The results of the latest Public Attitudes to Higher Education survey show UK universities still enjoy public support - but work needs to be done to improve engagement and outreach.
By John O'Leary
"The findings on research were even more positive, with almost 70 percent agreeing that university research is one of the best things produced in the UK”.
Universities in England have felt generally unloved since the pandemic; criticised by politicians and media alike, first over remote teaching and value for money, and more recently over freedom of speech. In an era of tight public spending constraints, ministers have felt little pressure to loosen the purse strings, even though tuition fees for undergraduates have been frozen for five years and student maintenance loans are set to rise by 2.8 percent at a time of 10 percent inflation.
A new report on public attitudes to higher education suggests that universities may enjoy more support than previously supposed, although perhaps not enough to influence a government that is facing a wave of public sector strikes (including by university lecturers) and gloomy economic forecasts. But the polling, commissioned by the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) and the independent charity UPP, shows more backing for universities than in last year’s initial exercise, and considerably more than in the United States.
The Public First polling organisation, which interviewed almost 2,000 adults last summer, found that 63 percent of those with definite views on the subject believed that universities were heading in broadly the right direction. The findings were effectively reversed in the last equivalent US survey, by the Pew Research Center in 2019, with only 38 percent thinking the country’s universities were taking the right direction and 62 percent feeling they were not.
Nor did the results divide on political lines as much in England as in the USA. There were only two percentage points between Labour and Conservative voters in the positive and negative categories, whereas Republicans and Democrats were 20 percentage points apart. Almost three-quarters of Republicans disapproved of the direction American universities were taking.
There was good news, too, for English universities on the perennially controversial topic of how many higher education students there should be. Ever since Tony Blair’s government set a target of 50 percent participation, there has been a movement, mainly among Conservative voters, to put expansion into reverse. The latest polling found 37 percent were satisfied with the current level of participation and another 17 percent wanted more students, while only 27 percent thought a smaller proportion of the population should go to university.
The findings on research were even more positive, with almost 70 percent agreeing that “university research is one of the best things produced in the UK”. Three-quarters of those polled thought that universities were important to research and innovation, and 57 percent agreed that they were important to the UK economy as a whole. Half of all respondents accepted that even during the current public spending squeeze, research should receive funding from the taxpayer, although more than a third thought a lot of the money spent on it was wasted.
Think university is important for the economy
Do not think universities prepare students for the real world
Think cost of living and economic pressures would deter studies
Despite the encouraging overall results, however, English universities will be concerned about negative findings in the “culture wars” sections of the new survey and about the differing perceptions by age group and educational qualifications. One in five thought taking a degree was a “waste of time” and this proportion rose to almost one in three among 18-24 year-olds. Although 75 percent considered collecting a degree an impressive achievement, 58 percent did not think it prepared students for the “real world”.
On freedom of speech, 57 percent believed that it was under “at least some threat” on campus, and these concerns differed little by political persuasion. While 62 percent of Conservatives saw a threat, Liberal Democrat and Labour supporters were only three and four percentage points behind respectively. The findings are significant, considering the succession of ministers, as well as media commentators, who have criticised universities over curriculum changes, trigger warnings and the treatment of individual academics with unpopular views. But the latest polling demonstrates that the critics are far from united on what universities should be doing. While 56 percent said that universities should always defend and promote free speech on campus, even if that offends or upsets some groups of students, only 46 percent thought that universities should completely protect people’s ability to say what they like on campus, even when what they say is offensive to others.
There were also differences of opinion on student funding, with 71 percent of respondents believing that the cost of living and economic pressures would deter people from going to university in the next few years, and 57 percent thinking that the Government should provide additional support to students. Yet only 10 percent placed students among the top three groups they would prioritise for support with the cost of living, compared to 57 percent for those on minimum wage and 47 percent for pensioners.
