The government is pushing ahead with plans to uncap the number of students attending universities. With UK industry in the midst of a well-documented skills crisis is this move going to be good for British engineering?
Of the 352 respondents to last week’s poll, the largest group of respondents, 32 per cent, thought that removing the cap on student numbers would have little effect on engineering, because there are unlikely to be more students wishing to study the discipline; while 26 per cent thought removing the cap wouldn’t have any effect on the number of places available. A fifth of respondents thought that additional engineers were unlikely to be of high quality; while only 15 per cent thought that removing the limit was an important step in producing more engineers.
Please continue to let us know your opinions on this subject.
Having more engineering students is only going to be of value if there are enough graduate level jobs in the economy for them to go into.
I think it is more important to find a way of managing new graduate expectations in preparation for entry into the “Real” world of work.
Perhaps different options might have been better
1. Government to give full grants for all engineering, medical, science and Maths degrees
2. Government to severely cap art and Social sciences.
Now that would stop students wasting time (and money) on pointless degrees and encourage the best to go in to subjects we need!
As a member of academic staff at one of the UK’s leading Universities, I can confidently say that student’s learning experience and satisfaction will be compromised if student numbers are uncapped.
Many UK universities have limited building sizes, class sizes and most importantly, staff to student ratios need to be kept at an acceptable level. Not only that, there are building and fire safety regulations to follow. Despite new teaching and accomodation buildings springing up on campus’, this is a reactive measure, not proactive. Larger cohorts mean that some academic staff need to repeat lab and tutorial classes many times. Some instutions have to resort to double or triple teaching.
At campus based Universities, increased student numbers have impact beyond teaching infrastructure; for example more students on and off campus need more accomodation, students living off campus need more transport infrastructure to get to class, not to mention library space, toilets, eateries, cafe’s, banks, medical centres, support services. Additional staff need office space, as well as public transport and car parking needs.
Our campus is already creaking under the load, with long queues for campus buses and students having to resort to using staff canteen areas at lunch times as everywhere else is full. It’s having a negative impact on our hospitality staff and our recent staff survey showed that staff members could not find anywhere quiet for meetings or breaks during term time. Despite incremental improvements, uncapping student numbers will simply add on more pressure.
Increased student numbers require careful planning in advance, putting classrooms, staff and other resources in place-to ensure each and every individual gets the learning experience they deserve. At my institution (which shall remain nameless), we take student satisfaction, well-being and feedback very seriously. If only the coalition goverment had the same level of care for the UK’s teachers, academics and students.
Caps on student body sizes are one of the many ways that the bureaucrats who try to control all large organizations (and end up stifling them) so that things do not develop a momentum that they cannot stop. I will be very difficult to change this until we all understand the reality of the bureaucratic mind and their frightened need to control.
White’s First Law is “The primary purpose of (a certain kind of) bureaucrat is to prevent anything getting done, because you cannot be blamed for something going wrong if you never let it happen in the first place.”
A larger body of students is going to be more likely to thwart the control mechanisms and that cannot be allowed to happen.
Start using the facilities you have for more than 55% of the year and there is just a chance I might find some of what you say of value!
After a highly successful international commercial and managerial career at age 50 I started teaching Engineering topics at several so-called Higher Education establishments. Several because I found the senior central administrations incompetent to a scale that almost defied description and the academic staff (with the exception of Coventry) for the most part lazy, ignorant, arrogant seeking an easy life….you name it, I found it. I did suggest that had most joined a proper commercial organisation they would have been sussed out by morning coffee on day one, and thrown out by lunchtime. They play at being efficient and caring, and good teachers and may even do some irrelevant research…actually they have a single overriding interest: maintaining their life-style and having a great time at public expense.
I did have occasion to describe one group with whom I was associated as -morally, socially, professionally, intellectually and academically corrupt [I did first use the word inept but found corrupt better!]
