Union decries student 'cramming'

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Universities in the UK are "cramming in" more students but staffing levels are not keeping pace, academics say.

The University and College Union says there were 16.8 students per teacher in 2005-06, against 16.1 the year before.

The ratio was 18.1 in 2003-04 - but the union believes the drop is because many more part-time staff are being counted.

Universities say proportionately more staff are being recruited than students, although they have urged the government to maintain funding levels.

The union also said the ratio in the UK was above the most recent international average from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), which showed 15.5 students for each staff member.

Universities UK and the Universities and Colleges Employers Association said in a joint statement that there were significant variations in definitions and methodologies when calculating the international averages.

'Highly valued'

The statement added: "The OECD points out that, unlike other countries, the UK figures relating to the ratio of students to contact staff refers to public institutions only.

"In other OECD countries private tertiary institutions are also included."

But it conceded that the UK teaching numbers did include so-called "atypical" staff - those who are working less than four consecutive weeks, doing short one-off tasks or working as-and-when required.

The employers said their "hard work and contribution to the student experience is highly valued".

The union said it believed the figures compiled by the Higher Education Statistics Agency were now counting large numbers of part-time teaching staff.

This gave a misleading impression that more staff were on hand for students, whereas in fact they could be hard to get hold of.

There are now some 2.3 million students in UK higher education institutions compared with 1.9 million in 1999, according to the statistics agency.

Joint general secretary Sally Hunt said: "It is unacceptable that the UK, the fourth largest economy in the world, is falling behind competitors when it comes to the number of students to each member of teaching staff at our universities.

"Despite a recent recalculation of figures the UK is still way behind competitor countries, particularly Germany and Japan, and the ratio of students and staff actually rose this year."

Lecturers continued to perform "to an incredibly high standard", she said.

But she added: "We cannot keep cramming more students in our universities and expect the staff to put in even more unpaid overtime."

Quality time

The National Union of Students supported the academics' complaints.

President Gemma Tumelty said lobbying for more spending on teaching was a huge priority.

"That we lag behind Europe and other parts of the world in terms of our GDP spending on higher education, and hence our investment in teaching, is simply not good enough," she said.

The National Student Survey showed that students' overall satisfaction levels were higher in response to good contact time with staff.

"Staffing levels have clearly not kept pace with increased participation in higher education, but particularly as students are paying more for the privilege of higher education, their right to quality teaching must be promoted and not depleted."