• Many universities in the UK are affected by funding and strikes by university staff.
The business model of Britain's prestigious universities has recently been struggling to maintain financial stability. While the country's top educational institutions such as Oxford University have retained the global crown in the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2023 list, the prestige of some of the larger universities has masked a crumbling model of UK higher education.
Many universities in the UK are affected by staff funding and strikes. Last month, 70,000 people across 150 universities protested against falling wages, pension cuts and poor working conditions, according to a report by Bloomberg news agency. In addition, the British government has considered limiting the number of foreign students.
According to data from the Higher Education Statistics Agency, around 30% of the 274 universities and colleges were already loss-making at the end of the 2021 academic year.
Even 24 top institutions, including the Russell Group, Oxford and Cambridge, told a parliamentary committee earlier this year that the government needed to step up funding.
Rating agency Moody's also downgraded the ratings of major UK colleges Oxford, Cambridge, University College London and others on 25 October.
According to experts, the combination of Brexit and the pandemic has exacerbated the vulnerabilities of the rank-and-file places that form the backbone of the system, Bloomberg agency wrote.
Some academics said that many are effectively running as unviable 'companies' that depend on paying high fees to students from China and India.
Professor Karin Lesnik-Oberstein told Bloomberg that the funding system in the UK is "hopelessly compromised," relying on money from "foreign students, largely Chinese students".
However, data shows that lower-ranked British universities are falling out of international favor anyway. Brexit has caused them to lose European applicants, while high-performing international students are unwilling to pay top dollar for a product that may be losing its allure.
New enrollments from China fell for the first time last year, down 4.9% to 99,160 students, the UK universities cited data. While Indian enrollment climbed nearly 27%, the rate of growth is slowing.
That said, the UK still punches above its weight in higher education, especially compared to the rest of Europe, and has been strengthening ties with Commonwealth countries since leaving the EU, the agency said.
In July this year, the UK and India signed an agreement aimed at further promoting applicants.
However, many universities and their staff are getting more desperate. The Union of Universities and Colleges has reported that more than half of staff have shown symptoms of depression, with 21% of academics working an extra 16 hours per week on top of contracted hours.
The post-Brexit funding chaos has complicated access to research funding. In November, the government was forced to fill a $591 million gap in resources after the EU refused to grant the UK access to international science programmes.
Universities UK, which represents 140 institutions, is calling for a nationwide dialogue about the financial viability of the industry. The organization says funding is projected to be the lowest since 1900 when adjusted for inflation.
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