Examination of Witnesses (Questions 760
- 779)
WEDNESDAY 4 JULY 2007
PROFESSOR ALISON
RICHARD AND
PROFESSOR GEORG
WINCKLER
Q760 Stephen Williams: Just asking
questions on the international student market, there are about
four billion pounds worth of fee contributions to UK universities
in terms of the spending power, even more to invisible exports
effectively. Do you think the focus has been perhaps a bit wrong,
seeing international students as cash cows for the higher education
sector rather than the academic possibilities on offer both to
those students and to our own home-grown students? Do you think
the emphasis has been too much on the money and not the academic
experience?
Professor Richard: Let me make
a general point in terms of the cash cow concept. By our estimation,
at the undergraduate level the short fall between the revenues
dedicated for undergraduate education and the actual cost of that
education is actually not appreciably different for overseas students
than for home-grown or EU students. Simply there is no case for
suggesting that they are cash cows.
Q761 Stephen Williams: Is that Cambridge's
cost of teaching students or across the entire sector?
Professor Richard: I just wanted
to say that for the record. As far as Cambridge is concerned,
we offer one of the finest educations in the world and it is an
expensive education to offer and it involves loading in some aspect
of cost of our collections—our libraries, our research infrastructure,
our facilities and so forth, the capital investments. All of that
gets loaded into that number. I do want to emphasise that there
is no incentive for us to think of overseas students as a cash
cow, but, as I said earlier, and I think it is a risk to our system.
Insofar as the educational activities of universities are under
funded, it will be tempting use the unregulated market of international
students as a cash cow.
Q762 Stephen Williams: I accept that
for Cambridge it might be marginal, the contribution you might
get from international students, but for some universities that
is probably not the case. Do you think there is a danger that
the UK grant might be damaged if overseas students feel they are
not getting value for money, particularly when they can compare,
once they do circulate and mix with their own students, that they
are paying three thousand pounds and they may be paying fourteen
thousand plus?
Professor Richard: Yes. I think
it is a problem.
Q763 Stephen Williams: The final
question, to finish off this section in terms of our own students.
One of the experiences that we picked up in China, and we are
coming on to that later, is that too few students from this country
study abroad compared to the students who are coming from other
countries to study here. Do you think we are doing enough to educate
British students to be globally aware, to be aware of the opportunities
in higher education that are available to them abroad?
Professor Richard: I do not know
whether you are thinking about undergraduate or postgraduates
students, but at the undergraduate level, taking that first, first
of all, I think you are right, there are not the same level of
overseas junior year abroad. The US in particular places enormous
emphasis on getting students out of the US and studying elsewhere,
but that is in part because the US is so big, but if you look
at the percentage of students in the UK who have spent time in
Continental Europe, for example, for one reason or another, it
is a train ride away and my observation is that the UK is more
kind of unthinkingly international than the US is by a long shot.
So, the US is having to be much more strategic about it and its
educational objectives; I think we need to get a bit more strategic
about it than we have. I do not think it is good enough to do
it in an unthinking way, and it is one of the reasons to have
these partnership programmes, so you can open up summer exchange
programmes. We have the exchange programme with MIT, which is
enormously successful and interesting, not just for the students
but for the faculty who teach them. There is a whole pedagogical
innovation activity that has been driven by Cambridge academics,
finding qualities in the MIT students they do not see in their
own students, and vice versa. So there can be great value
in student exchange beyond simply to the students themselves.
So, the short answer, yes, we should do more. At the graduate
level, I think the real concern there for the US and for the UK
is the 20, 25 year trend of declining involvement in PhD programmes
that we have seen in both countries, such that in engineering
programmes and economics it is very difficult to find a UK national
in some of these programmes now. Does that matter? At some level
one could say not much. I think, though, it does matter for two
reasons. I do not think it is good for the UK not to be producing
any of its own academics who are British academics, and also what
does it say about the perception of universities and an academic
career if none of our young people in the UK, or a very small
number, are interested in dedicating their lives to research and
education, research and teaching?
