HEFCE announces cash for degree-level courses co-funded with employers

Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) announced today that it will make available £7,137 million in funding for 2007-08 to universities and colleges in England. The total grant represents an overall cash increase of 6.4 per cent compared with 2006-07.

Today's announcement provides:

• an additional 33,000 full-time equivalent (FTE) students for 2007-08
• a further 16,000 FTEs for 2007-08 and 2008-09 to support growth in key areas, such as foundation degrees, courses co-funded with employers, and Lifelong Learning Networks, which enable students following vocational courses to progress into and through higher education
• a 2.75 per cent increase in the unit of funding per student for teaching
• a 2.7 per cent increase in funding for widening participation
• a 5.4 per cent increase in research funding.

Additional funding of £25 million will be allocated for certain very high cost science subjects that are important to society and the economy, but may be vulnerable because of relatively low student demand. These are physics, chemistry, chemical engineering, and mineral, metallurgy and materials engineering.

See the full HEFCE press release here.