In my day, we didn't pay nothing for education, and we was grateful for wot we got. I wouldn't touch no fillet steak, coz it is cow and the mad cow disease put me off the beef.
Hahaha!
Exactly, 'tard. Dem kidz nowadays get salmonella and are like, wotz a chicken?
I'm fortunate to have started in 2011 and so got into the last year where fees were £3000 a year. As a linguistics student though I still find it incredibly unfair that there is one copy of that core textbook everyone needs for an essay in the library, while science students not only get better library facilities (more of their stuff is online and therefore accessible for all students) but also all of the lab equipment etc for the same price. Take into account the fact that geology students also get to go on week-long field trips to Spain, Ireland etc at a price subsidised by the university, and I just can't help but feel I am mostly paying for other people's degrees. So yes, I feel that I am paying too much as people on other courses paying the same amount get a lot more than me for the price. Mostly though, I keep my mouth shut, as at least I'm not paying 3 times the price!
University is to some extent about learning to learn independently, anyway.
It is but it's still important to attend lectures (in fact my college is very strict on attendance and it's compulsory) and it is important that lecturers are approachable and that students can ask them questions if they're having difficulties. I'm studying law and in my university the lecturers have what's called an open door policy. This means that students are free to ask them questions.
This is very off topic but I get on very well with one of my lecturers. I was doing an independent research project (which counted as a full subject) and the lecturer supervising it let me work on my own but she also gave me advice and suggested books, journals and stuff I could use. She also asked to read over it from time to time. As a result of that I get on very well with that particular lecturer :cool: About nine weeks ago I was crying over some personal issues and I ended up crying in that lecturer's office. She comforted me and I felt a lot better afterwards I'll always be grateful to her for her support when I was going through a particularly dark time in my life. I wonder if any of the students complaining about their university courses in the UK have had experiences like that? I study in Ireland so maybe lecturers (and students) have a different attitude here.
If I were a university student now I would certainly want well-stocked libraries that were open every day, online access to journals, quiet places to study with internet access, access to photocopiers for a reasonable charge, a range of interesting and relevant lecturers and sufficient equipment in laboratories, etc. Paying all that money it is only fair that the institutions provide the necessary facilities.
If I were a university student now I would certainly want well-stocked libraries that were open every day, online access to journals, quiet places to study with internet access, access to photocopiers for a reasonable charge, a range of interesting and relevant lecturers and sufficient equipment in laboratories, etc. Paying all that money it is only fair that the institutions provide the necessary facilities.
All the stuff you're asking for would cost even more money and the cost would be passed onto students.
If I were a university student now I would certainly want well-stocked libraries that were open every day, online access to journals, quiet places to study with internet access, access to photocopiers for a reasonable charge, a range of interesting and relevant lecturers and sufficient equipment in laboratories, etc. Paying all that money it is only fair that the institutions provide the necessary facilities.
My university has all that! The library is even open at weekends. It's not open on public holidays though but I can understand that. We have access to online journals, photocopiers, plenty of study space and whatever. Not sure about laboratory equipment as I study law, but I have a friend doing a science degree and she spends a lot of time in the labs. I study in Ireland though and undergrad fees are much lower than they are in the UK.
They were on the radio, complaining about how awful their courses were, and how they did not get enough lectures or contact with tutors. Are they entitled to "value for money", now that university courses are so expensive ?
Damn right. At college me and my friends moan about classes being cut short and stuff, but unlike those down south we're not paying thousands for our education. Personally I'd be taking some sort of action if I wasn't getting every penny worth.
There are times that students have valid complaints about how courses are run and their interaction throughout studying. But those complaints were valid even before they had to pay increased fees.
The problem is some students interpret the fact they have to pay more as meaning they should get more for the increased fee. From the Universities point of view though, they are not getting more money, it's just coming from a different source. Course content is the same because it's always costed that much to produce however in the past the government have funded most of the cost with students contributing a little. Now students are paying the entire cost.
