ISLAND students who want to go to university next year will find out next month what funding they will be entitled to.
Yesterday it was announced that universities have been allowed to raise course fees from £3,290 to a maximum of £9,000 per year.
The Department of Education and Children spends £11.5 million a year paying the tuition fees of more than 1,600 students in higher education - as well as meeting means-tested maintenance awards for around a third of them.
This is in contrast to the UK where students take out loans to meet course fees which they repay over 25 years.
The department has said that it will take time to ascertain what the funding changes mean for the overall education bill and how students and their families might be affected.
Minister Eddie Teare MHK said: "We have a finite budget for higher education and, obviously at this time of great fiscal challenge for the Island, we cannot just find money from nowhere to meet sudden increases in fees.
"However, it's important we try to meet the aspirations of young people who are achieving better and better exam results and want to continue to study at higher level as this can only benefit the Island's economy. Therefore we will look to do what we can do to continue to fund higher education as generously as possible."
Regulations which set out the criteria for higher education funding will go before Tynwald in December. This has been brought forward from the spring to give students and families more notice of the changes due in September 2011.
The situation is made more complex by the fact that some Island students are not charged tuition fees at the same rate as those residents in the UK.
Some changes to funding have already been introduced:
- From next September students must get two A levels at grade C – originally two at Grade D - in order to qualify for degree funding.
- Those students who choose to take a longer degree course will have to pay a £1,000 contribution to the fourth and subsequent years as will those studying to postgraduate level.
- Students must also achieve a 2:1 degree before being eligible for postgraduate funding.
This year 708 students from the Isle of Man started higher educations courses.
What do you think? Do you feel the government should meet the rising costs of sending Island students to university in the UK? Let us know your thoughts by commenting below.
