Universities offer students cash, laptops or gifts as 'incentives'

2022-08-17

Less prestigious universities offer students cash, laptops or other gifts as ‘incentives’ to sign up for courses

Up to 60,000 school-leavers face losing top choices when A-levels come out
Universities have reacted to a boom in ‘inflated’ teacher-assessed grades
They have raised their requirements and reduced number of firm offers this year

Less prestigious universities are offering ‘bribes’ of £2,000 or more, laptops and rail cards to lure students.

Up to 60,000 school-leavers face losing their top choices when A-levels come out tomorrow as the Government clamps down on grade inflation.

Record numbers of 18-year-olds are applying – even though universities are reining in recruitment.

Universities have reacted to a boom in ‘inflated’ teacher-assessed grades during the pandemic by raising requirements and reducing firm offers this year.

Up to 60,000 school-leavers face losing their top choices when A-levels come out tomorrow as the Government clamps down on grade inflation

Education experts believe it will be the most competitive admissions round for decades, with students struggling to find last-minute top degree places after sitting A-levels in the traditional way for the first time since 2019.

The courses at elite Russell Group universities available through ‘clearing’ – in which students without an offer from a university apply for unfilled degree places – has halved in two years.

However, other institutions across the country, which have hundreds of courses available in clearing, are providing ‘incentives’ to students. The University of Stirling is offering a £1,000 undergraduate clearing scholarship.

Oxbridge ‘to snub well-off A-level pupils’

Middle-class pupils are more likely to be rejected from Oxbridge this year because of a drive towards low-income students, the former head of Harrow has said.

Barnaby Lenon claimed some colleges may also want to recruit more international students, who pay higher fees.

It means affluent pupils picking up their A-level results tomorrow are unlikely to be able to keep their university places if they drop a grade.

Mr Lenon, who was head of Harrow for 12 years and is now Dean of Education at the University of Buckingham, said the squeeze will affect pupils at top state schools as well as private ones.

Every year, Oxford offers around 3,300 places and Cambridge has 3,650.

Cambridge said yesterday it would aim to accommodate pupils from ‘challenging backgrounds’ on A-level results day, while Oxford wants 25 per cent of its students to come from disadvantaged backgrounds by 2023.

Cambridge, pictured, said its intake of British students had increased this year. Oxford did not respond to a request for comment.

Aberystwyth University offers a scholarship worth £2,000 to students who achieve AAA. It guarantees university accommodation, free sports centre membership for first-years and free rail cards.

All students enrolling at the University of Bedfordshire will get a £1,500 bursary for living expenses. Those who gain A-levels of BBC or more will be eligible for a merit scholarship worth £2,400.

The University of Northampton is offering certain undergraduates a choice of a laptop, £500 off accommodation or £500 in vouchers to use in campus cafes.

Universities have reacted to a boom in ‘inflated’ teacher-assessed grades during the pandemic by raising requirements and reducing firm offers this year

And the University of Derby achievement scholarships to reward ‘hard work’ provides eligible students with £1,000 in their first year of study. These universities all deny bribing students.

But Professor Alan Smithers, director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at Buckingham University, said some students were ‘risking the direction of their lives being influenced for really just a few hundred, possibly a thousand pounds, which is damaging the entry process’.

He added: ‘Universities… with many places in clearing are offering bribes and incentives to attract highly qualified students to them rather than let them go to their competitors.’

Chris McGovern, of the Campaign for Real Education, said many ‘naive students’ who accept the incentives ‘will end up heavily in debt for a sub-standard, woke degree that is of little value’.

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