Tuition Fees: Home Status and Overseas Student Status

After our presentation to Grade 11 parents on the application process in the UK several questions on tuition fees and the fee structure for International students and domestic students have cropped up.  With this post, we hope to point families to some resources as they start researching universities and the fee structure. Please note that policies and fees change, and at the time of writing this post, the details are correct. We encourage families to peruse individual university websites and also to contact university representatives directly, for clarification and up-to-date information.

Broadly speaking, all country destinations have two categories: International and Domestic. Domestic students are termed as those who hold a passport of that country. So you could be an Australian citizen, having lived in Singapore your entire life, and you are still considered an Australian national for university fees. This is also true for Canada, most European destinations, New Zealand, and the US (in-state tuition for State Universities has an additional category; we will speak with students one-on-one about this).  The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has published an e-book, this has a section on tuition fees policies for OECD countries for 2012.

The education department of the UK Government decides the categories of student fees. There are two broad categories however,  UK/EU known as “home” and Non-EU or “Overseas”.  The fees increase in the UK, for domestic students from £3,000 to £9,000 has everyone talking; even British Intellectuals are discussing the increase in tuition fees.  With the increase, families are more concerned about what category they will fall into.

As mentioned earlier, usually universities look at a student’s passport and citizenship. However, in the UK, a student’s citizenship and residency status are evaluated. If you are an EU passport holder or a UK citizen, you may not instantly be considered “home status.” Usually families have to prove that they pay taxes in the UK or an EU country and have records of this for three years prior to a student enrolling in university. In addition, if you already hold citizenship of an EU country or the UK, and a parent works for a UK or an EU-based company, this will benefit the student’s claim for home status. Finally, if the family is only outside of their home in the EU or the UK (for two years or else), this should be highlighted to gain home status.

However, the classification of “home” fees can be complicated and we recommend that individuals contact specific universities to clear doubts. Families should also visit the UK Council for International Student Affairs website for detailed information on Home status vs. Overseas status

To assess whether someone is viewed as “Home” or “Overseas,” students may be asked some questions and will need to provide some information:

·           Do you have permanent residence in your current country?

·           Give details of countries in which you have lived with the dates.

·           Do you own property / pay taxes / have medical insurance in the UK?

·           Is your father’s / mother’s work contract temporary?

·           Is your father’s / mother’s employer UK / EU based?

Please note that documentary evidence will be required for all claims.

According to Education UK average costs, per year, for International students are:

·         Arts courses: £7,000 to £9,000

·         Science courses:  £7,500 to £22,000

·         Clinical courses: £10,000 to £25,000

 

It is important for families to understand that a university can charge different fees for different courses. It is up to the university to decide what fees it will charge for the courses it offers. However, the Guardian University League Table lists the minimum and maximum tuition fees charged by each university for domestic and International students for the academic year 2012-2013.

The next question may be, is there financial aid available in the UK?  The UK government wants to ensure people are not deterred from enrolling into university because of lack of funds. Bursaries and scholarships are forms of financial help for International and home status students.  Students will have to look at individual universities to see if there are bursaries they are eligible for.

Home status students can also apply for a loan. The Students Loans Company administers all student loans. It manages student loans to EU students from any national UK student finance company. Students must apply to the Student Finance Company that is in the area they are from (England, Northern Ireland, Scotland, or Wales).  There’s also information on Student Loan Repayment.

Deciding where to study and what course to enroll in is a difficult task. Add to the mix the complication, for some, on fees category, and the university application process becomes an emotional and financial journey.  We encourage families to find out all information about fees and additional costs (accommodation, transportation, food and so on) as students explore their options. To make it a little less difficult, we ask families to ensure they have open and frank discussions about several factors: location, course of study, and definitely about finances.

Good luck researching university options!

UK or US?

Finding a university that is a good match for you requires not just an understanding of yourself as a person and a learner, but also an understanding of the type of experience that different universities have to offer.  Many of you are considering universities in both the UK and the US.   While both countries have terrific reputations for higher education and are home to some of the most prestigious institutions in the world, the experience of attending university can be quite different in each country.  There are some important distinctions that may make one country a better fit for you than the other, depending on your interests, learning style and aspirations.  Here are some of the key differences between these two university systems.

Commitment to course of study.    In the UK, university applications are subject-specific. This means that when you apply, you must apply to a specific course.  If you are UK-bound, you will need to have a good idea of the direction you would like to head in by the beginning of Grade 12 at the latest.  At US universities, in most cases you will apply for a place at the university, rather than in a specific course, and it is perfectly acceptable to arrive at a university without a clue about what you would like to specialize or “major” in.

Professional and specialized degrees uncommon in US.   The UK allows you to study professional degrees in the first instance, as a Bachelor degree.  Programs such as the Bachelor of Medicine and the Bachelor of Laws are particularly popular.  You will be also surprised by the breadth of offerings in the UK, degrees, with degrees available in specialties as far and wide as Brewing and Distilling, Physiotherapy, Television Production and Puppet-Making.  In contrast, professional and highly specialized degrees are most often offered in the US as Master’s or PhD programs.   It is possible to major in Engineering, Business or Architecture as a US undergraduate, but these programs are not offered at all universities.