I am sorry to appear so critical and concerned: but based upon my previous (and indeed subsequent) career as a consultant have told it as I have found it.
PS I did have the good fortune to win outright the Higher Education Academy Engineering national award for best UK Engineering teacher in session 2003/4: perhaps my removal from all teaching (three times!) may indicate the concern felt by others at being shown up (by a relative new-comer to their game) as I have described. Interestingly, amongst my consultancy assignments was the marketing, brand-name and technology due-diligence of a $4.5 billion take-over of the major US Fiber producer in 2004, an analysis of the chemistry, technology, and image of a particular fiber (the one that cyclists (and ladies!)wear to keep in shape in that part of the world which now accounts for some 60% of textile production…and a series of other strategic projects. Readers may be as surprised as I was to learn that I was removed from teaching these topics -apparently I saw such a poor teacher that students (albeit unidentified!) complained…so that the protege (who’s experience of strategic planning was running a clothing stall in Leeds Market -pinch yourself, it happened…)of an overseas trained ‘slot-in’ [who like his protege had difficulty with English in both written and spoken format could remain in employment after he had completed his M Sc.
If you were to notice a certain concern in my view of academia, you would be right.
Physician?, heal thyself.
I can honestly say that in a life-time of seeking to improve clients affairs (and being extremely successful in doing so) I have NEVER seen such waste, incompetence and stupidity as I have seen in HE. It is a joke.
I regret to say I can confirm some of Mike Blamey,s experience when it comes to modern academia having been involved with two universities on a new development project since 2010.
It’s hard to keep your feet on the ground when the tax payer is footing the bill and salaries to academic staff escalates as their income increases by the massive 3 fold increase in student fee’s under this spendthrifts government.
Universities now count their income in the Billion. My experience is that up to £500 million is a typical turnover for a university with + 20,000 students and that there many over £1.2 Billion, annual income.
These numbers are staggering when one considers the typical turnover of the businesses they are relying on to give them universities the commercial credibility they trumpet they produce.
Our company would also be producing commercial spin off’s if it turned over £500,000 million. The big difference is that we would be paying commercial taxes and having to justify our existence to shareholders.
Whilst universities have become cash cows on tax payers money where senior academic staff not count their salaries in the 100 of thousands and minor staff have salaries which attract the 40% tax rate for income over £150,000 pa.
I can understand where Mike Blamey is coming from…..
The comment from ‘anon’ ?
I have heard similar bleats since 1990.
A simple repost.
You have identified some problems. What are YOU doing to solve them?
[ Or like too much else of the civil service -those paid by the State-) are you simply wringing your hands in horror and waiting for someone else (the bottomless pit of Government expenditure?) to deal with it.
What a joke that it is apparently unsettling for academics to have to repeat their material several times? Too many are giving the same content in their lectures that they offered 25 years before! So little new is being offered to students. I have opined that we have moved little from the Abbot sitting at the end of the cloister reading out the Bible so that the novice monks can copy it down, word for word: and that too often the material that is offered passes from the notes of the lecturer to the notes of the student without passing through the brains of either.
Mike B
In view of the poll that our journal is presently conducting, fellow bloggers might enjoy a letter I wrote last week to Thunderer -the leader writer in the Times, following an excellent proposal in a very recent editorial:
Ross Clark
“Thunderer”
The Times
London 07/08/14
Dear Ross Clark,
“We have too many legal parasites. Shut some Law Schools”
Nice piece, you are right of course, but you (like so many others who comment) miss the pivotal point. The adversarial system (which alone in Europe) our nation presently uses to settle disputes. This makes excellent work and income for five sets of jumped-up clerks, masquerading as professionals, but benefits UK plc not one penny piece. No wonder the numbers of these parasites have increased as you describe, the pickings are so easy.
