Well, it certainly is interesting times in UK Higher Education provision.
Today’s news is the emergence of a New College of the Humanities, with a professoriate of (15) academic stars, led by Professor AC Grayling, who will become its first Master when it opens to students in 2012:
A new British college aiming to rival Oxford and Cambridge has been launched by leading academics. [BBC]
They are aiming high – with fees of £18,000 a year, three times the ‘normal’ rate of £6,000. They are, of course, a private, for-profit company, with significant investment behind them. The inspiration is unabashedly from US elite liberal arts institutions. It’s going to be small and selective: they’re looking for three As at A level … and people who can spare £54k plus living expenses.
This appears to be yet another instalment of less than perfect policy coherence in UK academia. Hot on the heels of the Prime Minister very publicly blocking the Minister’s floating of the possibility of paying for ‘off quota’ places … a new venture emerges where you can do just that. So you can’t buy a place at university … unless you’re able to pay twice the maximum cap on fee loans. I can’t see how this can possibly do anything other than reduce social mobility.
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