Giving All First-in-Family UK Students a Year’s Free Tuition is a Bad Idea - Here’s Why

<p>A <a href="https://www.hepi.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Making-Universities-Matter-Report-125-FINAL.pdf" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer">recent report</a> by the UK’s Higher Education Policy Institute recommends that the UK Government introduce a ‘First in Family Allowance’ which will make any potential UK student whose parents did not attend university eligible for a year’s free tuition.</p>
<p>The report states that&nbsp; “the level of parental education is a major influence on educational progression, with parents often more concerned about tuition fees and graduate debt than the prospective students” and that “first-in-family students are more likely to have overlaps with family background and income-type measures of disadvantage, such as income deprivation, living in a single income household and lower socio-economic status.”</p>
<p>Whilst I largely agree with this statement, I don’t believe that offering every student whose parents did not attend university the option of a year’s free tuition is the most effective way of encouraging a greater number of students from low income backgrounds to attend university.</p>
<p>Here’s why…</p>

<p>Firstly, I think that if a scheme is going to be introduced to “overcome a barrier” to students from low income backgrounds who wish to attend university, that the scheme should exclusively target students from a low-income background.</p>
<p>It’s unreasonable to assume that the majority of students whose parents didn’t attend university are from a low-income background. For many, it may just be that for some households it just wasn’t the ‘done’ thing, or that their jobs at the time simply didn’t require a degree like so many do now.</p>
<p>The fact that students who come from some of the highest income households in the country would be eligible for the same year’s free tuition as someone from a very low-income background is a ludicrous thought. Surely the money would be better used to help students who genuinely need the financial help – e.g. used for extending grants or scholarships available.</p>