Richard Brabner, Director of the UPP Foundation, said “These challenging findings around cost of living – and the lack of support from the public to make students a priority group for financial aid – means it is incumbent on all of us working in the higher education sector to continue to make the case for student access and success.”
Perhaps the most concerning aspect of the report, however, was the low level of engagement with universities at any level. Three in 10 of those polled were classified as “broadly uninterested”, including 38 percent who had been students themselves. More than half of all respondents thought that society overvalues a degree, although most would still want their own children to go to university.
Nearly half of those interviewed had not interacted with a university in any way over the course of the previous year, whether visiting a campus, having contact with students or staff, or even seeing an academic interviewed on television. Fewer than one in five had been on a campus during the year, a proportion which dropped close to one in 10 for those from the two lowest socio-economic classes. The after-effects of the pandemic may have depressed the figures for in-person visits, but those for other forms of engagement remain surprisingly low.
According to Brabner, these findings encouraged a number of universities to send the report to their governing bodies to debate how they could boost engagement with the public. “The real challenge is how to engage with lower socio-economic groups and make people more aware of the value of universities,” he said. “It is not enough to be able to demonstrate in data that your university is having an economic or social impact if there is no corresponding belief amongst the general public that such an impact exists.”
As in 2021, those taking part in the exercise were divided into seven groups according to their general view of universities, from the 16 percent who see higher education as critical to finding a good job to the 10 percent who support universities primarily for their research – and the similar proportion who see them as an entry ticket to elites. Most displayed similar attitudes to the previous year. The exception was the group labelled as University Pessimists – predominantly Conservative voters who did not experience higher education – who had become “increasingly extreme” since 2021. Two-thirds of them dismissed a university degree as a waste of time, compared to less than half in the last report, and only 6 percent thought universities had a positive effect on the country.
Nick Hillman, Director of HEPI, said: “A sustained advocacy job will need to be done either side of the next general election if more people are to understand the true value of higher education. One of the most dispiriting findings is how many people have only very rarely, or never, knowingly visited – or even apparently engaged passively with – a university. It is clear universities need to do more to welcome people onto campus and to make their activity more visible.”
The polling is intended to become an annual exercise tracking public views of higher education and the value of a degree. Brabner added: “All my conversations with vice-chancellors suggest that they are really interested in these issues and recognise there is a lot of work to be done.”
Universities UK has launched a national conversation on higher education funding, with the fee for home undergraduates worth little more than £6,000 in real terms, compared to the £9,250 originally approved. The Public Attitudes report should provide some ammunition for the campaigners, but also a measure of how far universities have to go to win the support of large sections of the population.
Enter Chris Hipkins:
New Zealand's new Prime Minister and his plans for education
Enter Chris Hipkins:
New Zealand's new Prime Minister and his plans for education
What does the change at the helm of New Zealand’s government mean for the international education sector? This is the story of a PM who has consistently warned that “tough decisions lie ahead”.
By Leigh Pearson
"Hipkins immediately acknowledged that the Ardern administration had moved 'too much and too fast'."
New Zealand’s ruling Labour Party surprised the nation and the world late in January with a change in leadership, leading to Education Minister Chris Hipkins being sworn in as Prime Minister on 25 January 2023.
While the country was stunned, the spectacularly smooth transition following the resignation of Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern reflected careful planning and saw Prime Minister Hipkins assume the role with a well-prepared repositioning of the government. He relinquished his education portfolio.
Hipkins immediately acknowledged that the Ardern administration had moved “too much and too fast” on wide-ranging reforms, had failed to sufficiently explain the reasons for the reforms to New Zealanders and had not engaged with business. Highlighting a change of direction, he added that his government would focus on “bread and butter” issues, a term emphasising a back-to-basics approach reflecting the country’s cost of living crisis. According to the country’s official data agency, Stats NZ, the cost of living for an average household increased 8.2 percent in 2022.