When I was a student of Engineering in the late 50s/60s, I recall discussion of the evils of totalitarian states: that a small unchallenged, unchecked group – members of the leadership of those in the Eastern Bloc, who were at the top of a single party state-who had gained absolute power (and were determined to retain it come what may) were a disgrace, an outrage and that we should do whatever was necessary to defend ourselves to combat their nefarious ways.
Please point out to me, a simple Engineer, what is the difference between the above outrage and the activities of those who presently (whatever Parliament may believe otherwise) hold similar powers within this nation. I refer to the same group as you. Junior lawyers decide who can get to court, more senior ones -hired verbal gunmen- decide who shall win and those who were poachers and are now game-keepers, nod their approval and count up the winnings before awarding the prizes. Am I right or am I right? I am.
What is a potent definition of drug dealing? That one group has the monopoly of supply of a particular dangerous product/service, that they can get the punters ‘hooked’, and then increase the price and reduce the availability of supply to keep they there. Any similarity between the above and what lawyers [from the bottom of their dung-heap to its summit] have perpetrated on citizen, corporation and the state since they gained absolute power from the clerics about 500 years ago is quite co-incidental.
If you apply the above two ideas, when trying to make sense of the continuation of lawyers’ unchallenged power, you will be amazed how things drop into place.
Best wishes,
Mike Blamey
PS; my academic research “the control and disciplining of professional staff in public & private practice” has experimented with many elements of the present legal farce: particularly the speed and extent of cover-up that more senior lawyers will apply, no matter what has been going on, when one of their number is exposed or threatened. Its results are at your disposal.
MB
Mike Blamey
Airlie Associates
‘Have been saying for some time now that all Engineering’ (value-add) courses be free to qualifying students and all ‘Arts’ (cost-add) courses be at full cost to the students.
Taking the value added argument one stage further: can we envisage a differential company tax regime which taxed value added (manufacturing) at one rate and simple ‘profit’ added (retail and most services) at a higher and punitive rate, until the various sections of our economy (if it is!) were in balance again.
Sorry to bring in a “textile” analogy [but it is an area I know rather well] but throughout my career I have noticed that whereas a problem may show itself at one point in the process, its root was invariably ‘up-stream. [fabric problems are invariably yarn problems, yarn problems are invariably fibre problems. [I did hear once of a firm whose lawyers seriously considered suing the sheep for providing/creating the wrong wool!]
Such is the power of ‘retail’ in textiles that most production in Europe/USA has gone off-shore: because manufacturing firms simply could not ‘screw’ their staff and their suppliers any more to placate the demands of greedy retailers and their buyers. What little profit they could make was from their staff and their suppliers: not from their customers. I wonder how many other aspects to GB plc are similarly affected? Too many!
MikeB rightly raises serious concerns about both the efficiency and efficacy of University teaching. Many years ago I was senior sub-contract buyer (All circuit boards and custom metalwork) at a company who were one of the earliest practitioners of JIT in the UK. We were a DTI reference site and frequently provided tours and lectures to a large number of British companies considering a JIT manufacturing process. For ourselves, we increased stock turnover in a low volume, high value-add company to about once a week. This was achieved by integrating our key suppliers into a seamless manufacturing and assembly process linking their production to our demand. Interestingly their fears that this would cost them money were entirely wrong and in time they used this same process for many of their other customers. Nowhere were there University courses offering such learning. We learned as we went along which brings me to one of my key points…
University education is effectively useless until the student has also learned how to apply his/her lessons to real life situations. The manufacturing director of one of Britain’s largest companies said that graduates were a cost to his company for the first two years of their employment and only offered value and gained responsibility after that period.
My second and final point is to recommend to everyone a book. In my view this should be compulsory reading for all Secondary students and form part of all Degree courses, whatever the subject. That book is “Right First Time”. by Frank Price. It’s quite old as I read it in the early ’80’s but its lessons have stayed with me since then.
JohnK describes his/his firms contribution to the earliest JIT (and I am sure associated quality management) ethos: which did much to further manufacturing. Though in the end, the sheer unadulterated greed of ‘retail’ removed most of the advantages, at least from UK manufacturing.