It also depends on the nature of the complaint. Many complaints that are just disagreeing with their final result generally have no merit but some students think because they've paid a lot of money then it should guarantee a good pass. Unfortunately that's not how academia works!
Yeah. The figures given in the reports yesterday were combined complaints and appeals. I thought it very unfair using this combined figure, and then concentrating on the complaints side - giving the impression they were mostly complaints.
I know that a lot of the 'complaints' we receive where I work are actually academic appeals against low grades due to factors like student illness or personal circumstances which meant they were unable to complete or submit in time. Take those out of the equation, and actual complaints about teaching, course content, equipment, etc. drop by about 99.9%
I was in uni from 2003 - 2007, back when fees were a measley £1000 a year; and even then I didn't feel as though I was getting value for money! Very little contact time, few seminars, badly-stocked libraries and poor IT access.
Last year the uni phoned me to ask would I consider donating something like £100 a year of my income for the next five years to 'give something back'. The girl I spoke to was nice, and didn't take offence when I explained that I didn't feel as though I owed my uni anything at all.
I wouldn't take an arts degree with fees at their current level.
Having to deal with students on a daily basis I find all these complaints about lack of lectures and not enough contact hours laughable. In my experience Students don't go to lectures or seminars or tutorials, they don't use the office hours that lecturers have set aside for them to discuss stuff with them. When they do go to lecturers they sit there talking or playing with their mobile phone, about 2 years ago one of our lecturers had enough and walked out of the lecture. And it has got worse over the years, they come without bothering to do the work for the lectures or tutorials, some even come without pens or paper. I sent an email to about 40 students last year and had a read receipt on it so I knew it had been read, out of that 40 only 8 bothered to read it.
When I first started working here you had maybe 5 or 6 students who didn't show up now you are lucky if you get a half the class showing up. Yes University is all about being independent but don't complain about lack of contact when you don't use what is offered to you already.
Another thing I have noticed in the 8.5 years I have worked here is that students are getting ruder and more arrogant but are demanding more. The way I see it is that if I get a student who is polite then I am more willing to go out of my way to help them than someone who treats me like I am stupid. A please and thank you does not hurt.
I sent an email to about 40 students last year and had a read receipt on it so I knew it had been read, out of that 40 only 8 bothered to read it.
I think it depends on the particular year
My daughter was doing a Chemistry Masters degree, which is VERY maths heavy (certainly 1st year degree standard maths, if not higher), and as a Mathematician (she only decided on Chemistry instead at the last moment) she was asked to help organise extra help for the year below her (who she found particularly unimpressive!).
So they organised a room, a schedule, and emailed all the students in the lower year - not a single one bothered turning up. They ran three or four 'classes' with no students, and eventually packed it in.
Eventually it turned out not a single student was ever checking their emails, despite all official communication coming via their Uni email address, and that they were all informed of these during orientation.
To be fair, I did a degree and had pretty minimal contact with tutors. I come to lectures/seminars, left, wrote up my assignments, turned up for the exams and that was it.
I did a masters - same thing.
I did a PhD and saw my supervisor maybe 3 times a year.
Those were the days of no tuition fees (although full grants for all had long been scrapped - I got no grant).
(That didn't apply to the MSc or PhD though - they had to be paid for).
Another thing. When an undergraduate gets his/her assignment returned - don't automatically think the tutor returning it marked it. It may have been marked by an exploited PhD student.
I do not think the hours of contact with Lecturers has changed over the years.
I think the problem has been that they have got used to being spoon feed when doing there GCSE and A Level exams in recent times, and they are not prepared for for the harsh realities of university education, where you have to find out by yourself.
Having to deal with students on a daily basis I find all these complaints about lack of lectures and not enough contact hours laughable. In my experience Students don't go to lectures or seminars or tutorials, they don't use the office hours that lecturers have set aside for them to discuss stuff with them. When they do go to lecturers they sit there talking or playing with their mobile phone, about 2 years ago one of our lecturers had enough and walked out of the lecture. And it has got worse over the years, they come without bothering to do the work for the lectures or tutorials, some even come without pens or paper. I sent an email to about 40 students last year and had a read receipt on it so I knew it had been read, out of that 40 only 8 bothered to read it. .
