio 11.2 Spend per student/10 9.8 Average entry tariff 224 Value added score/10 6 Career after 6 months 86 Contin-uation 99 2 3 St Andrews 97.9 93…
I returned to uni for freshers’ week 20 years after leaving. Here’s what has changed
In the autumn of 1997, I was a fresher at the University of Glasgow. Months after the Labour landslide, weeks after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, I was an 18-year-old British-Indian made up of equal parts teenage kicks, terror and Topshop – and on my way to Scotland for the first time, to…
What is Engagement?
Last Saturday we had a thunderstorm move through Seattle…we don’t get them very often around here so a storm with over 2200 lightning strikes is pretty crazy and awesome….but more than that…it was Mother Natures way of calling in Fall. Since then the temp as barley hit 70 degrees if we’re lucky and the low…
‘I became suicidal’: students accused of cheating by UK tell of ‘living hell’
Farzana Boby describes her life in Bangladesh as a “living hell”. She returned from London two years ago, having spent three years failing to overturn an allegation of cheating by the British government. Boby is one of thousands of international students forced to abandon their studies and return home who are awaiting the publication of…
University league tables 2019
1 1 Cambridge 100 89 91 70 11.0 9.7 225 5.8 88 99 Satisfied with course 89 Satisfied with teaching 91 Satisfied with feedback 70 Student to staff ratio 11.0 Spend per student/10 9.7 Average entry tariff 225 Value added score/10 5.8 Career after 6 months 88 Contin-uation 99 2 2 Oxford 97.4 90 92…
Moving out of your student flat? Beware the small print
When you rent a property – whether a room in halls or a shared house – you sign a legal contract that sets out rules for you and your landlord. Ignoring the small print may cause problems throughout your tenancy, but can bite particularly hard when you move out. If you haven’t done it recently,…
#EduroChallenge Day 1: Students of All Ages
Sometimes we need a little nudge to do the things we know are good for us. Like blogging…I know it’s good for me, I always mean to do it, but doing it…that’s the hard part. I think that’s in part why at Eduro Learning we decided to do a 21-day challenge to start the school…