Poach the student: how UK universities could compete for second or third years

Students who don’t quite make the A-level grades to get into their first-choice university could soon be given a second chance: they may be able to switch in their second or even third year under government plans that could see universities poaching undergraduates from rival institutions.

Jo Johnson, the higher education minister, has already set out the government’s vision for a system where students can move more easily between HE providers without losing credit for the work they have already undertaken.

Now Ucas, the university admissions service, has said it too regards greater “portability of qualifications” as “vital”. A spokesman said last week that it is working on plans to change its website so that students can search for second- and third-year vacancies.

Those who don’t complete their studies would have the opportunity to pick them up again later at a new institution. Students who feel they have made the wrong choice of university or course could transfer much more easily.

In policy circles “credit transfer” tends to be talked about as something purely student driven. But experts have told Education Guardian that universities should be braced for a fresh barrage of competition in an already combative recruitment marketplace, with students considered “fair game” for snaffling long after freshers’ week. Mike Nicholson, director of student admissions at Bath University, says his institution already receives quite a lot of interest from students who want to move there in the second year. Some want to “trade up” from a university lower down in the league tables – particularly international students who, Nicholson says, may not have been able to identify the relative merits of British universities from a distance.

He warns that some universities could flounder if such transfers became commonplace. “If you are an admissions officer and you work really hard to get students to come into your first year, and then you find half of them disappear to the university up the road in the second year, what do you do then? Do you try to recruit students from the university in the next town to make up your numbers?”

But he adds: “The counter-argument is that this extra competition could act as a stimulus for universities and courses to up their game and make sure they are giving students the experience they want and have been promised.”

Alec Cameron, vice-chancellor of Aston University, insists that there is a “strong ethical argument” for boosting students’ ability to switch universities, and that anyone who argues against it does not have their best interests at heart.

But having come to Aston from a leading university in Australia where credit transfer is the norm, not the exception, Cameron says he is under no illusion about the fierce competition it could trigger.

“Competition for second-year students is not explicit in Australia, but it is clearly understood that the option to move exists and that universities would be keen to facilitate the transfer of students into their institution. They don’t take out TV or radio ads, but they make it known amongst students. There is an active soft media campaign, using social media.” Some Australian institutions who want to increase student numbers without noticeably dropping entry grades use the credit transfer system to “churn students into the second year”, he says. They turn down underperforming applicants for the first year – when entry grades count in league tables – but tell them they will reconsider in the second year if they reach a certain standard.

Andrew Norton, HE programme director at the Grattan Institute, an Australian thinktank, says movement between universities there is increasing, with students choosing to transfer “up, down and across the system status hierarchy”, but typically within state boundaries.

Nick Hillman, director of the Higher Education Policy Institute thinktank, says that there could be scope for UK universities to pursue students ruthlessly. “When Birmingham University went public about the fact it was going to make unconditional offers to students there was an outcry in the sector, but then lots of other universities quietly followed suit,” he says. “It is possible that some universities might start aggressively advertising that they will take good second-year students. Again there would be criticism, but others might then follow.”He points out that trading up is already common in the UK system at masters and postgraduate level. “You might see a student who has done well at a less prestigious university doing a postgraduate course at Cambridge,” he explains.

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Emma Pollard, a specialist in higher education at the Institute of Employment Studies who has researched credit transfer for the Department for Education, says: “One of the government’s ambitions for credit transfer was that students could trade up. “They could try higher education, maybe studying at a familiar institution or one with a lower entry tariff or studying at sub-degree level to gain a bit of confidence, and then perhaps consider their options.”

She adds that there needs to be proper support for students thinking of changing their course or institution.

The Sutton Trust, a charity focused on overcoming educational disadvantage, believes some bright poorer sixth-formers may make the wrong choice initially and want to change once their confidence grows in the first year.

Lee Elliot Major, the Sutton Trust’s chief executive, explains: “We want high-achieving students from poor backgrounds to go to the place that is right for them.

“For some that might mean going to a good course locally. But we worry that many tend to go to the university down the road rather than considering options further afield.”

However, Nicholson argues that poorer students may find switching university too daunting. “For students from disadvantaged backgrounds who have settled in during the first year, the idea of moving is likely to be a significant challenge,” he says.

Hillman argues that such hesitancy may be more universal: “If I had chosen to leave my university at the end of my first year, the one thing that would have pulled me back would have been the friends I had made.”