The measures, which have come after a public consultation and have attracted much controversy, include tighter restrictions on working after study, raised English language requirements and tighter accreditation procedures.

Home secretary Theresa May said that her aim was not to stop genuine students, but that the UK wanted to attract ‘the best’ and the measures would “eliminate abuse within the system”. The new measures are expected to result in 80, 000 fewer visas each year – a quarter of the current total.

Here is an overview of the measures:

• Tighter accreditation and inspection regimes
• Less students will be able to bring dependants with them
• For non-EU students, the right to work after graduating will only be given those who have job offers with trusted employers, with a salary of at least £20, 000
• The standard of English required to study a degree course will rise

The measures have prompted fears by university groups that international students will be deterred from coming to the UK – resulting in a huge financial loss for many institutions that rely on international fees. There is also a worry that it will adversely affect smaller schools such as English language providers.

Are you an international student? Would these measures put you off coming to the UK? We want to know your thoughts!

The theme of the competition is: “How will I use my learning to become a ‘Graduate with Impact’?” This theme has been chosen because:

• Obtaining a degree is important but the whole university learning experience should contribute to your effectiveness as a citizen, in work and in the world
• Employers have expressed views about the suitability of new graduates for the world of work and the concept of ‘global citizenship’ is an expectation that graduates will contribute more widely than within employment

This competition offers the opportunity for students currently in business education to have a voice and identify within your learning experience ‘What works for me?’

BMAF is looking for bright, enthusiastic students to submit a podcast, video, A1 poster, article or likewise describing their experiences studying and how they intend to make an impact with their experience.

When submitting their entries, students should consider:

• Which elements of your learning experience make you feel you will have impact in the world in the future?
• Why was that experience effective for you?
• How do you intend to have impact? What have you contributed already?
• What could other students and academic staff learn from your experience?

What can you win?

The author of the winning submission will be win:

• a cheque for £300 from the Higher Education Academy BMAF Network
• an iPod Touch donated by the Association of Business Schools (ABS)
• and will be invited to attend the Higher Education Academy Annual Conference at the East Midlands
• Conference Centre, Nottingham, on 5-6 July 2011

There are also two runner-up prizes of £150 available from the BMAF and these and other submissions will be made available via the HEA/BMAF website.

Plus! School awards

The School or Faculty that the winning student is registered with will be presented with a Certificate to recognise the positive environment that student has described. The outcomes of all submissions will be aggregated and shared with business and management schools and students and may contribute to future BMAF/ABS activities.

Criteria

If you fulfil the following criteria, you are eligible to enter the competition.

• Open to students registered on programmes with business and management schools in the UK. Please identify the university you are at
• Submitted to bmaf@brookes.ac.uk on time – 17:00 on Friday 18th March 2011, accompanied by a completed Entry Form
• Maximum size of 1100 words if written, 5 minutes if podcast or video, A1 if a poster (Contact bmaf@brookes.ac.uk for arrangements if submitting video or audio)
• Of a standard of writing, language, presentation, content, etc. acceptable for the BMAF website, and for use in their publications where appropriate
• Describes particular learning experiences and how those influenced you, why the opportunities were of benefit, with linked advice for students and university staff
• Outlines how you hope this experience, knowledge, etc. will enable you to have impact in work and society, or possibly already has
• Contains interesting, thoughtful and constructive discussion
• Appropriate use is made of the format chosen

More information

To learn more about the competition, and about last year’s entries, and to download an Entry Form, visit the BMAF website here . For queries, please contact the BMAF Network office at bmaf@brookes.ac.uk or 01865 485670.

PM David Cameron recently claimed that they were doing “everything possible” to encourage new business start-ups and said: “The future of our economy depends on a new generation of entrepreneurs coming up with ideas, resolving to make them a reality and having the vision to create wealth and jobs”.

Despite this belief, no-one actually knows how many graduate entrepreneurs there really are; official graduate employment numbers do not take into account students who have started their own business. The key statistic used about UK graduates is the Destinations of Leavers of Higher Education (DLHE), published each year by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (Hesa). However, this only  details the number and percentage of students employed full-time and part-time, doing internships or voluntary work  and those who are self-employed or freelance. Most entrepreneurs would come under this last category, but universities are complaining that without a specific category, the work to encourage entrepreneurship is not being represented fairly, especially in those universities specifically focused on developing entrepreneurs.

But, as of yet, no such category exists. This is despite universities doing more and more to encourage  entrepreneurship, with many offering societies and opportunities for both students  and staff. The National Council for Graduate Entrepreneurship recently revealed that student engagement with these opportunities has risen 50% since 2007. The DLHE has also seen a 46% increase in the number of graduates describing themselves as self-employed or freelance.