Within weeks, some reforms had been abandoned or delayed. Notably, however, the Prime Minister’s own well-advanced reform of vocational education survived. Proposed in response to the mounting debt faced by the country's 16 polytechnics, the reforms were designed to meet employer skill needs.
The centrepiece for the reforms is Te Pūkenga, which now runs New Zealand’s 16 polytechnics and nine industry training organisations. The institute has already had a tumultuous history. Since launching in April 2020, four senior executives have been appointed and resigned, including the inaugural Chief Executive. The organisation is forecasting a NZ$63 million deficit for 2022 and will require a NZ$456 million funding boost through to 2027, according to a business case study accidentally leaked online.
This comes at a time when the wider tertiary education sector is under pressure due to an estimated 10 percent fall in domestic student numbers and international student figures taking time to bounce back for most institutions.
The financial environment for all tertiary education providers is further compounded by across-the-board cost pressures including staff salary demands. Some Private Training Establishments (PTEs) have faltered.
million
Te Pūkenga's forecasted deficit for 2022
fewer domestic and international students in NZ tertiary education
million
Te Pūkenga's petition amount for government cash injection
Proportion of NZers in tertiary education during 2010s
Proportion of NZers tertiary education in 2021
Other factors outside institutions’ control, such as the country’s historical birth rate, will continue to affect the sector in the short-term. From 1993-2003, the country’s birth rate dropped almost 14.4 percent, to a then historical low of 14.183 per 10,000 people. The delayed impact of those declines, almost two decades later as students age into the tertiary education system, have been significant. From a highwater mark of 17 percent during the 2000s, total tertiary education participation shrunk to 12 percent of population in 2021.
Minister Hipkins has always told universities to look to their strong balance sheets to resolve their funding issues, but recent job losses indicate that’s not enough.
During his five years as Education Minister, Hipkins supported international education and its global and financial contribution to the country’s schools, tertiary institutions and local students. During the pandemic, the country’s international student in-country cohort fell from 115,000 in 2019 to around 20,000 in 2021. The period when the New Zealand border was closed to students offered the Minister an opportunity to reset the sector.
In May 2022, he announced the country would fully reopen to international students two months later and that he would be undertaking a promotional tour to the United States and South America. He said: “Our international education sector has done it tough for the last few years. Bringing forward our reopening to all international students shows this Government’s strong commitment to them, and to the rebuild of high-quality, world-class, New Zealand international education.”
At the same time, the Minister moved to reposition the sector with policies focused on “value over volume.”
Launched in August 2022 at the New Zealand International Education Conference, Hipkins’ International Education Strategy 2022-2030 is designed to get the sector “back on track” and moving towards a “more sustainable and high-value international sector post-COVID-19” for international students and outbound domestic students. This includes a medium to long-term goal for the sector which is “less reliant on onshore education delivery.” It also calls on New Zealand providers to attract students beyond China and India.
As the welcome mat was fully rolled out to international students, the then Education Minister tightened immigration settings for many of those students. This saw the removal of in-study and post-study work rights for students in non-degree level courses, with Chris Hipkins spelling out that he did not want studying in New Zealand to be a “backdoor to residency.”
“We won’t be going back to [the previous government’s] volume over value approach that became a backdoor to residency for lower-skilled and lower-paid migrant workers, who were then at risk of exploitation.”
"Under Hipkins’s watch, the government also developed the International Student Wellbeing Strategy.”
Post-study work rights for undergraduates would be limited to the actual time they studied in New Zealand while post-graduate students kept their three-year post-study work rights.
Under Minister Hipkins’s watch, the government also developed the International Student Wellbeing Strategy, described as the heart of New Zealand’s international education and developed to ensure international students ”feel welcome and safe, enjoy a high-quality education and are valued for their contribution to the country.” Education providers are required to ensure student safety and well-being by meeting requirements set out in the Education (Pastoral Care of Tertiary and International Learners) Code of Practice. It is demanding for providers.