That's a huge generalisation...I have missed just one lecture in my three years at uni and have never played with my mobile phone during lectures. I prep and bring all the documents I need. My uni email is set to forward emails to my regular email address so I dont miss any (but...there would be no read receipt).
I'm fortunate because I started in 2011 so my fees are ONLY £3k a year but even so I have a £9k debt for fees and another £3k in maintenance loans. I will be paying off that debt for years so I expect the uni to deliver and will complain if they don't. For the record, I found the non-academic staff to be the most rude, particularly at the beginning of the course when students are confused about all the bureaucracy...customer service skills were non existent
I graduate this year and paid £3,000 per year for 8 hours of teaching time a week. There is an absolutely huge gulf between the amount you pay and the amount of face time you receive. Whilst my course was very much centred around writing and independent research (so the library, which is covered in the costs, was invaluable), it's still steep for what is essentially a days worth of teaching spread over a week.
People who started uni in 2012 and beyond have to pay triple my fees with no extra teaching time. It's proof if proof were needed that higher education establishments are being run for profit and not for the furthering of education standards.
I graduate this year and paid £3,000 per year for 8 hours of teaching time a week. There is an absolutely huge gulf between the amount you pay and the amount of face time you receive. Whilst my course was very much centred around writing and independent research (so the library, which is covered in the costs, was invaluable), it's still steep for what is essentially a days worth of teaching spread over a week.
People who started uni in 2012 and beyond have to pay triple my fees with no extra teaching time. It's proof if proof were needed that higher education establishments are being run for profit and not for the furthering of education standards.
To be fair they've had their funding slashed by 80%. The tuition fee increase is not going to lead to Uni's making more money as half of the students won't pay it back anyway.
If fees were uncapped the costs wouldn't go down for the subjects with little contact they would just go up in the subjects with loads.
That's a huge generalisation...I have missed just one lecture in my three years at uni and have never played with my mobile phone during lectures. I prep and bring all the documents I need. My uni email is set to forward emails to my regular email address so I dont miss any (but...there would be no read receipt).
I'm fortunate because I started in 2011 so my fees are ONLY £3k a year but even so I have a £9k debt for fees and another £3k in maintenance loans. I will be paying off that debt for years so I expect the uni to deliver and will complain if they don't. For the record, I found the non-academic staff to be the most rude, particularly at the beginning of the course when students are confused about all the bureaucracy...customer service skills were non existent
And you tell me not to generalise but you have done just that saying that the Administrative staff were all rude. I have students telling me how helpful I have been, I have had gifts from students for helping them out. The good students, the polite students are the ones we are willing to help. You speak to people the way you wish to be spoken to.
What I don't get paid for is to be talked down to like I am thick, it may come as a surprise to a lot of students but many of us have degree's (something they don't at the moment in time, one of my colleagues has two Master's for example), to be shouted at, to be told I can't do my job because I refuse to move them to a different class as the one they want to go in is full with no spare seats, to have my door kicked when it's not answered straight away, to be slagged off because I am on lunch and they want their work now and not in my office hours like they were told. Our jobs are not just to deal with students we have other responsibilities that make Universities run smoothly.
And you tell me not to generalise but you have done just that saying that the Administrative staff were all rude. I have students telling me how helpful I have been, I have had gifts from students for helping them out. The good students, the polite students are the ones we are willing to help. You speak to people the way you wish to be spoken to. .
You'd have a point if I had done that......I said "I found the non-academic staff to be the most rude"..........I cant see an 'all' in there, can you? The "I found" is also just a hint that my comment was based upon my experiences.
I've made no comment about their level of education, just their role. Is that a sore point?