University Education —–useless? I had the opportunity of several visits to OZ in the 80s and 90s. I was impressed with the manner in which University courses there did prepare young engineers for a wide spectrum of responsibility. As one lecturer did say: “we are on the end of the ‘line’ ie a long way from everywhere, and there is often no local support/backup: so they will have to make their own decisions [he was particularly referring to the mining industry] Let us be honest: the www had solved some of that issue!
The reason that present university Engineering courses are inadequate? Again, am I the only person who has worked it out? Universities teach primarily to cover the needs of the 2% of students who will remain in that ‘academic?’ system, NOT for the 98% who will leave.
Hey Ho
Mike B
“Again, am I the only person who has worked it out? Universities teach primarily to cover the needs of the 2% of students who will remain in that ‘academic?’ system, NOT for the 98% who will leave.”
Something that hasn’t received the attention that it deserves is the high proportion of overseas students in many university engineering departments. Already they outnumber home students in most of the high ranking redbricks and they are a lucrative source of income for the university as they pay the highest rate of tuition fees.
This generates a question of whether engineering courses are designed first and foremost around the needs and interests of overseas students with home students effectively being treated as second priority customers. In some foreign countries, a degree from a British university is so highly valued by society and employers to the point where the knowledge and skills that the graduate has acquired from the course hardly even matters. Overseas students also seem to prefer a traditional academic course over a more practical course because more often than not they are deemed to be the brightest and the best in their home countries. Those who don’t make the grades stay behind and take a vocational course at the local technical college.
Therefore high ranking British universities see little point in making engineering courses up to date and relevant to the real world (in Britain). On the other hand, some former polytechnics have developed degree courses in applied areas of computing – like video games development – in conjunction with industry. These courses tend to be dominated by home students.
Engineering in any form is the backbone of any society and should be promoted regoursely.
Arts should be equally promoted but not at same level as Engineering and Science
It won’t help much until they restore the quality of degrees. Currently, an MEng is at best at the level of second year BSc, and grads generally lack any workshop training too (which used to be required for a degree to be accredited).
Of course, Industry (not Government !) need (or needs-is Industry a plural already ?) to get back to sponsoring students; in 1981, 2/3 of my BSc year were sponsired.
Can not see any national gain – no specific scientific gain for the nation.
With that money we can do other need-based specific exploration defined by the government and academic participation.
Wind turbines cost more to build than produce in energy terms so effectively the more that get built the more load there will be on conventional energy systems.
They are, by and large, an ill conceived sop to the greenies and another tax revenue stream with little or no regard to the actual problems of cost and efficiency.
Use the effort that is being wasted on their design and implementation to make nuclear energy safer and more efficient.
Britain, following Maggie’s mastermind catastrophe to turn it into a “Service Industry” is now a service industry without any engineering capability in any of the important branches e.g. Aerospace, aircraft, heavy Engineering, cars etc. Worse most of the R&D work has been curtailed through the closure of Universities and the of the UK share holders in the “City” that R&D is a dirty word that only wastes money. Most “Universities” (this includes many low grade colleges that have been re-branded) have been forced to offer Vocational Specific courses where pure R&D is unnecessary!
Under these conditions the requirement for Engineers and Scientist has dwindled to nothing and indeed very few decide to go to such course (in the few that still exist) because their degrees will not get them a job at the end of the day. This is a great pity because Britain has still a lot of brain power but the politics allow it to go to waste. It needs some charismatic politicians to realise that Britain cannot survive with tourism alone or by repairing Chinese / Foreign products, and turn the tide by boosting Education in General, Universities in particular and putting R&D Science and Engineering in the agenda.
It is ironic to a degree that the Government is obsessing about STEM subjects in schools, and engineering graduates, whilst presiding over an economy that remains stubbornly service and financial sector focussed.