This could be due to a lack of job opportunities for graduates, or could be a reaction to success stories such as Mark Zuckerburg (the creator of Facebook) and Napster creator Shawn Fanning, plus reality TV shows such as The Apprentice and Dragon’s Den that make starting a business seem a reality rather than just a dream.

Until there are specific statistics, we cannot know how many graduate entrepreneurs there are. However, hopefully in the next few years we can expect a whole host of new inventions and businesses and, perhaps, a boost to the economy.

The report, carried out by the National Foundation for Educational Research on behalf of the government, was a five-year study tracking 8,000 A-level students. It found that a state-educated student with the grades BBB is likely to perform as well in their university degree as an independent or grammar school pupil with AAB.

This research, however, is not the first to show that students from state schools fare better at university. In July of this year another study compared the degree results of privately and state-educated UK students with similar backgrounds  and also found that those from state schools were more likely to get a higher degree.

So why do state school students do better? Researchers have suggested that privately-educated students have much more preparation and help during A-levels and university applications and are being pushed to their limits, in comparison to those at state schools who might not be achieving their full potential.  Therefore, those who get good grades without such help and coaching are likely to have more ability in the first place.

Lee Elliot Major, research director at the Sutton Trust, told The Guardian:  “Independent and grammar school pupils are getting lots of support – they’re being pushed to their limits, whereas with comprehensive pupils they aren’t fulfilling their full potential, and this shows up at degree, where they fly”.

Another possible reason is that pupils in state schools are used to having to work on their own and having less individual attention due to larger class sizes, which are also often part of university life.  When they transfer to university, they are used to the large amount of independent learning and self-discipline required, whereas those who have been continually helped and focused-on in a private education might struggle with having to do it alone.

What do you think about the results of these reports? Do you agree? Let us know your thoughts.

Clegg stated in a letter to the NUS that he was not trying to stop people from protesting, but said ” I do believe the nature of that debate and the language we use, is important if it is not to have consequences that none of us want”. But NUS President Aaron Porter fired back by telling him: “The anger felt at this betrayal is real, justified and desperately disappointing to those who placed in you their hope for a different politics” and that it was “astonishing” to suggest the NUS was contributing to “misinformation”.

Clegg defended the Liberal Democrats u-turn on pledge to freeze tuition fees, saying  “I believe we have played an important role in proposing a new system in line with our fair, progressive values” in a letter he wrote to NUS president Aaron Porter. He also said that people should consider the impact of the new policies on students from poorer families wanting to go to university, and insisted it was “crucial” to understand that there would be no upfront fees and repayments would begin once graduates started earning over £21,000, as opposed to the current £15,000.

However, Clegg’s comments will offer little comfort to students who might be facing a huge increase in tuition fees; the vote is due next month which could allow English universities to almost double the current £3,290 fees to £6000, and even £9000 in some cases. Many students feel that debts from university education are high enough and that increasing fees will put people off from going to university. They believe it will also mean price will become a factor in choosing where to study. Despite Clegg’s protests, research by published on Tuesday by the think tanks million+ and London Economics suggests 60% of students will be worse off under the plans.

The Education at a Glance 2010: OECD Indicators report showed that the unemployment rate among college graduates was between two and four times lower than those workers with only a high school diploma.

The study, which has recently been released, is the latest in an annual series which analyses data amongst its 31 member countries. Researchers used data from 2008 and 2009 and were able to draw conclusions about the impact the economic crisis had on the relationship between education and employment.

Andreas Schleicher, head of the OECD unit that produces the Education at a Glance series said that “In some countries, people with higher education were almost unaffected by the crisis, whereas the crisis really hit hard the people in the lower end of the spectrum,” He then went onto say that in a moment of crisis and in a high-wage economy “people who don’t really live up to those economies’ needs have a really hard time.”

Younger workers were particularly affected.  The unemployment rate among 15 to 29 year olds in Hungary who had a college degree was about 2%, compared with about 12 percent among workers without a high-school diploma. There was also a similar outcome in Ireland where there was a 7% rate of unemployment among college graduates compared with 15% of those without a high school diploma.

Mr Schleicher went on to say that “everyone asks, ‘When is this going to level off? When are we going to see declining returns on better-qualified people?’ And it just hasn’t happened. You can still see, in most countries, those who are better qualified are better off.”

The UK slipped from third highest to fifteenth in the years between 2000 and 2008 with the Russell Group of leading universities in the UK warning further cuts to the higher education system could lead to a “lower division of higher education quality from which it would be difficult to ever recover”.

