Thread by @JohnnySRich

The #AugarReview is out today. I haven’t finished reading it, but here are some first impressions.

There’s much to praise. It’s measured and well argued, but ultimately it won’t solve the problem of post-18 education funding.

A thread...

The return of maintenance grants is the biggest positive, intended to end inquity of the poorest students graduating with the highest debts. #AugarReview

The reduction of fees to £7.5k is not enough to achieve anything positive for students. Anyone put off by £9,250 isn’t going to see it as a bargain and it will benefit only the graduates who earn most and won’t repay for as long #AugarReview

Meanwhile the cut in funding threatens courses and even whole institutions. The #AugarReview does propose that the shortfall is made up by govt teaching grant, but my guess is that that will be the first proposal to hit the bin when HMT responds.

Also the shortfall is not proposed to be made up on a per student basis, but across the system. Lower cost courses will only earn the £7.5k while higher cost will get the top-up. The #AugarReview panel seems to have missed the counterintuitive problem that triggers.

At the moment unis cross-subsidise between courses. Low cost Philosophy, for eg, helps pay for high-cost Engineering (even though Engineering already gets a top-up, but it doesn’t meet full cost).#AugarReview

It’s not necessarily a direct subsidy. In my example, English might merely contribute more to running the library or student welfare. Cut fees for English and it can still support itself but can’t fund Engineering, the library & welfare. That’s where the axe falls. #AugarReview

High-cost courses - exactly the ones where there are the biggest skills shortages and the highest earning outcomes - are threatened by the #AugarReview. The only way around this is that the top-up needs to be huge and the Govt just won’t do that.

#Augarreview also keeps making the build-it-and-they-will-come mistake. There’s lots of talk about plugging skills gaps, but as far as I can see, no lever (market or managed) to ensure people end up in the courses to meet the needs.

People will choose to study what they want - as they have with business courses and creative arts - largely regardless of the labour market. Data projections 15 years hence about skills gaps and earnings don’t persuade a 17 yo to abandon their dreams. #AugarReview

Similarly the lure of being a student at uni will continue to make it hard to achieve the very welcome proposals about more Level 4 and 5 qualifications. #AugarReview

This is one of many positive proposals to support FE. @AoC_info has campaigned well for these and has deservedly won lots of ground.

However, it would be terrible if this becomes an HE vs DE debate. Both help students and skills and both must thrive by being brought closer.

The failure to solve the skills problem is #AugarReview’s Achilles heel. It won’t solve the long-term problems. At one point, it almost admits that by saying that ‘operational gearing’ means unis can bear a cut while student numbers rise to 2025. Watch for the next review then.

As @MartinSLewis has pointed out (and see above), extending the repayments from 30 to 40 years is likely to be regressive, meaning grads will pay a ‘tax’ throughout (and even beyond) their working lives. #AugarReview

It’s relevant then that #AugarReview suggests rebranding the student ‘loan’ repayments as ‘student contributions’. A rebrand is sensible - calling it a debt was always off putting and (slightly) misleading - but Govt should use ‘graduate contributions’ instead.

There’s lots of focus on supporting disadvantaged students and fairer access. That’s very welcome. This includes a shift in funds to unis that admit more disadvantaged students. This is one of the best bits of #AugarReview, but let’s watch whether the rebalance is big enough.

#AugarReview also mentions the need for better careers support in schools and beyond. Even recommends more funding 👏👏. However, the actual proposals mostly relate to more outcomes data - this is a complete failure to understand the driving forces behind students’ choices.

#AugarReview could have been more explicit in joining up the need for better #CEIAG in schools and the preservation of #access funding in unis. We need the #outreach. It’s in the report, but mostly between the lines.

The recommendation to stop funding Foundation years sits uncomfortably with stuff about supporting disadvantaged students. I think the idea is that compared to Access diplomas, #AugarReview reckons they encourage gaming of funds. Unusually for the report though, this isn’t clear.

There’s are good arguments for Foundation years: such as the sense of just continuing on a process makes progression to a degree simpler. This is a recommendation, they could have comfortably dropped. #AugarReview

A really innovative proposal is an interim level 4/5 qualification for degree students. Drop-out in the UK is low by international standards, but the stigma is worse than in most countries because we don’t have a way of valuing part-degrees. This might address that 👏#AugurReview

However, the danger of addressing the stigma is that you encourage drop-out #catch22 Has to be the right thing to do though, especially if you can come back later in life: #AugarReview proposes many ways to try to encourage that possibility

In the #AugarReview principles, it is suggested cost should be shared with employers. Still working through, but I haven’t yet found anywhere where employers contribute to the cost. #LetOffTheHook

It seems the only way employers are supposed to "share the cost" is to pay a graduate premium, but as the #AugarReview makes clear, they don’t always do so (if you study creative arts, are disadvantaged, employed in the wrong part of UK , etc).

The (bogus) economic theory behind this is that students will veer towards higher paid courses and that will bring in the employers. But as we’ve seen, they don’t, because, even if they had 20:20 foresight, it’s not all about the moolah. #AugarReview

Besides, students from disadvantaged groups, in the wrong part of country, etc. can’t make a choice that would get employers to contibute more. #AugarReview kind of recognises this in saying State needs to support (some of) these students more, but still employers #LetOffTheHook

With all due modesty, I haven’t seen a single argument in #AugurReview that means that my @HEPI_news proposal isn’t a better & more radical way to fix tuition funding more permanently & equitably, and get employers to contribute fairly #FairerFunding bit.ly/HEPI-FairerFun…

@HEPI_news Still lots more to digest, but I’m going to wrap this thread up for now.

On the whole, for now, I give the #AugarReview a low 2:1... but that’s probably only because of #GradeInflation.