Someone commented about having ‘graduate jobs’ to go into within the engineering industry – it might also be helpful if the older type (no doubt old fashioned) view of C&G style apprenticeships, day release and sandwich degree courses ere re-introduced.
“It is ironic the degree that the Government is obsessing about STEM subjects in schools, and engineering graduates, whilst presiding over an economy that remains stubbornly service and financial sector focussed.”
It’s all a numbers game to make Britain look good in international educational statistics. The government can then boast about Britain’s ‘well educated workforce’.
The traditional 3 year 30+ weeks per year degree course could easily be replaced by a 2 year 45+ weeks per year alternative. That would allow for a 50% increase in student numbers without changing the burden on buildings, accommodation and infrastructure. Businesses in most university towns would welcome continuous business rather than the dead weeks outside of term time. Universities would have to increase the quantity of teaching staff to maintain current staff:student ratios and time for research activities to continue at their current level, but a 50% lift in student numbers would generate the income to do that. It would reduce overall accommodation fees as many non-campus students have to pay for rooms they do not use outside term time. It would reduce their food bill over the whole course by 33%, for some inexplicable reason students continue to eat for the full 52 weeks of the year. The administration burden of enrolling for 2 years rather than 3 is not significantly greater. It would eliminate the culture shock that graduates get when they move from part time university to full time working. It would reduce the amount of student debt accrued, and start earnings and repayment a year earlier, thus reducing debt interest. Apart from forcing students to develop a greater work ethic (which most employers would applaud) I see no down side.
We need a healthy mix of apprentices and degree qualified engineers. Engineering degrees in universities are dominated by home not foreign students. The issue with getting more students into engineering courses goes back to image and aspirations of the student during school. If no engineer has been out to inspire kids to be engineers how can we expect them to even consider it in university?
We have a high value type engineering economy in the UK driven by the value of the pound and how the industry has developed to be competitive. In Germany you can only be an engineer if you have a degree. The old system allowed people with no degree and a large amount of experience the title also, i’m not sure if this is still in place now.
Apprenticeships have their place but it would be a step back for engineering in the UK if we over focused on them. We would have a lot of jobless apprentices and further decline of the industry. Better is a shift in the degree modelled on the TU (Technical University) in Germany.
Industrial-scale Solar PV installations would benefit from larger subsidies for a shorter period of time, e.g. 5 years. This fits better with industrial investment criteria but would be cheaper overall than 25 year subsidies.
“…I see no down side.”
I do! That is if I was still an academic(whatever that is) and had become used to the inefficiencies, laziness, long breaks, short teaching sessions, such that I would miss my vacations, trips to attend conferences, un- or mis-used facilities….and a salary what is generous to a fault.
How would I find the time to deal with students seeking additional support (good heavens, they are almost like customers, clients -a damn nuisance actually wanting value from the vast amounts they have to pay now -and that would never do!)
Its yet another joke, played upon society: from those of us who are so important that the ordinary ‘rules’ of commerce, capitalism, market forces, not to mention the skill gaps, poor teaching, ineffective research that we offer free do not apply.
Scrap the entire thing…and start again.
An analogy: early reciprocating aero-engines produced minimal power. Gradually Engineers improved, modified, enhanced performance…and so on until the same basic ‘blocks’ could produce greatly (400%) enhanced power.
Much of the ‘effort’ was to convert reciprocating effort to rotary -as propellers do not do a lot for flight simply going up and down.
But it took the development of turbine -already rotary motion-turbo-props to really enhance the performance by a quantum leap: and of direct jet thrust to go another step. I see so many parallels in society as a whole: education, settlement of disputes, political roles….crying out for a similar ‘leap’ forward.
It is appalling the UK Governments have consigned Uni Students to mountainous debts as a basis for their studies.
These aspiring students are our investment in our futures and I want them to get the same grant I did when I studied Medicine at Kings College in the Strand in 1961.
