Two year degrees: higher education should not be a sprint

The extension of two-year degrees is the latest higher education initiative being floated by the government. Accelerated degrees already exist, for example at the University of Buckingham, a private provider, but there are limited offerings elsewhere.

The extension of these courses is not a totally new idea. Seven years ago there was a debate on fast-track, two-year degrees when Vince Cable, then business secretary, mooted them as a money-saving idea alongside a graduate tax and the notion that more students could live at home.

Now, accelerated degrees are back on the agenda. The twist this time around is that the government is not considering a cut-price element, which some saw as the saving grace of the scheme when it was initially suggested. Instead universities minister Jo Johnson has announced plans to allow universities to charge up to £13,500 per year for the shorter programme. The government has presumably arrived at this figure by calculating the tuition fee for a three-year degree (£27,000) and halving it.

Two-year degrees would generally work through an extra ten weeks being added to the academic year, to fit in the full curriculum of a three-year course. This would mean that students would be expected to work more intensively. As long as vice-chancellors can prove they are investing the same resources as for a conventional course, they will be able to apply to increase fees.

Make no mistake, this latest move is aimed at the growing number of for-profit, private education providers whom the government is very keen to bring into the universities sector.

In January, Johnson said, “There is an urgent need for innovation, particularly in the form of flexible programmes with strong employer engagement offering faster routes into work than the traditional three-year residential degree programme. For too many high quality new institutions able to do just this, however, the path to degree awarding powers is blocked by inherently anti-competitive requirements."

The idea, then, is that private providers will find it much easier to obtain degree-awarding powers under the proposed legislation, particularly for "flexible" programmes such as accelerated degrees. The result will, of course, be the expansion of private institutions.

The reality of opening up higher education to private providers, as seen in the United States, is that many students have bad experiences: there have been allegations of poor quality provision and even of outright fraud. The 2012 US Senate Harkin Report found that more than half a million students who enrolled with a for-profit college in 2008-9 left without a degree or Certificate by mid-2010. Among two-year Associate degree-seekers, 63 per cent of students departed without a degree. Of course, the most infamous example of profit-driven education failing students is the now-defunct Trump University.

Robin Middlehurst, co-author of Higher Education Policy Institute report “Alternative providers of higher education: Issues for policymakers,” described the problem well: “Experience in the USA and Australia shows overly generous rules for alternative providers are a magnet for questionable business practices. The end results can include stranded students, a bill for taxpayers and regulatory intervention.”

Furthermore, the burden that two-year degrees would put on teaching staff shouldn’t be underestimated. We are concerned that the employment consequences of fast-track degrees will mean that institutions employ more casual staff to teach a third semester over the summer.

Already, 53.2 per cent of academics across the UK are employed on insecure contracts, according to UCU research carried out in 2016. Students and their families, paying higher fees than ever, may not be happy in the knowledge that teaching staff may be on contracts which resemble those used by shamed retailer, Sports Direct.

And if that third semester is taken on by permanent staff, additional teaching requirements in the summer are also likely to have a detrimental impact on staff workloads. For the majority of academics, the summer period is taken up with research, the marking of exam resits, admissions, postgraduate teaching and supervision, updating courses and reading lists for the next academic year, and dealing with relentless bureaucracy.

Fast track programmes will make it harder for students to combine study with periods of reflection, critical thinking and a deep approach to learning. They risk undermining the well-rounded education upon which our universities’ reputations are based.

Students should also be aware that if they take a two-year course they may well find it much harder to go on and study in other European countries, whose universities may demand that they have studied a longer first degree.

With Brexit in the pipeline and, as a result, a raft of damaging headlines around tightening up student visas in the UK, EU and international student recruitment is already a massive concern for British universities. Now is not the time to bring in a policy that could be seen as watering down the value of UK degrees, which could then exacerbate any future loss of international students.

Degree level study is a marathon not a sprint. The government would do well to remember that.