Tuition fees could be set to rise to a massive 20k for science degrees

Unis have warned fees could rise to a massive £20,000 a year for science and medical degrees. 

The huge price hike is to cover the “real cost” of teaching, laboratories and support staff.

Universities UK’s new president Dame Julia Goodfellow said her organisation, which represents university Vice Chancellors, had launched an inquiry into the “real costs” of science, Engineering and Medicine degrees and found them to be far higher than the current nine grand a year.

Apparently science degrees alone cost more than £21,000 to deliver, while five-year-long medical degrees are significantly more expensive.

Goodfellow is now proposing the fee cap of £9,000 a year is re-examined, because for some subjects it’s supposedly “not enough”.

The Universities UK president, who is also VC at Kent, said: “There are real problems for the high-cost subjects and for universities like Imperial College, which has a lot of science degrees.

“Look at doctors and the length and cost of their training. Should students borrow that money [for higher fees] or should the government support that cost?”

At UUK’s annual conference later this week Minister for universities and science Jo Johnson is expected to reveal more details of government plans to allow some top universities to raise fees from £9,000 by inflation from 2017.

Last week Goodfellow was forced to defend academics amid complaints of short contact hours at some universities and tutorials and lectures held by postgrads rather than professors.

She said students have to realise learning at uni is different to being “spoon-fed for exams at school, adding: “Universities do their best to prepare students for that when they get there.”