Q764 Stephen Williams: Just to clarify
what you were saying there, you are saying that there are not
enough UK students studying at PhD level in this country.
Professor Richard: I am saying
it is a concern. How many is enough? I just say that for the last
25 years there has been a declining enrolment, and the reasons
for that are complex. That trend is not unique to the UK; it is
also the case in the US, and it is a source of worry there as
well.
Q765 Chairman: And the rest of Europe,
Professor Winckler?
Professor Winckler: This is just
not true for the rest of Europe, because many students in Continental
Europe use Erasmus programmes of various kinds in order to get
the global awareness you are talking about. One of the reasons
of mobility is, of course, to improve their skills in English.
If you look, for example, to Continental Europe, Spanish students,
Italian students and now, for example Polish or Czech students,
are really using the opportunities to study abroad, not only in
Europe. They also like to go to Australia, they like to go to
the United States, and so on. So I think that has increased in
Continental Europe.
Q766 Chairman: What about the question
of European students staying on and becoming PhD students. Is
there a declining number in Europe?
Professor Winckler: No, PhD studies
will be increasing too. We have to be careful when looking at
the statistics, because we still have in Continental Europe a
huge amount of what I would call old PhD studies where you can
get your PhD quite easily without doing much research. But there
is the brain drain with respect to PhD to the United States, either
PhD or post-doc, and this is one of our challenges and this is
one of our reasons to revamp the university systems.
Q767 Fiona Mactaggart: I just wanted
to ask a question, Professor Richard, following on from what you
said about the value of partnership, the importance of postgraduate
students. When we were in China I met a British chemist who was
working in a Chinese university who was jointly supervising PhD
students with a French university, and the supervision was shared
between the two universities. He was actually very enthusiastic
about the kind of intellectual stimulation for him and for the
students in that. He said it seems to be quite impossible to do
that with British universities. I wondered if you knew of any
examples of it and if you could tell the Committee why it is not
possible for British universities to have this kind of exchange
within a programme, sharing supervision of postgraduate students
between universities. Is it cost?
Professor Richard: It is not impossible
and we do it. We have a joint postgraduate programme with NIH
in Washington where students spend two years there, two years
in Cambridge. We have just launched such a programme with the
National University of Singapore. We also have a very innovative
Masters level programme in Chinese studies immersed in particular
academic areas—political science, economics and law—with
Peking University, where students spend time at Cambridge, go
out to Peking, come back to Cambridge. I think it is a very interesting
model and it helps to establish all kinds of partnerships. The
teachers get to work together. As I said, we have this joint Maîtrise
with Paris, we have a joint law programme now with Harvard.
It is happening more and more. I should just say, these things
all take time and effort and staff commitment to make them work,
and, as I look at Cambridge, we do not have the resources to put
the infrastructure in to support some of these activities as well
as one might, and you could pose the question, because you asked
the question, how could government invest more? Should there be
dedicated funding to support international partnership? Part of
me says, yes, and part of me says we have too much ring-fenced
funding already, and I am not a fan of ring-fenced funding, it
is just endless jumping through hoops. If we could have a broader
consensus about what was important and where we were trying to
travel as a national system, then I think it is better to leave
universities to make their own decisions about how to make the
investments that they make.
Q768 Mr Chaytor: Could I ask Professor
Richard, what specifically do you think the United States is doing
to rise to the challenge of growth in India and China that we
could learn from?
Professor Richard: It is a good
question. Professor Winckler is absolutely right that there is
no federal strategy in the US. It is very interesting. The Spellings
Report is the first effort. One can say that you can go all the
way back to Vannevar Bush's report, the classic report of 1946,
that basically envisaged what the higher education system of the
United States should be about and made a decision to make the
country's major investment in R&D channelled through universities,
graduate students to be a part of that effort, support for graduate
students. Since 1946 there really has been silence, in some sense,
on the federal front and I think there is now a growing concern
that the system, while still second to none, has these problems.