I graduate this year and paid £3,000 per year for 8 hours of teaching time a week. There is an absolutely huge gulf between the amount you pay and the amount of face time you receive. Whilst my course was very much centred around writing and independent research (so the library, which is covered in the costs, was invaluable), it's still steep for what is essentially a days worth of teaching spread over a week.
People who started uni in 2012 and beyond have to pay triple my fees with no extra teaching time. It's proof if proof were needed that higher education establishments are being run for profit and not for the furthering of education standards.
It may seem steep if you're thinking that what you're paying for is just the face to face teaching. There'll also be a lot of admin staff in the background producing the course materials and ensuring the running of the course itself. All of that costs money too!
My university has all that! The library is even open at weekends. It's not open on public holidays though but I can understand that. We have access to online journals, photocopiers, plenty of study space and whatever. Not sure about laboratory equipment as I study law, but I have a friend doing a science degree and she spends a lot of time in the labs. I study in Ireland though and undergrad fees are much lower than they are in the UK.
That´s good to hear! My university had these things too, back in the Dark Ages (when tuition fees were 1,100 pounds per year. We did get ripped off for photocopying, but that wasn´t a cause for complaint back then). However when I visited other universities I noticed that some of them had facilities that were not so good - one I noticed in particularly was how well-stocked the libraries were and the hours for which those libraries were open. Nowadays with such high tuition fees factors like that would certainly play a significant role in my choice of institution.
Comments
Hahaha!
Exactly, 'tard. Dem kidz nowadays get salmonella and are like, wotz a chicken?
It is but it's still important to attend lectures (in fact my college is very strict on attendance and it's compulsory) and it is important that lecturers are approachable and that students can ask them questions if they're having difficulties. I'm studying law and in my university the lecturers have what's called an open door policy. This means that students are free to ask them questions.
This is very off topic but I get on very well with one of my lecturers. I was doing an independent research project (which counted as a full subject) and the lecturer supervising it let me work on my own but she also gave me advice and suggested books, journals and stuff I could use. She also asked to read over it from time to time. As a result of that I get on very well with that particular lecturer :cool: About nine weeks ago I was crying over some personal issues and I ended up crying in that lecturer's office. She comforted me and I felt a lot better afterwards
All the stuff you're asking for would cost even more money and the cost would be passed onto students.
My university has all that! The library is even open at weekends. It's not open on public holidays though but I can understand that. We have access to online journals, photocopiers, plenty of study space and whatever. Not sure about laboratory equipment as I study law, but I have a friend doing a science degree and she spends a lot of time in the labs. I study in Ireland though and undergrad fees are much lower than they are in the UK.
Damn right. At college me and my friends moan about classes being cut short and stuff, but unlike those down south we're not paying thousands for our education. Personally I'd be taking some sort of action if I wasn't getting every penny worth.
A dippy-loma, surely?
(Ten minutes of roaring laughter ensues).
Yeah. The figures given in the reports yesterday were combined complaints and appeals. I thought it very unfair using this combined figure, and then concentrating on the complaints side - giving the impression they were mostly complaints.
I know that a lot of the 'complaints' we receive where I work are actually academic appeals against low grades due to factors like student illness or personal circumstances which meant they were unable to complete or submit in time. Take those out of the equation, and actual complaints about teaching, course content, equipment, etc. drop by about 99.9%
Last year the uni phoned me to ask would I consider donating something like £100 a year of my income for the next five years to 'give something back'. The girl I spoke to was nice, and didn't take offence when I explained that I didn't feel as though I owed my uni anything at all.
I wouldn't take an arts degree with fees at their current level.
When I first started working here you had maybe 5 or 6 students who didn't show up now you are lucky if you get a half the class showing up. Yes University is all about being independent but don't complain about lack of contact when you don't use what is offered to you already.
Another thing I have noticed in the 8.5 years I have worked here is that students are getting ruder and more arrogant but are demanding more. The way I see it is that if I get a student who is polite then I am more willing to go out of my way to help them than someone who treats me like I am stupid. A please and thank you does not hurt.