Depth vs. Breadth followed by Depth.  In the UK there are generally no distribution or general education requirements.  You will take most of your classes in the area you applied for with a few choices of electives.  As a result, most degrees take only three years to complete, although Scotland requires students to take a wider selection of classes in the first year, and so Scottish degrees take four years.   In the US, Bachelor degrees take four years to obtain; most universities require that students sample courses in a broad range of subjects before specializing or majoring in one subject for the last two years.  This flexibility makes it possible in the US to major in two unrelated subjects, and at some US universities, you can design your own major to suit your particular interests.  While the US liberal arts and sciences approach makes it very easy to change your mind about what you want to study, in the UK it is far less common but still feasible to change your original choice of subject to a related subject.  There are also several combined and dual degrees in the UK that allow study in more than one subject, and liberal arts-type offerings are becoming more available.

Public vs. Private, Large vs. Any Size.  The vast majority of the UK’s over 300 higher education options are government-funded rather than private, and are relatively large institutions, catering to both undergraduates pursuing bachelor’s degrees and graduate students in master’s and PhD programs.   The average size of a UK university is 15,000 students, and after the first year many students live independently off campus in their own accommodation.  While the US has many large, well-reputed state universities, funded by American states, most of the over 4,000 higher education options in the US are privately funded and endowed.   Liberal arts colleges, which focus solely on undergraduate education, are often as small as 1,200 students and offer residential living communities for all four years.

Application Procedures.  Applications to UK universities are processed through a central governmental agency known as UCAS (Universities and Colleges Admissions Service).  You can only apply to five universities in the UK, and only to four if you are applying to medicine programs.  You can apply to Oxford or Cambridge, but not both.   Because you will only submit one Personal Statement for UK applications, it makes sense to apply for the same or very similar subjects at each institution so that you can write about your interest and suitability in that area.  Applications to US colleges and universities are processed by the individual institution, although there is a private application consolidator known as the Common Application, which has about 400 members, that makes it easy to apply to many popular universities using a single online application, with individual supplemental essays for specific institutions.

Admission criteria.  Admission in the UK is largely credential-driven, with UCAS publishing minimum IB requirements, and offers of admission are made conditional on attaining IB results that are consistent with predicted grades.  UCAS distinguishes between UK and European Union residents and other international students, and admissions criteria and fees differ for these two groups.  The US has a holistic admissions process and considers a large range of factors above and beyond a student’s academic ability (as evidenced by assessment grades since Grade 9, predicted grades and standardized test scores), including how applicants would enhance the diversity of the student body, what special talents or contributions they would make to a learning community, and in many cases, their ability to pay.

Upcoming presentations to Grade 11 will focus on the special features of the UK and US university systems and the procedures, requirements and timing for applying in each country.  Future presentations will cover other countries popular with UWC students, including Canada, Australia and Singapore.  

Self-Assessment and Career Exploration Tools

Students thinking about university often jump right to “Can I get in?” without spending sufficient time on "What do I want from a university experience?” and "Which kind of university is right for me?"   The first step in identifying which universities would be a good match must start with students themselves.  It is important that students invest some time and energy reflecting on their own interests, learning styles and aspirations as they embark on their university search and application process. Students with a higher degree of self-awareness are better able to determine what criteria would make a college or university a good match for them.  This week Grade 11 students will be meeting with University Advisors to learn about some resources to explore their own interests and potential future careers. Here are some of the online tools we will share.  These resources will be made available to younger high school students over the course of the school year.

FAMILY CONNECTION
Family Connection is the university and career website that is used to manage and track all university applications of UWCSEA students.  It provides a self-discovery assessment called Do What You Are an online questionnaire to help students match themselves to careers and majors or courses of study.   Students can take about 30 – 45 minutes to complete the questionnaire and get immediate feedback.  By clicking on the Explore Careers tab in Family Connection, students can search careers by name or keyword and read detailed profiles of specific careers.  Under Explore Interests, students can complete a Career Interest Profile and identify interests based on Holland Occupation Themes, a system of matching personalities to careers.

CAREERSCAPE
Careerscape is a UK-based careers exploration site where students can learn about many different careers and the courses of study recommended as preparation.  Careerscape includes information on all UCAS Higher Education courses (currently around 50,000). This information is organized by career or by a search facility for keyword, region and type of course.

UCAS
UCAS is the online site students will use when the time comes to apply to universities in the United Kingdom.  Under Course Search, students can see the different kinds of courses of study that are available in the United Kingdom and the increasing variety of joint degree combinations.  Students interested in particular careers can see where in the UK a variety of professional degrees are offered.


We recommend that parents start a conversation with their children about their own career paths and share how their thinking about careers and career preparation has evolved over time.  Many of us are not currently in the career that we initially studied for.  The path to a satisfying and fulfilling career is not usually a straight line, and students will be comforted to know that the decisions they make now about which subject to study or where to enroll in university are not final determinants of their potential for success.