What is Britain Good At?

Generali

chewmylegoff wrote: »

Christ, yesterday I needed to stop reading the BBC and Guardian, today i'm a daily mail fascist. I can't do anything right.

Anyway, are there any reliable stats to show what the fall numbers is, and specifically the fall in the number of people applying to universities and for what courses.

I am rather sceptical that the weight of the changes is falling on MEng students waving £25k around. I would have thought that it would be more targeted at people who can't speak a word of English claiming to be studying at tower hamlets college of illegal immigration, although obviously now I think about it, it would be too much to ask for the govt to implement any policy competently.

According to UCAS (link) the figures are thus:

2011 applicants:
UK 506,388
Other EU 40,790
Non EU 36,368

2012 applicants:
UK 462,507
Other EU 36,205
Non EU 41,361

So the number of students that (presumably) require visas has risen by 14%. The biggest rise is in students from the Far East (or the near North West as it is to me).

dtsazza

ruggedtoast wrote: »

the neo-liberal free market assumption that we outsource jobs to them, and they buy back knowledge services from us, isn't working, if it were unemployment wouldn't be so high.

Well that's a non-sequitur.

I don't think anyone every claimed that buying knowledge services would provide enough employment for everyone in the country, regardless of how many or who they are. It could easily be the case that other sectors aren't pulling their weight, or that there are more people here than can be sustained by the above exchange (I guarantee if 300m extra people arrived here tomorrow, employment in the knowledge industry wouldn't increase by that much).

And besides, I suspect (without any proof admittedly) that the majority of the current unemployed don't have the aptitude to do as well in the knowledge services sector; it certainly has higher barriers to entry than more manual work. If this is anyone's "fault", it's not the sector's...

purch

Generali wrote: »

You say that but the UK is still the largest place in the world for transacting foreign exchange.

The thing is that there is a level of expertise around some parts of the financial services industry that is unparalleled anywhere in the world. That hasn't gone anywhere (apart from the bits that have gone to India).

........or retired :T

chewmylegoff

Generali wrote: »

According to UCAS (link) the figures are thus:

2011 applicants:
UK 506,388
Other EU 40,790
Non EU 36,368

2012 applicants:
UK 462,507
Other EU 36,205
Non EU 41,361

So the number of students that (presumably) require visas has risen by 14%. The biggest rise is in students from the Far East (or the near North West as it is to me).

doesn't really back up mr toast's assertions that the govt has destroyed the 'industry', given the increase in applications. also, if his figure of 50,000 odd indians coming a year before is right, this shows that most of them are not going into universities.

however, applications is not equal to successful applicants managing to get a visa.

p.s. the numbers also suggest that this is not a £multi-billion industry at all.

de1amo

i havent seen anyone mention one of the uk's specialities,,,,,,,,,weapons --we do like to arm the world -we are so moral like that

ruggedtoast

Generali wrote: »

According to UCAS (link) the figures are thus:

2011 applicants:
UK 506,388
Other EU 40,790
Non EU 36,368

2012 applicants:
UK 462,507
Other EU 36,205
Non EU 41,361

So the number of students that (presumably) require visas has risen by 14%. The biggest rise is in students from the Far East (or the near North West as it is to me).

UCAS only deals with undergraduate applications, they don't to my knowledge know who actually enrols.

Post grad applications go direct to the universities themselves and UCAS is not involved in them, so this, much larger market, does not feature in those figures.

The UKBA reports visas sponsored each year. From India alone in 2010 it was 55,000. In 2011 it was 30,000. A 45% drop in sales in one year is a massive hit for any industry to take.

The undergrad market from India to the UK is very small, across all countries, UG students are less bothered about PSW visas.

ruggedtoast

chewmylegoff wrote: »

doesn't really back up mr toast's assertions that the govt has destroyed the 'industry', given the increase in applications. also, if his figure of 50,000 odd indians coming a year before is right, this shows that most of them are not going into universities.

however, applications is not equal to successful applicants managing to get a visa.

p.s. the numbers also suggest that this is not a £multi-billion industry at all.

