This is slightly below an overall increase in applications to Scottish institutions of 5.7 per cent and UK wide increase of 7.8 per cent.

The increases have been attributed to the onset of recession within the UK, with past trends showing similar increases at times of economic downturn. 

The applications data also revealed that Law remains the most popular subject of study, while there were also significant increases in economics and science based subjects. Notably there was a 29 per cent increase in applications to study Japanese.

Commenting on the current economic context to these increases, a spokeswoman for Universities Scotland stated, “During times of economic difficulty, people tend to turn to education because other options in the jobs market are restricted,”.

It seems that this thinking could explain the 12 per cent increase in applications from mature students as they try to gain advantage in an increasingly difficult job market.

The Universities and College Union reacted to the news by stating that “education must be at the heart of any government plans to improve social mobility and help the country in tough economic times.”

Speaking to the Student on the implications of increased applications, Tony Axon of UCU Scotland said, “Applications and indeed admission to Scottish Universities have been going down leaving some institutions under recruiting, so I'm not sure there is an intervention on student numbers required just yet.”

The Scottish Government have claimed the figures are a vindication of their policies, with Education Minister Christina Secretary MSP saying, “The SNP Government's support for students and higher education is beginning to repair the damage done by years of Labour misrule by reinstating education based on the ability to learn, not the ability to pay.”

Scottish Labour education spokeswoman Claire Baker MSP told the Student, “The general media reported these statistics as an increase in mature students and highlighted concerns over job insecurity leading to an increase in numbers which I think is more accurate than the SNP's claims.”

Comments

Add New

Rise In Mature Students Richard (86.147.235.xxx) 2009-03-04 13:57:26 The rise of Mature Students does not really surprise me - I recently got made redundant and was considering Univeristy to improve my job prospects, but got a bit lost and scared! I am in a new job now, but I have managed to do much better research. Hero.ac.uk gave me lots of good information on what courses to look out for and http://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/wiki/Mature_Studen ts was brilliant, showing what Universities are near me and what life as a Mature Student is really like. Reply 0   0

Write comment
Name:
Email:	do not notifynotify
Title:
Please input the anti-spam code that you can read in the image.

Powered by !JoomlaComment 3.26

3.26 Copyright (C) 2008 Compojoom.com / Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."