National Bursary Scheme

The Higher Education Policy Institute has today launched a report on a national bursary scheme to address how institutions support poorer students.
In the year following the introduction of variable fees, UK HE spent £100 million on bursaries to assist poorer students and to widen participation.
However, there is an inequality between the bursaries offered across institutions and HEPI is calling for this to be standardized so that students from poorer families can rely on the bursary they will receive. The report highlights the requirement for additional sup-port for the poorest students, saying: “even the poorest students liable for fees of £3,145, and with annual living costs of around £8,200 (total costs of £11,345), would require an additional £4,965 from interest-bearing loans to meet these total costs.” Also, the more socially inclusive a university the more it is likely to be spending on bursaries, in effet penalizing universities for widening participation. The report suggests a national pool that can be drawn on to provide buraries to poor students.
Diana Warwick, Chief Executive of Universities UK, defended the current system, saying: “The maintenance and bursary arrangements which were agreed under the HE Bill were designed to provide appropriate levels of support for all students and, in particular, to encourage non-traditional students to aspire to any university they wanted.
“Given the diversity of views across the higher education sector, it is clear that any future move to a national bursary scheme would raise a number of critical questions which will need to be explored further.”