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Dept for Education and Employment

Answer

Mr. Alan Campbell: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Employment how many students enrolled in full-time higher education courses in England and Wales in each of the years from 1993 to 1998; and how many such students failed to complete their courses in each of those years. [91930] Mr. Mudie: The number of entrants to higher education courses, in each of these years, is given in the table. Home Domiciled Entrants to Higher Education Courses {1} England and Wales _________________________________________________________________________________________________. 1993 {2} 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 Undergraduate Under 21 194,656 199,151 200,754 204,118 216,936 217,365 21 and over 203,210 210,317 228,552 226,085 220,906 218,494 Postgraduate 99,083 122,974 126,254 118,876 123,841 129,373 Total entrants 496,949 532,442 555,560 549,079 561,683 565,232 _________________________________________________________________________________________________. Note: 1. Full-time and part-time courses. Excluding HE students in FE colleges. 2. Figures for 1993 were collected on a different basis to those in later years. Includes a small number of HE students in FE colleges in Wales. The available information on non-completion consists of UK level full-time and sandwich first degree non-completion rates published in the Departmental Annual Report. The table shows these non-completion rates for the same period: UK {1} Full-time and sandwich first degree non-completion rates Percentage _________________________________________________________________________________________________. Year Non-completion {2} 1993-94 {3}17-18 1994-95 {3}17-18 1995-96 {3}18-19 1996-97 {4}n/a 1997-98 {4}n/a 1998-99 {4}n/a _________________________________________________________________________________________________. {1} The institutional coverage of the non-completion rates is restricted to the former UFC-funded universities in the UK and former polytechnics in England. {2} "Non-completion" covers all those leaving degree courses because of exam failure, ill health, personal and other reasons. It includes those switching to a lower level course but it excludes students transferring between degree courses or subjects. {3} Ranges are given, because the introduction of a new data source in 1994-95 made it difficult to measure non-completion, under existing definitions, accurately. {4} n/a = not available. "Non-completion" covers those who leave full-time and sandwich first degree courses for various reasons including exam failure but students who failed their final examinations are not separately identified. The non- completion rates relate to a narrower range of courses and have a different institutional coverage than the entrant figures shown. Therefore, it would be inappropriate to use the non-completion rates shown to estimate the number of entrants each year who did not complete. The Department is currently working with the higher education funding bodies in the UK to develop a method of calculating non-completion rates which can be applied to all UK higher education institutions and which takes into account the non-traditional routes that some students follow. These routes may include changing courses or institutions, repeating years or leaving higher education for a year or more before continuing their studies. It is intended to publish the results of this work in the next Departmental Annual Report.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

91930; 336 c160-1W

Session

1998-99

Subjects

Admissions Higher education Students Student wastage

Contains statistics

Yes