The education portfolio has been held by eight former New Zealand Prime Ministers, either before or during their time in office. Chris Hipkins is the third Labour Prime Minister to have an education portfolio association following Peter Fraser (1940-1949) and David Lange (1984-1989), reflecting the party’s fundamental belief in education access for all and how education improves lives.
The country’s 41st Prime Minister has a family pedigree in education: his mother is the chief researcher at the New Zealand Council of Education Research. He joined the Labour Party while at school and is a former Victoria University of Wellington student president. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in politics and criminology.
During his first year at university, Hipkins was one of several students arrested while protesting at Parliament against legislation he said would turn academic entities into corporate entities and students into customers. Chris Hipkins campaigned for 10 years against his arrest securing an apology and award of more than NZ$200,000 to be shared with his fellow 41 protestors. A judge found there were no grounds for arrest.
Referring to his protest arrest during his maiden speech to Parliament in 2008, He spelt out his commitment to tertiary education. “I remain as committed today as I was 11 years ago to breaking down the barriers to participation in higher education. I am incredibly proud of all that has been achieved over the past nine years, from putting an end to the massive tuition fee increases to the introduction of interest-free student loans. I am deeply disappointed we are one election victory away from achieving a universal living allowance for students.”
While an allowance was not implemented, Hipkins did introduce a fees-free policy in 2017 to be phased in over eight years. However, that policy was paused and it remains available only for students in their first year of study. Loans continue to be interest-free.
While Hipkins carries a lifelong commitment to education into his Prime Ministership, it is unlikely that the political and economic environment he is confronting will permit him any special regard for the portfolio. Alongside a cost of living crisis, the country now faces an estimated NZ$13 billion bill to rebuild after the recent storms. As the new Prime Minister has consistently warned, “tough decisions lie ahead.” And that’s before election day on 14 October 2023.
Far From Home
The student accommodation crisis
Higher education is seeing an uptick after the COVID-19 pandemic. Many universities are happy to see enrolment numbers rising. However, after reports reveal a lack of housing, are universities, and their countries, truly prepared to fully accommodate international students? We look at different perspectives and solutions across major university hubs.
By Prisha Dandwani
“In the short-term, universities and operators need to work together to understand available stock across the country."
It is not easy for Zennon Ulyate-Crow, Founder and President of the University of California Santa Cruz Housing Coalition, to reveal the more drastic details of student housing shortages.
“I know students that have slept out in the woods, camped in the woods, have a tent, and use communal lounges for the showers and kitchen,” he says.
“I walk around campus and I see vans that students are living in, I see lights on, or even solar panels on the roof. And I know people that are commuting every day from two hours away because they can’t find housing.”
The hard truth
According to a 2021 report by research, policy and advocacy organisation The Hope Center at Temple University, 14 percent of students in America experienced homelessness, the highest percentage the centre has seen since tracking began in 2015. Nine percent of students are homeless in The University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC), where Ulyate-Crow studies as a second-year politics major.
When explaining how difficult it is for local and international students to find rentals, he says, “I had friends going to check an apartment and there would be a line of 60 people queueing up to see a place… it is a landlord’s market.
“Santa Cruz has the highest percentage of landlords, almost every single homeowner rents out a room, or a shed. Even then, these rooms, with shared facilities in a family home, go for about USD $1500 a month”.
In the UK, while student homelessness exists, the Higher Educational Policy Institute (HEPI) reported there is not enough data to determine clear numbers. Jon Wakeford, Director of Engagement and Chair of UPP, a full-service student residential company, headquartered in London, says “there are three full-time students competing for every PBSA (purpose-built student accommodation) bed in the UK.”
How did we get here?
“This has been decades in the making in California,” Ulyate-Crow tells QS Insights Magazine. “COVID-19 exacerbated so many issues. After the restrictions, everyone started moving back in, classes resumed in-person, and the price of accommodation is now eclipsing the price of tuition.
