Global trends in higher education financing: the United Kingdom

Journal article

Over the last 40 years, UK higher education has moved from a publicly funded system to a mixed publicly/privately funded system regulated as a tuition loans-based consumer market, in which both the student as graduate, and the higher education institution, are responsible for a significant proportion of total costs . It is nevertheless subject to robust government control. This is partly exercised indirectly through comparative assessments of institutional performance by public agencies that define common objectives and install a hierarchy based on measured performance, helping to differentiate HEIs within the market. Institutions remain partly dependent on government funding in the forms of research-related support, teaching subsidies and subsidization of the loan system through non-repayment of debt. The 2012 introduction of a £9,000 maximum fee for full-time students and £6,750 for part-time students in England, based on income-contingent repayment arrangements, was associated with a net increase in funding, growth in full-time first degree students, and a sharp fall in part-time and mature age students. Part-time students begin repayments four years after the commencement of their course of study. The long-term cost of the student loans scheme is uncertain and its sustainability is in question. After 15 years of declining funding for students, total systemic funding rose by 50% between 2000 and 2015 and per student funding also rose, but this benefitted only the research-intensive universities in the Russell group. These universities benefit most from funds allocated through the government’s periodic national research assessments.

Authors: Marginson, S

• Publication status: Published
• Peer review status: Peer reviewed
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Journal: International Journal of Educational Development
• Volume: 58
• Issue: January 2018
• Pages: 26-36
• Publication date: 2017-05-01
• Acceptance date: 2017-03-27
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ijedudev.2017.03.008
• ISSN: 0738-0593
• Keywords: FFR