Atheist Elite College.

recedite

I meant for as long as the "free education" concept has existed. I'm open to correction, but I think there was some sort of govt. student grant system in place even before 1995 that ensured any bright student with no family money could take up a place at TCD, or indeed at the NUI colleges. In other words TCD was not any different to any other Irish uni in terms of being elitist or "only for the rich". If it was better than NUI colleges at attracting UK students, then fair play, but I would not agree that it was "pitching" for rich dimwits who failed Oxbridge entrance exams, or trying to fulfill that role.

I'll suggest another possible alternative market for the new NCH. Instead of trying for failed Oxbridge candidates with money, maybe those candidates from outside the EU who already pay full fees anyway in existing Irish/UK universities.

HansHolzel

recedite wrote: »

I meant for as long as the "free education" concept has existed. I'm open to correction, but I think there was some sort of govt. student grant system in place even before 1995 that ensured any bright student with no family money could take up a place at TCD, or indeed at the NUI colleges.

Ah, those good old grant days (three per year i.e. one per term). Some f*^king high, walking down to the bank with that cheque in your pocket :-)

Peregrinus

recedite wrote: »

I meant for as long as the "free education" concept has existed. I'm open to correction, but I think there was some sort of govt. student grant system in place even before 1995 that ensured any bright student with no family money could take up a place at TCD, or indeed at the NUI colleges. In other words TCD was not any different to any other Irish uni in terms of being elitist or "only for the rich". If it was better than NUI colleges at attracting UK students, then fair play, but I would not agree that it was "pitching" for rich dimwits who failed Oxbridge entrance exams, or trying to fulfill that role.

Well, I can assure you that the pre-1995 grant system did not achieve the objective that "any bright student with no family money . . . could take up a place". But, yes, there was a grant system, and it operated equally with respect to TCD and other third-level institutions.

I wasn't meaning to suggest that NCH's for-profit no-public-funding model was something that TCD had previously followed; just that the Oxbridge rejects that (I think) NCH caters to is a market which TCD used to cater to. And - I shouldn't need to say this - there's nothing wrong with that.

recedite wrote: »

I'll suggest another possible alternative market for the new NCH. Instead of trying for failed Oxbridge candidates with money, maybe those candidates from outside the EU who already pay full fees anyway in existing Irish/UK universities.

Oh, yes, I'm sure we'll find that in their student body, non-EU students are overrepresented, by comparison with most British universities. (And nothing wrong with that, either.)

But what's distinctive about NCH is that it very clearly offers an Oxbridge model of education - tutorial-based, not lecture based and with a very, very low student:staff ration of 10:1. (NCH aside, there's only two other educational instititutions in the UK which offer that kind of ratio, and guess which two they are?) So who is that model likely to attract?

I stress I'm not being critical of NCH. They think the Oxbridge model is a good one, and they want to emulate it. They want to do it without seeking government funding, because they are fed up with the distortions introduced by government funding priorities. (It's the New College of the Humanities, note, and it's the humanities departments up and down the country that are being decimated by a government which thinks that university education is about training people for jobs, and jobs are either in technology or business.) So, they value the humanities for their own sake? They admire the Oxbridge teaching model? Good on them.

But the cost of avoiding the compromises forced on you by government funding is accepting a different set of compromises. The College may value the humanities for their own sake, but when the are charging eighteen thousand sandwiches a year, there's an awful lot of customers who won't shell out unless they are persuaded that this is an investment with a good prospect of paying off in the form of a high-earning job, which a BA in history or philosophy doesn't invariably lead to. Hence every student, in addition to taking a Univ of London BA in one of the humanities, take the New College Diploma, which includes the Professional Programme, covering numeracy and financial literacy, impact of technology, negotiation, self-management and working in teams, etc - it looks a bit like a mini MBA, really, and I don't think that's a coincidence.

Another compromise is that you have to market yourself - hence the celebrity faculty like Richard Dawkins and Laurence Krauss. Ask yourself why a College which offers courses only in Economics, English, History, Law, Philosophy and Politics would need a famous evolutionary biologist or a famous physicist on staff? (Hint: there's a clue in the word "famous").

Again, I have no problem with this. I wish NCH well and I hope it survives and prospers. And it won't, if it doesn't attract students. And if a connection with Richard Dawkins raises the profile of the College - and it will, signficantly - then that will help. But, being realistic, Dawkins's contribution to the success of this venture will be more on the marketing side than on the educational side. Whatever teaching he does there - and I suspect it won't be much - is not going to affect the class of degree that anybody gets.