Are universities providing value for money to British students? - Yorkshire Post Letters

Should we be surprised to read that universities are collectively losing around £1bn when Chancellors are receiving salaries of between £200,000 to over £300,000, and the many vice-chancellors at each university are receiving over £150,000? (The Yorkshire Post, October 17, 2023).

Are universities providing value for money to British students who want to achieve more financial stability in life, and therefore decide to take a degree when they are being charged fees of £9,000 a year?

Degree courses are generally three years in duration and a simple calculation adds up to that there will be a minimum debt of over £27,000 at the end of the course. This is a burden, especially for a young person who may be starting out in their chosen career path.

Granted that a student loan sits there gaining a small amount of interest until earnings are greater than £21,000.

I believe that students would gain more by taking up an apprenticeship, and if they commit to a company they have got a job, and are on the bottom rungs of the ladder, which may lead to a good job as either a supervisor or manager in years to come.

Universities should be run more like a business rather than a public sector organisation and reduction in funding from £7,000 in 2012 to an estimated £5,800 by 2025-26 is not unreasonable as I would like to see more funding going into education for those with special needs and primary education.

Universities have the ability to seek sponsorship from the private sector with research projects whereas schools have to rely on education grants from central government and fund raising by parents.

Universities are as a whole financially stable and they have more opportunities to raise funding by having more internal skills to be more incentive and entrepreneurial?

The highly paid senior university staff need to be 'thinking out of the box' more to evaluate greater opportunities with industry, culture, sport and health to generate more income streams.