“This is not necessarily the university’s fault. They have not expanded housing, but infrastructure costs have also skyrocketed.”
Similarly, the UK is undergoing multiple challenges. Wakeford explains shortages are a result of “structural undersupply of accommodation and an increasing student population”.
“Whilst this appears a fairly obvious answer, the anatomy of the wider crisis in student housing dates back more than two decades, with the huge expansion in rates of participation in higher education following the 1992 Further and Higher Education Act (the act shifted higher education dynamics in the UK, such as removing 500 further education institutions from the local education authority (LEA) and established further education funding councils (FEFCs).
“And the number of full-time students has increased well over 700,000 since the year 2000.
“However, capital grants from the Higher Education Funding Council (HEFC) for accommodation projects were incrementally reduced and then scrapped altogether. UK universities, have, therefore, been generally unable or unwilling to develop accommodation leveraged off their own balance sheets.”
In Canada, the global housing crisis is reflected in the student housing shortages. Laurent Levesque, executive director of UTILE, an organisation based out of Montreal that develops affordable student accommodation, explains, “Governments and universities have invested heavily in recruiting international students, but similar efforts have not been put into increasing the student housing stock accordingly.”
According to a 2021 flash report from UTILE, about 1.3 out of 1.5 million students in Canada live in private apartments off campus. 43 percent said they live in an apartment in need of repair.
“Students have had to rely increasingly on the private rental market for housing, which has created significant pressure on the rental market in the neighbourhoods where universities are located,” says Levesque.
In Australia, meanwhile, after China’s announcement in January this year that online degrees from foreign institutions would not be recognised, people believed that the estimated 40,000 Chinese students rushing over for the term start caused shortages.
While the increased number of Chinese students is a contributing factor, David Bycroft, Founder of the Australian Homestay Network (AHN), which specialises in family hosted student accommodation, thinks this is more of a fuelling factor than a real cause.
“I think very little of this crisis is due to the direct announcement of China about online studies. The accommodation problem has come about because of a number of other economic factors”, he explains. A recent study by PEXA & Longview, demonstrates that housing prices have increased by AUS $7.1 trillion in the past 20 years.
Bycroft adds, “When COVID-19 hit, a lot of people ran for cover to the key safer cities - London, Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne - where students want to go to”.
UCSC Student Housing Coalition demonstration, May 2022
Students as custodians, not landlords
In UCSC, many students take charge, and their political involvement has had an impact. Ulyate-Crow’s housing coalition has grown to 600 activists in the past year, and he sees his team’s hard work manifest in different projects, such as coauthoring the SB 886 bill. The bill, which successfully passed the Californian senate in September 2022, exempts student housing projects from the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), which tends to block new housing structures.
However, he acknowledges this housing crisis will take decades to fix. “The things I’m advocating for, I won’t see the benefit of, but I know that in 10 years, because of the work I did, it will help others.
“With the SB 886 Bill we’re expected to measurably reduce the timeline of student housing pipeline by years, but I wonder, why did it take a bunch of students to push for this, why could it not have been the universities themselves?”.
Community power
In Australia, hosted accommodation, such as the homestay network Bycroft founded, is one immediate solution as it calls on the community to open up their homes to international students at a reasonable rate. It gives families a chance to introduce a sense of culture and connection in their home as they foster new friendships. Earlier this year, Kerri Player, a Townsville host for students through AHN said, “We see familiar places through new eyes, and it is lovely to share these experiences with enthusiastic people, we also encourage our students to share their favourite foods and customs with us.”
Across January to February this year, there have been a total of 3,233 homestay places active on AHN. They are on track for their first-ever year of 10,000 placements.
Responsibility of HE Institutions
When asked what universities can do, Ulyate-Crow feels administrations need to be bolder. “They tend to have a very, very, deep-rooted acceptance of the status quo and of the system. University administrations have a lot of power as they are usually the economic and cultural job centres of so many of the communities they reside in.”