The OECD also expressed fears that having fewer people with qualifications would lead to long-term economic problems in the UK, as short-term cuts in higher education would also reduce the tax returns of the future.

Steve Smith, president of the universities group Universities UK, is also concerned about the nature of the findings and the cuts, saying: “At a time when many of our competitors are investing in higher education and research as a way out of the recession, we cannot afford to be left behind.”

Universities Minister, David Willetts, believes that the report shows that higher education shows some real challenges which he says the government is “ determined to tackle”. Willetts added that the government had taken action to boost numbers by funding an extra 10,000 places.

However, with the UK now falling behind Poland, Iceland and Slovakia in the list of the proportion of young people graduating, and countries like Australia and New Zealand doing well owing to increased investment in higher education, some people are starting to worry.

Aaron Porter, president of the National Union of Students said: “With the UK already being left behind other countries in its graduation rates and public funding, a double whammy of short-sighted funding cuts and arbitrary limits on student places will make matters far worse in the years ahead.”

This view is echoed by Sally Hunt, head of the UCU lecturer’s union who warns that the governments refusal to fund sufficient places at universities will “come back to haunt us”.

How do you feel about the UK higher education system? Do you think that cut-backs are the wrong answer and the government should be investing for the future? Let us know what you think below.

The study, published by the Higher Education Statistics Agency, found that three of the top performing universities were the University of Surrey (96.9%), Robert Gordon University (95.9%) and the University of Cambridge (95.2%).

One of the reasons for Surrey’s success maybe the practice of encouraging students to take a professional training placement as part of their studies. This usually happens in the third of fourth year. Head of careers at the University of Surrey, Russ Clark said that “Surrey has always been committed to producing employable graduates” and that the university “attracts students who are very focused and have one eye on the world of work”.

The study also seems to show that specialist universities tend to do better when it comes to graduate employment. Institutions such as the Central School of Speech and Drama and the Royal College of Music both performed well with over 98% of students in employment six months after graduation.

The overall statistic for all graduating students in employment after six months is around 89%. This leaves around 10% of students unemployed after six months, up on the figure of 8% from last year. The study follows on the heels of a another recent survey that found that for each graduate job advertised there was an average of seventy applicants, suggesting the market for graduate jobs was becoming incredibly competitive. This may be one of the reasons that specialist schools perform better, as their students are already trained in certain fields rather than broader subjects.

It has also emerged recently that record numbers of students will be applying to universities this summer in the UK, up a massive 11% on last year. This has led to fears that similarly large percentages may be left disappointed by the lack of university places. Government restrictions and funding cuts are being blamed for the shortfall in places.

As the fight for university places and graduate employment becomes more competitive, students are advised that being an organised, hard working and persistent candidate will benefit them in both instances.

The UK is a consistently popular choice for international students, offering a wealth of world-class institutions and some of the most multicultural cities in the world.

UK qualifications are recognised throughout the world for their high standards, opening up a multitude of opportunities for graduates.

As well as providing an invaluable education, the UK can also offer a fantastic lifestyle for students from bustling, cultural urban centres to spectacular countryside and recreation.

This issue of i-studentadvisor is packed with all the information students need to begin their education in the UK, from information on work and student visas through to accommodation, student banking and beyond. This issue also includes a special Business supplement, featuring insights from the UK’s leading business associations and graduates, as well as a look ahead to the future of business studies.

Keep checking i-studentadvisor.com to see our new issues as they are published or subscribe free to get all the latest i-studentadvisor issues direct to your inbox.

If you have any feedback on i-studentadvisor UK 2010, email us at editorial@i-studentadvisor.com or leave a comment.

The Australian government is providing $27.8 million over the next three years towards the construction of the new school, which will allow postgraduate medical students from the Northern Territories to avoid needing to relocate to Adelaide to complete the first two years of their degrees. Aspiring doctors from the Northern Territories will soon be able to study all four years of the course closer to home.

Speaking in Darwin on Friday, Warren Snowdon (Federal Minister for Indigenous, Rural and Regional Health) said:

“If we can (give people greater control of their local hospitals) and along with looking at addressing workforce issues and primary care issues, we will make a significant improvement to the health care of all Australians, but particularly those people in the Northern Territory.

When students train remotely, wherever it is, they’ve had a very good experience as a student and they generally go back and perform better than their city counterparts in the examination context and more and more of them are coming to work in the bush.”

Government officials expect the school to educate around 40 medical students per year, with the first graduates entering the workforce in 2015.

For more information on studying in Australia, read the latest i-studentadvisor Australia guide.