Published in The Education Guardian
Martin Harris, the director of fair access explains what he will require universities to do if they want to charge full fees.
Among the many challenges facing those with responsibility in the higher education sector, there is one issue that continues to lie at the heart of what universities and colleges exist to do: the challenge of ensuring and enhancing equality of opportunity for our those with the potential to benefit from higher education, without sacrificing excellence where it can be attained.
This is particularly important now, in light of the introduction of variable tuition fees. When parliament agreed to allow universities and colleges to charge variable fees for full-time home and EU undergraduates from autumn 2006, it also said there was a need for certain safeguards to fair access during a period of rapid change and, for some, uncertainty. The Office for Fair Access (Offa), of which I am the first director, is the result.
One of the principal tasks in my new role is to ask universities and colleges to specify the ways in which they intend to continue the strikingly successful efforts they are already making to encourage the brightest and best from all social backgrounds and from all kinds of schools to apply for the programmes of study most appropriate to their skills and aptitudes.
It seems difficult to imagine that this is in any way a controversial statement – all six universities I have studied at or worked in, as well as many others I know well, have always done this as a matter of course. But in the new environment brought about by variable fees, such reassurances need to be publicly reiterated.
In addition, institutions will need to satisfy me, if they wish to charge variable fees, that they have a clear, fair and equitable fees and bursary policy, and that they will continue to develop policies that ensure able young people are encouraged to apply for courses for which they are best suited, regardless of their background. I anticipate that all institutions will do just that, and I shall be working to that end from the outset.
Discussions with the sector so far have shown that institutions are ready to do more towards widening participation.
By way of example, if, over time, 80% of higher education institutions charge the full fee of £3,000, and if they invest 20% of their additional income into bursaries, then we would be looking at up to as much as £200m each year available to support students from under-represented groups, in particular those from low-income groups. This will be money put directly into the pockets of students and, in my view, will be a major step towards ensuring that all those who have the potential to benefit can gain access to a course most suitable to their needs.
Offa’s role is about supporting universities and colleges so that they can, where appropriate, broaden the pool of applications right across higher education. There will be no predetermined targets or benchmarks, no social engineering – merely a determination, which I know is widely shared across the sector, to seek applications from those most able to benefit. As one senior colleague put it to me recently: “To the extent that universities exclude for the wrong reasons, the victims are not only those excluded, but also the whole idea of what great universities are about.”
So, I will seek from each institution a clear statement of the measures it intends to develop, or build on, to safeguard fair access. Institutions will identify their own target groups and set their own goals and milestones, as they do already, and the sharing of best practice will make fair access easier to achieve.
Alongside this, I will want to know what proportion of their net extra revenue after 2006 they intend to use for bursaries to support either the fees or the living costs of those students whom they judge to be in need. One thing only is assumed: that where a university charges the full £3,000 fee in 2006, then the difference between this and the maximum state support available to poorer students (£2,700), a gap of up to £300, will be made good for all such applicants.
Beyond this, I will leave it up to institutions to judge how much of their net extra revenue they wish to reinvest to support potential students. The proportion of such new funds committed to bursary support will, I believe, vary substantially from institution to institution, depending on the current social composition of their student body, and it will be for each institution to specify within broad limits, what kinds of bursary support they intend to make available, and on what basis.
I was delighted when I was appointed director of fair access last month. The goals I have set out here are ones I have adhered to throughout a university career of more than 40 years. And the policy of admission on merit alone, regardless of socio-economic background, was what gained me admission to Cambridge, from a Plymouth grammar school, all those years ago.
The Sutton Trust’s latest data shows conclusively that improved opportunities for young people in state schools are not at the expense of those in independent schools. This is a win-win situation, and I know that my colleagues in the sector will work with the Offa team and myself to develop the policies, which are already starting to deliver to such good effect. I hope that from now on the debate will generate more light and less heat – the goal of genuinely fair access is too important to be lost sight of, even for a moment.
Sir Martin Harris, Director of OFFA