I'm afraid your Daily Mail filter is obscuring your view of reality. Students coming on Tier IV university visas are definitely enrolling in university. As stated the UCAS figures are not an accurate representation of international student numbers.

HESA data lags by a couple of years. Here is the release for 09/10

Top level analysis of 2009–10 HESA data

The 2009–10 HESA data reveals that there were a total of 454,980 non-UK domiciled students in UK HE institutions in 2009–10. This represents an increase of 9.5 per cent on the previousyear and a growth of 51 per cent since 2002–03. The number of non-EU domiciled studentshas topped 300,000 and stands at 308,710 (growth of 11.1 per cent on 08/09).

If you have 450,000 students, each paying between £8000 and £16000 per year for tuition fees alone, and then you add on their accommodation, subsistence, travel, and everything else they spend, how much do you think it works out as and how many British jobs vanish if they vanish?

chewmylegoff

ruggedtoast wrote: »

I'm afraid your Daily Mail filter is obscuring your view of reality. Students coming on Tier IV university visas are definitely enrolling in university.

my understanding is that all student visas are tier IV visas, and that there is no such thing as a "tier IV university visa", but happy to be corrected on this.

i tried to use google to find out about it but my "daily mail filter" (which i'm surprised to have, having never picked up a copy of that rag) appears to be obscuring all relevant details of such specialist university visas (and their declining numbers) from the whole of the internet. (to be honest i didn't look that hard, but the home office and wikipedia seem to think tier IV visas are for all higher education.)

As stated the UCAS figures are not an accurate representation of international student numbers.

HESA data lags by a couple of years. Here is the release for 09/10

If you have 450,000 students, each paying between £8000 and £16000 per year for tuition fees alone, and then you add on their accommodation, subsistence, travel, and everything else they spend, how much do you think it works out as and how many British jobs vanish if they vanish?

yeah fair enough, didn't appreciate that the UCAS figures were only for undergrads.

i'd like to see some actual stats that postgraduate student numbers are being affected though, rather than just being called a daily mail knob head.

ruggedtoast

chewmylegoff wrote: »

my understanding is that all student visas are tier IV visas, and that there is no such thing as a "tier IV university visa", but happy to be corrected on this.

i tried to use google to find out about it but my "daily mail filter" (which i'm surprised to have, having never picked up a copy of that rag) appears to be obscuring all relevant details of such specialist university visas (and their declining numbers) from the whole of the internet. (to be honest i didn't look that hard, but the home office and wikipedia seem to think tier IV visas are for all higher education.)



yeah fair enough, didn't appreciate that the UCAS figures were only for undergrads.

i'd like to see some actual stats that postgraduate student numbers are being affected though, rather than just being called a daily mail knob head.

Higher Education is what is taught at universities. As opposed to Further Education which is equivalent to A Levels.

To get a Tier IV visa the student has to be sponsored by a university, there are a set of mandatory requirements they have to conform to, which are different to the ones for students being sponsored for lower level courses.

I've already given you the UKBA figures for India 2010/11 and 2011/12, there is a 45% drop.

chewmylegoff

ruggedtoast wrote: »

Higher Education is what is taught at universities. As opposed to Further Education which is equivalent to A Levels.

To get a Tier IV visa the student has to be sponsored by a university, there are a set of mandatory requirements they have to conform to, which are different to the ones for students being sponsored for lower level courses.

I've already given you the UKBA figures for India 2010/11 and 2011/12, there is a 45% drop.

Some funny looking universities on this list http://www.bia.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitecontent/documents/employersandsponsors/pointsbasedsystem/registerofsponsorseducation


As you can see from this list, the total figures for tier iv visas do not necessarily translate into a fall in university attendance. Are there any specific figures showing such falls?