UK: Poor quality university courses face limits on student numbers

London: Universities could be restricted in recruiting students to poor quality courses, under new government plans.

Ministers will ask the independent regulator, the Office for Students (OfS), to limit numbers on courses that do not have “good outcomes”.

Education Minister Robert Halfon said imposing restrictions would encourage universities to improve course quality.

Labour said the move would “put up fresh barriers to opportunity in areas with fewer graduate jobs”.

The advocacy group Universities UK said university was a great investment for the vast majority of students.

A spokeswoman for the organisation warned any measures must be “targeted and proportionate, and not a sledgehammer to crack a nut”.

The government said courses that do not have “good outcomes” for students would include those that have high drop-out rates or have a low proportion of students going on to professional jobs. It will also look at potential earnings when deciding if a degree offers enough value.

PM Rishi Sunak said: “The UK is home to some of the best universities in the world and studying for a degree can be immensely rewarding. But too many young people are being sold a false dream and end up doing a poor-quality course at the taxpayers’ expense that doesn’t offer the prospect of a decent job at the end of it.”

Nearly three-in-10 graduates do not progress into highly-skilled jobs or further study 15 months after graduating, according to the OfS.

The OfS already has the power to investigate and sanction universities which offer degrees falling below minimum performance thresholds – but the new rules would require the regulator to limit student numbers for those courses.

The current thresholds for full-time students doing a first degree are for:

80% of students to continue their studies

75% of students to complete their course

60% of students to go on to further study, professional work, or other positive outcomes, within 15 months of graduating

Universities UK said the UK had the highest completion rates of any OECD country and overall satisfaction rates were high.

“However, it is right that the regulatory framework is there as a backstop to protect student interests in the very small proportion of instances where quality needs to be improved,” a spokeswoman said.

We may get more details of the government’s plans to regulate “rip-off courses” later on Monday.

But according to the Education Minister, Rob Halfon, any recruitment limits on courses will entirely be a matter for the regulator, the Office for Students, rather than the government.

He suggested that the OfS would use “existing powers” to look into poor quality courses.

“We can’t order the Office for Students to do anything,” he told Radio 4’s Today programme.

Currently it can launch an investigation where fewer than 75% of students complete a course, or where fewer than 60% go on to further study or professional work.

This announcement does not change these criteria.

And other aspects of the policy are unclear.

How many students may be denied a place at university in future?

If one in five students would have been better off not going to university (according to one study) is that the kind of numbers the government has in mind? It won’t say.

What are these poor quality courses? Are some subjects more likely to have high drop out rates than others?

The Department for Education can’t say which courses would be at risk of recruitment limits- that would be for the OfS to determine.

But this raises a further question: If some courses are of such poor quality, why not just scrap them entirely?

Speaking on Today, Education Minister Robert Halfon said putting limits on underperforming degrees will mean those courses “will then improve”.

“Students will be able to make informed choices,” he said. “If a course has poor outcomes they might choose to do another course at university, they may still decide to do that course but will have the recruitment limits on it.”

Labour’s shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson said the announcement was “an attack on the aspirations of young people”.

But Mr Halfon dubbed that accusation as “nonsense”.

“The Labour party has been obsessed with quantity over quality and had been party of poor standards in education,” he said.

Liberal Democrat education spokesperson Munira Wilson said the prime minister was “out of ideas” and had “dug up a policy the Conservatives announced and then unannounced twice over”.

She said: “Universities don’t want this. It’s a cap on aspiration, making it harder for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds to go on to further study.”

The idea originated in a 2018 review set up under then-Prime Minister Theresa May. The same review also suggested that more money needed to be pumped into education and that tuition fees needed to be cut – but these are not being implemented.

The new pledge comes ahead of three by-elections in Conservative-held seats on Thursday.

Chart showing how subject choice impacts lifetime earnings

The government also announced it would reduce the maximum fees universities can charge for classroom-based foundation-year courses, from £9,250 to £5,760. In 2021/22, 29,080 students were studying a foundation degree.

Foundation year courses are designed to help prepare students for degrees with specific entry requirements or knowledge, such as medicine and veterinary sciences.

However, the government said research suggested too many people were encouraged to take a foundation year in some subjects like business, where it was not necessary.

University Alliance, which represents professional and technical universities, said cutting fees for foundation year courses was “disappointingly regressive” and “makes them financially unviable to deliver”.

Chief executive Vanessa Wilson said: “Disadvantaged students and the ‘Covid generation’ will lose out if this provision is reduced or lost.”

She added that the government had chosen “to berate one of the few UK sectors which is genuinely world-leading”.