What can we learn? I think there are specific things that we can
learn. We can learn that philanthropy is great, you can tap philanthropy,
and we are trying to do that now. At Cambridge we are being very
successful. If you do not ask, people do not give, but if you
ask in a serious way and you make your case well, the English
do not have a gene for meanness, is my observation, and we are
getting a lot of enthusiasm and interest in the institution that
goes far beyond simply philanthropy, and that is what is not well
understood here. The relationship with your alumni community is
a relationship with the best, brightest ambassadors you could
have. They write about you, they talk about you, they connect
you to the real world, they give you advice, they interact with
the institution in all kinds of ways. We can learn that from the
US system, and we need to. That is one really good thing to learn.
The other, I believe, which I feel very committed to, is to think
about undergraduate education. The forecast of undergraduate education
and making it needs blind and needs based, and certainly for a
university like Cambridge, as we strive to reach out to all sectors
of societies from low-income families right the way across the
spectrum, having such a policy in place is absolutely essential.
So, in terms of federal policy, I see none right now. In terms
of particular practices and aspects that have made that system
strong, there I think there are interesting things to look at.
Q769 Chairman: Professor Winckler,
do you have a view on that?
Professor Winckler: I would simply
say, the typical reaction of the federal institutions is that
they, if they see a problem like that, just double the budget
of the National Science Foundation. If they do it, they do it
quickly, guaranteeing an effect.
Q770 Mr Chaytor: So, you are both
saying that the financing is the key thing, either rapid investment
in the National Science Foundation or the tapping of philanthropists
and the establishment of endowments from alumni, but is there
nothing structural about the system in the United States that
has an advantage over ours and will enable them to continue to
compete with China and India?
Professor Richard: Part of the
differences—. Again, it is going back to what you were saying.
The system in the States has grown up out of history, so you have
the private universities, you have a state system where they have
to argue with the state legislator to get their budget, so it
is not as if there are not constraints on the budget, but it is
at the level of the state.
Professor Winckler: Let me just
complement that. Look at the State of California. If they think
that they might be losing, then there is a proposal to invest
more in the university system. There is a reaction at the state
level. At the federal level there is only just more funding.
Professor Richard: Can I make
one more point. I said earlier, much earlier, that one of the
things I appreciate about the US system is this kind of celebration
of the diversity of the system and the niche players within that
system from a community college that is really proud of what it
is doing in the same city as Berkeley and Stanford and so forth.
By the same token, there is a diversity of financial underpinnings
that support this system. So, the private universities are able
to mobilise their own resources. The state universities still
cap the cost of an undergraduate education in order to keep it
affordable. The states make investments. The costs of some of
those systems are not as high, because of what they are particularly
doing. We do not see still here that kind of diversity. There
is a kind of one-size-fits-all mindset to some degree here.
Professor Winckler: If Stanford
University sees a problem it will mobilise its alumni and it will
receive one billion dollars.
Q771 Mr Chaytor: The fact that British
universities have not until recently mobilised their alumni the
same way, you say, is a weakness and this has to be a way forward?
Professor Winckler: I do not know
how it is in the United Kingdom. One of the problems in the European
Union, in the continental part of the European Union, is that
they do not have any well-working alumni organisations, and usually
the alumni do not identify themselves with their universities
because they basically say, "This is part of the state. I
pay taxes, and that is sufficient."
Professor Richard: I think that
the good news in the UK is that that was very much the mindset,
but the transition to a different way of viewing things is happening
as we speak. It is happening at lightening speed, and I think
that the new commitment for the Government to come up with matching
funds to support philanthropy, however that plays out, these are
all good things. I would like to see the tax laws further simplified
and taken further in this country, because I think there is, in
fact, huge goodwill and, of course, huge wealth in this country
that could be tapped to the support of the higher education system.
One of the strange things about the UK is that the philanthropy
that there is is very differently directed—it is not directed
at higher education in this country—quite strikingly differently,
whereas in the US it is strongly directed at higher education
as well as absolutely at a higher level.
Professor Winckler: Allow for
institutional autonomy so that you get a certain kind of identity,
and then the alumni will like to come back. For example, I studied
at Princeton University. I gave more money to Princeton University
than to the University of Vienna because there is an identity
created around the University of Princeton.