That is free fees, accommodation, books and food with enough to spend having a drink in the Students bar in Villiers Street to mix with other students in different disciplines.
But we now see Students working 20
hrs a week in check out tills when they should be studying.
I could not afford such time as I was studying till midnight.
So the quality of the degrees has suffered to accommodate a financial based degree.
It is no wonder we are falling behind in excellence in Engineering and Science.
I would also suggest the expansion of Engineering and Science requires more specialised courses to make them more productive when they gain a professional post.
The intake for degree course from such a wide range of entry qualifications means the first year is mainly spent in bringing students up to the same as “A” level GCSE students
This was a view expressed by Lecturers at Reading University some years ago that I was invited to.
Degree course could be tailored to have a format along with Nuffield project based training alternatives to “A” Levels, so work experience could be built into more courses that may also have some remuneration as useful employees.
Well, well, well,
a bunch of ancient geezers (and I include myself in that category) slagging off current, and recent past University education and consigning those dreadful art student to nothing more than second rate citizens….Oh! and of course Maggie Thatcher.
My wife is head of department in a prominent university with 50 or so lecturers reporting to her and I can promise you that every one of them works damn hard, to the extent that my wife is at work during her holidays to simply keep up with the demands of her job. Nor does she, nor her colleagues take advantage of the system indeed most of them go above and beyond, the specifics of which I can’t go into. But she works in Nurse education where the work is expected to be hard, perhaps the engineering profession is a victim of its own ‘success’ as I have met plenty of lazy, virtually illiterate engineers who take an awful lot more than they give whilst continually moaning about their lot.
And were it not for the arts we would be virtually without Designers and Architects without whom many engineers would be without jobs.
Were it not for Thatcher we would still be running the nationalised industries of the 70’s except that they would by now have completely bankrupted the country. Someone mentioned having a politician with character and courage to step up and make changes, well that was Thatcher, and whilst she didn’t get it entirely right, no one has had the ba**s since to do something about the service industry society we were all bemoaning 20 years ago.
So whilst you’re all courageous enough to slag off British Universities based on personal or anecdotal, limited experience, go out and do something about it instead of bleating. Grab your torches and pitchforks and see off the Ogre’s that are running the country, the snivelling geeks we all used to despise at school and university who spent most of their pasty faced lives in the shadows only to figure out they would like a life in politics because that was easy money.
As for paying students from abroad, they don’t moan because they have to pay for an education like most places in the rest of the world does, they simply cough up and work damn hard to ensure they get their value for money. And most of them humbly and diligently. Student debt? If parents and family in the UK cared as much about their children’s education as visiting students’ parents do, there wouldn’t be a problem.
What on earth entitles anyone to free education…….and beer?!!! Just because you pay tax? Please, we’re living in the 21st Century and only now paying for the privileges you guys enjoyed in your youth. Do try and keep up chaps.
For our society to operate effectively all skills are needed not just engineering, that includes arts, history, social sciences etc.. The commentators who assume that engineers are the only ones adding value perhaps need to get out more and better understand how our economy works.
The big elephant in the room is related to confidence not with interest or aptitude. We need to teach our girls how to be confident when surrounded by a men-only crowd at school and/or work.
We need to let the know that it’s okay to feel fearful but that they also have tools to deal with that feeling. I am a 45-yr old female engineer that has had to learn it the hard way.
You can read my blog post about this http://worklifemyself.blogspot.com/2014/08/i-am-woman-and-i-am-engineer10-ways-to.html
Like someone mentioned before, trying to make more engineers isn’t going to help unless there are sufficient jobs available (where there aren’t). So I don’t see any point in trying to increase the number of engineers in the first place.
Plus I don’t think removing caps isn’t an option. It is actually good that there are caps. Quality over quantity
Maybe more students could will do something for the literacy of engineering in the UK. Look no further than the graphic above for evidence that there is room for improvement.
Unlikley?