If they used that power to proactively approach municipalities, seek more permits to build housing on their own, and integrate innovative techniques, such as modular housing, Ulyate-Crow believes it would make a significant difference.
He adds that even though the student population at UCSC has doubled in the past decade, not one new housing section has been built; and instead, his university has resorted to turning double rooms into triples.
Bycroft says he was already talking about shortages with university partners in Australia six months before demand skyrocketed this year. "There is a lack of people prepared to get ready for what was inevitably coming; universities usually respond to the disaster, not avoid the disaster”.
His advice to institutions is to “pretend it’s a crisis now and introduce your strategy, and that means getting people together to solve problems”.
Additionally, there are concerns that universities treat international students like cash cows without adequate care for their welfare. Bycroft believes the universities that do not take a holistic approach will find it difficult to continue operations in the long term.
Scape Victoria, opening Semester 1, 2024
“The [universities] that have got a plan for proper pre-departure orientation, proper partnerships for accommodation and mental health support, are the ones that will prosper in the new world.
“All these issues, such as the pandemic and housing crisis, are just forcing the industry to do business properly for international students.”
Levesque has a similar perspective, outlining that though housing is not a core business for Canadian institutions, they must prioritise housing as imperative to student well-being.
“Housing is a major source of student indebtment. On-campus accommodation should be treated as a student service, not as a source of revenue to finance universities’ other activities.”
UPP’s Wakeford summarises the responsibility of institutions, emphasising that “if the demand projections to 2030 and beyond are realised, and universities wish to benefit from the tide that floats all boats, it will be universities themselves that have to engage more actively with providers, as well as finding a way to be less reticent in developing residences on their own campuses”.
Partnerships
Wakeford acknowledges that in the past year, because of inflation and increased costs of borrowing, it is harder to build. “In the short-term, universities and operators need to work together to understand available stock across the country. An immediate action could be to launch a commission to establish the quantum of the issue. This would help to convene all the relevant actors and provide evidence-based policy recommendations to government and others,” he explains.
For many PBSA providers, the pressure is on as well. Anouk Darling, CEO of PBSA owner and operator, Scape Australia, reflects on her company’s experience during the pandemic. “It brought the PBSA industry to its knees, there was no support from the government or our education institutions. Scape stepped up to support hundreds of students left stranded, we dropped our rent, supported them with crisis accommodation and helped them find work in the community”, she recounts.
Responsiveness is key, however, as Darling decides to focus on what lies ahead. Scape is working with education partners to provide housing options across a variety of price points. “We’re focused on the future, including a robust development pipeline, lobbying local and federal government to fast-track regulatory process and review punitive taxes that inhibit capital growth to ensure ongoing investment in the sector”.
Urgent collaboration
No matter who was speaking to QS Insights Magazine about the shortages, it was evident the common thread is to work together. If the pandemic has emphasised anything, it is that no man is an island, nor can the sector afford to behave that way.
Bycroft emphasises the need for everyone to play a role, explaining that the government could make it clear to accommodation hosts that pensions will not be affected, or provide tax incentives. “They could even tax homeowners who do not rent out their properties to balance supply/demand. It is all solvable but needs a community approach.
“The thing is you’ve got people worried about the environment, war, country relations going sour; there’s only one common thing that stops all those things, and that’s international education.” When people from different countries come together to solve problems, increase awareness of global issues, and gain cultural understanding, it subdues separation.
Wakeford refers to the growth of higher education, which is a positive development, even if it means more investment into student welfare is required. “The number of young people aged 25 to 34 years old with a tertiary qualification increased by nearly 45 percent in OECD and G20 countries between 2005 and 2013. OCED projections expect this to just increase till 2030.
“This reflects the development of global economies generally and the approach of emerging economies to, for instance, fund their young people to be degree educated across the world”, he explains.
With higher education on the rise, and the opportunities it will bring, ensuring physical student security is a necessity.