Q772 Mr Chaytor: But in terms of
the balance of funding between alumni undergraduates and postgraduates,
the states and general taxation, how do you see that shifting?
In terms of Cambridge specifically, for example, within the next
ten years what do you think the balance will be in Cambridge's
revenue income between funding from general taxation and private
funding?
Professor Richard: For Cambridge,
our strategy is to try to diversify even as we strengthen our
financial underpinnings. I think we can do it, I think it is essential
for our financial strength, and that will be essential to support
our academic endeavours. It would be my hope and my expectation---.
Returning here to the UK, part of what brought me back was obviously
a great university, but also a sense that things were really changing
in this country and that there was a rapidly growing appreciation
of the value of the university system. So I would anticipate and
hope that, though every government has massive demands upon it
from every corner, of course, that higher education would be viewed
still as a major priority for this country's investments because
the knowledge economy is something of a cliché but it is
real for all that.
Q773 Mr Chaytor: But as a guideline
then, what should be the proportion of the revenue from the state
for your university, or similar research in terms of universities
in the next decade?
Professor Richard: If you look
at our budget right now, a third of our operating budget—this
is in broad, straight terms—comes from Research Council
funding. That is public money. It is peer reviewed, we compete
for it, we do well at that. That is a third of the operating budget—Research
Council money and the charities, the big charities. A third of
our budget comes from a combination of fees, endowment income
and other sorts of income and then a third of it comes from the
QR block grant and our HEFCE teaching grant put together. I would
like to see us grow these other sources of our fee income and
our endowment income and, to some degree, our other sources of
income to grow out of our dependence on government and to enable
government to reallocate funding elsewhere, because the whole
system needs it.
Q774 Mr Chaytor: So after 2009, what
do you think the typical undergraduate course fee at Cambridge
will be?
Professor Richard: I do not know.
I think we have to wait—
Q775 Mr Chaytor: What would you like
it to be?
Professor Richard: I do not want
to pre-judge the outcome of that question. I hope you know me.
Q776 Mr Chaytor: The answer to your
previous question is assuming there will be an increase in course
fees from undergraduates as well as postgraduates.
Professor Richard: One way or
other, whether it comes from the students themselves and their
families or whether it come from overseas, I do not know what
the solution will be. I do not want to get there yet, because
I actually subscribe very deeply to the stipulation in the 2004
Higher Education Bill that there should be a review of what has
happened over the intervening five years with the introduction
of £3,000 fees, because I have no question in my mind that
from Cambridge's point of view, and this is a Cambridge view,
for Cambridge to become, as it were, a finishing school for the
children of the well to do, there would be two sets of victims
there: those who were not coming to Cambridge because they felt
they could not afford it, but Cambridge would also be a victim
of that. It would be lesser place. You would lose the soul of
the place if that happened, so we cannot allow that to happen.
I do not believe it will, because we have a bursary system in
place that should make it more easy for students from low-income
households to come to Cambridge, but I think we have to wait until
we get to 2009, see what the review is but we have to bear in
mind that if we want to have an education of this quality it needs
more support than it now has.
Professor Winckler: Let me say,
first, that per student Europe is lacking about 10,000 euros annually;
so actually universities need more money. If you compare that
with the United States, there is more public money with respect
to GDP spent on universities than in Europe. In the United States
1.2 to 1.3 % of GDP is given to the universities as public money;
in Europe it is only 1.0%. If you then take on top of that the
private contribution, then you come up in the United States to
nearly three per cent per GDP, whereas in Europe universities
actually have only very few private monies, around 0.2 or 0.3
% of GDP. So we really lack a lot of money. The question is how
to close the gap. One point is tuition fees. I have now been part
of various discussions about whether to raise tuition fees. There
is a debate in Sweden; there is a debate in Denmark. I have been
participating in that debate in Poland and so on. Many issues
come up. Let me just present three important lines of thought.