I think it depends on the particular year
My daughter was doing a Chemistry Masters degree, which is VERY maths heavy (certainly 1st year degree standard maths, if not higher), and as a Mathematician (she only decided on Chemistry instead at the last moment) she was asked to help organise extra help for the year below her (who she found particularly unimpressive!).
So they organised a room, a schedule, and emailed all the students in the lower year - not a single one bothered turning up. They ran three or four 'classes' with no students, and eventually packed it in.
Eventually it turned out not a single student was ever checking their emails, despite all official communication coming via their Uni email address, and that they were all informed of these during orientation.
I did a masters - same thing.
I did a PhD and saw my supervisor maybe 3 times a year.
Those were the days of no tuition fees (although full grants for all had long been scrapped - I got no grant).
(That didn't apply to the MSc or PhD though - they had to be paid for).
Another thing. When an undergraduate gets his/her assignment returned - don't automatically think the tutor returning it marked it. It may have been marked by an exploited PhD student.
I think the problem has been that they have got used to being spoon feed when doing there GCSE and A Level exams in recent times, and they are not prepared for for the harsh realities of university education, where you have to find out by yourself.
That's a huge generalisation...I have missed just one lecture in my three years at uni and have never played with my mobile phone during lectures. I prep and bring all the documents I need. My uni email is set to forward emails to my regular email address so I dont miss any (but...there would be no read receipt).
I'm fortunate because I started in 2011 so my fees are ONLY £3k a year but even so I have a £9k debt for fees and another £3k in maintenance loans. I will be paying off that debt for years so I expect the uni to deliver and will complain if they don't. For the record, I found the non-academic staff to be the most rude, particularly at the beginning of the course when students are confused about all the bureaucracy...customer service skills were non existent
People who started uni in 2012 and beyond have to pay triple my fees with no extra teaching time. It's proof if proof were needed that higher education establishments are being run for profit and not for the furthering of education standards.
To be fair they've had their funding slashed by 80%. The tuition fee increase is not going to lead to Uni's making more money as half of the students won't pay it back anyway.
If fees were uncapped the costs wouldn't go down for the subjects with little contact they would just go up in the subjects with loads.
And you tell me not to generalise but you have done just that saying that the Administrative staff were all rude. I have students telling me how helpful I have been, I have had gifts from students for helping them out. The good students, the polite students are the ones we are willing to help. You speak to people the way you wish to be spoken to.
What I don't get paid for is to be talked down to like I am thick, it may come as a surprise to a lot of students but many of us have degree's (something they don't at the moment in time, one of my colleagues has two Master's for example), to be shouted at, to be told I can't do my job because I refuse to move them to a different class as the one they want to go in is full with no spare seats, to have my door kicked when it's not answered straight away, to be slagged off because I am on lunch and they want their work now and not in my office hours like they were told. Our jobs are not just to deal with students we have other responsibilities that make Universities run smoothly.
You'd have a point if I had done that......I said "I found the non-academic staff to be the most rude"..........I cant see an 'all' in there, can you? The "I found" is also just a hint that my comment was based upon my experiences.
I've made no comment about their level of education, just their role. Is that a sore point?
It may seem steep if you're thinking that what you're paying for is just the face to face teaching. There'll also be a lot of admin staff in the background producing the course materials and ensuring the running of the course itself. All of that costs money too!
There's been some complaint in the department over how long feedback takes but that seems to have been sorted now.
That´s good to hear! My university had these things too, back in the Dark Ages (when tuition fees were 1,100 pounds per year. We did get ripped off for photocopying, but that wasn´t a cause for complaint back then). However when I visited other universities I noticed that some of them had facilities that were not so good - one I noticed in particularly was how well-stocked the libraries were and the hours for which those libraries were open. Nowadays with such high tuition fees factors like that would certainly play a significant role in my choice of institution.