The first one is that you have to look at the tax system. To state
it very bluntly, the flatter the taxes, the higher should be the
tuition fees. So, if you have a tax system, for example, like
in Denmark where you have very high marginal tax rates in the
income taxation, with a very progressive scheme, then you should
not go for tuition fees because you should allow some regressive
effects within the tax system. The second point is that you have
to look at the level of premium you earn on tertiary education
in the labour market. One of the important points in the Spellings
Commission was that they had the feeling that tuition fees have
gone up too high, given the kind of premium you can earn in the
labour market and given equity considerations.
Q777 Chairman: Where is this? In
which country?
Professor Winckler: In the United
States, the Spellings Commission. But take the case, for example,
in Sweden. When you complete your tertiary education you can only
raise your income marginally for reasons of equity within the
society, but then you should not charge tuition fees. When raising
tuition fees the question is what kind of premium is paid in the
labour market. If you take the study by The Economist,
"Brain Business" of September 2005, for example, in
Britain you have a high premium on tertiary education, and that
could be perhaps a reason to introduce tuition fees. The third
important point, and this is a lesson which needs to be learnt
from the United States, is if you allow, for example, Cambridge
to charge higher tuition fees, then establish, let me say, a federal
grant system on stipends and grants, otherwise you discriminate
against the poor. When discussing tuition fees do not look at
that issue in an isolated way.
Professor Richard: If you were
asking about the lessons from the federal system, the one piece
of federal intervention in the states has been the Pell Grants,
but the Pell Grants have been under some attack budgetarily.
Professor Winckler: I was alluding
to that.
Chairman: That is all very useful stuff.
Gordon.
Mr Marsden: Thank you, Chairman. I would
like to probe a bit further, if I may, on this question of collaboration
and brain circulation, which, incidentally, was a concept we came
across in our visit to China.
Chairman: We need more of it in Parliament.
Mr Marsden: We need more of it in Parliament.
Some people who have two brains, of course, find it difficult!
Chairman: That has been circulating!
Sorry, that was an in-joke.
Q778 Mr Marsden: Professor Winckler,
can I start with you and say that Professor Roderick Floud, who
you I am sure know, said at The Guardian Higher Education
Summit earlier this year that UK universities need to be collaborating
with other major players in the European higher education area
in order to be in the running for major research programmes and
compete in big science. Is that something you would agree with?
Professor Winckler: Let me first
say that there are many programmes, be it the framework programmes
or other schemes where actually European universities, especially
continental European universities collaborate closely. Sometimes,
I must admit, there is too much collaboration in Europe and there
should be more competition. What we need to find is the right
balance between collaboration and competition. That is one of
the reasons why EUA, for example, has supported that with respect
to the grants given by the European Research Council collaboration
is not a criterion to choose on. The important point is only quality.
So what we would like to see is that quality is the important
point. But I agree with you that if I look at collaboration among
continental European universities this has become very intensive,
yes.
Q779 Mr Marsden: One of the reasons
I ask that question—and it was something that we discussed
when we had our Select Committee inquiry on the Bologna Process—if
you actually look at the track record in terms of producing results,
in my judgment anyway, of certainly the European Union over the
last 10-20 years in science projects, technology projects it has
not actually been that brilliant. We have had quite a heated debate
here in Parliament as to the UK's position in support of the Galileo
navigation system, which does not seem to be going very far, and
there has been widespread criticism of the European space programme,
and these are things which have been largely done on a collaborative
basis, pushed by commissioners and the by EU Commission. Is this
part of the problem, that it is too top-down?
Professor Winckler: If you look
at Bologna and Erasmus, for example the University is Vienna is
collaborating—I cannot even say the precise number—with
300 European universities. The University of Vienna is one of
the top 10 or 20 universities with respect to the Erasmus because
we really engage in that. We see a big chance also in rebuilding
Central Europe by using Erasmus. But the really top universities
are Spanish universities; and now I think the Czech universities
are catching up immensely. So here you will find networks of collaboration.
The most important outcome is that we get students who have lived
for at least one term in other country, speak another language,
have a certain cultural diversity, are globally aware and things
like that. We speak already in Europe of the Erasmus generation
because that programme is changing the mindset.
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