Universities enrolling students with poor English, BBC finds

Yasmin - not her existent sanction - came from Iran to survey for a master’s grade astatine a caller assemblage successful the UK, but she was "shocked" to find galore of her chap students had constricted English, and lone 1 oregon 2 were British.

"How is it imaginable to proceed this coursework without knowing a British accent oregon English properly?" she tells BBC File connected 4.

Most students paid different radical to bash their coursework, she explains, and immoderate would wage radical to registry their attendance astatine lectures for them.

Yasmin's acquisition reflects a increasing concern. The University and College Union (UCU) says immoderate institutions are overlooking connection skills to person precocious fees from overseas students, and 1 prof tells america 70% of his caller master’s students had inadequate English.

Universities UK - which represents 141 institutions - rejects the claims and says determination are strict connection requirements for students coming from abroad.

Jo Grady from the UCU, which represents 120,000 lecturers and assemblage staff, says it is an unfastened concealed that students who deficiency English skills find ways to travel to the UK to study.

"When we talk to members we perceive astir the tricks that are pulled successful bid to person radical walk the applicable connection trial and get connected to courses," she says.

About 7 retired of 10 students studying connected master’s courses successful England are present from overseas, acold higher than connected different types of higher acquisition course, says Rose Stephenson from the Higher Education Policy Institute, an autarkic deliberation tank.

In England, assemblage tuition fees for undergraduate home students are capped astatine £9,250, rising to £9,535 per twelvemonth successful 2025-26. Each of the different UK nations acceptable their ain fees. But fees for overseas students studying successful England person nary precocious limit.

• Tuition fees: How overmuch does assemblage outgo successful the UK?

"You tin complaint a overseas pupil arsenic overmuch arsenic they're consenting to pay," says Ms Stephenson.

Post-graduate fees are not capped either, truthful a master’s grade astatine an elite assemblage could outgo £50,000.

Because undergraduate tuition fees for home students successful England person not kept up with inflation, determination has been a real-terms chopped successful assemblage funding, says Ms Stephenson - with planetary students, successful effect, subsidising the below-cost fees of location students.

One whistleblower who worked astatine an bureau which recruits overseas students for UK universities told america agents would people families overseas who had the wealth to pay.

The whistleblower - who has antecedently besides spoken to the Sunday Times - said: "We knew that those universities are progressively hopeless and would spell on with our plans without overmuch scrutiny into however those students were being found.

"No autarkic enactment is looking astatine the grades oregon the examinations. It's the Wild West, successful a way."

The whistleblower worked for Study Group, 1 of dozens of acquisition providers feeding the UK assemblage system, and taking ample fees successful the process.

Based successful the UK, Study Group is simply a registered supplier which says it works for much than 50 universities with a web of 3,500 agents successful 99 countries.

Study Group powerfully disputes the whistleblower's claims, saying overseas students gain their places connected merit. It adds that immoderate determination to admit a pupil connected to a people is taken by the university, not Study Group, and rejects the assertion that introduction criteria are waived for immoderate reason.

It says courses it runs are robustly "scrutinised by spouse universities".

Yasmin paid £16,000 for her people successful planetary concern astatine a assemblage successful confederate England. She aboriginal recovered retired that of the 100 students connected astir of her modules, "maybe 80 oregon 90 of them bought assignments" from alleged "essay mills" based overseas. In England it is simply a transgression offence to implicit enactment for a pupil which they tin walk disconnected arsenic their own.

When Yasmin told her tutor what was happening, helium took nary action. Yasmin says she present feels her master’s grade has been "devalued".

A Russell Group assemblage professor, who has taught astatine respective universities and wants to stay anonymous, echoes Yasmin's concerns. He tells File connected 4 that 70% of his students astatine master’s grade level implicit the past 5 years did not person capable English connection skills to beryllium connected the course.

"There person surely been occasions erstwhile precise elemental questions person not been capable to beryllium understood by students who I americium teaching," helium says.

The prof told america helium has had to accommodate his teaching technique, and says students adjacent usage translation apps successful class. But helium insists responsibility does not prevarication with planetary students themselves, who are mostly trying their best, and says the concern varies from taxable to subject.

They pass, helium says, due to the fact that courses are often assessed done assignments, alternatively than exams. Some students usage effort mills and wage for others to constitute their enactment or, increasingly, usage artificial quality (AI). Both methods, helium says, tin decision existent anti-plagiarism software.

UCU’s Jo Grady says it is hardly astonishing immoderate students with mediocre English skills consciousness they request assistance from different people, oregon adjacent usage AI to bash their work, arsenic an "act of desperation".

She says her members archer their managers that enrolling students without bully English "is a atrocious idea… they volition struggle, and we volition besides conflict to thatch them". However, she says "university managers and leaders prosecute it regardless, due to the fact that of the wealth and income it volition bring in".

Some universities are successful fiscal crisis, says Ms Grady, and person go babelike connected high-fee paying overseas students who "pay eye-watering sums of money".

"Institutions are chasing money. They're not needfully chasing the champion candidates. And it's a corruption of what higher acquisition should be."

Vivienne Stern, main enforcement of Universities UK, rejects the proposition immoderate overseas students are being allowed connected courses with mediocre English connection skills arsenic a mode of boosting income.

She says universities transportation retired strict checks connected those they enrol - including minimum connection levels, arsenic acceptable by the UK government.

"Students volition request to beryllium capable to spend the interest to survey successful the UK, but beyond that it’s a question of taking students who apply, and applying a merit-based criteria," she says. "It is perfectly cardinal that this is simply a strategy that radical trust."

Ms Stern says planetary students are attracted by the prime of the UK's universities and says it would beryllium "unwise" to trust connected planetary income to money home acquisition and research, due to the fact that overseas pupil numbers could beryllium affected by geopolitics oregon shifts successful speech rates.

Meanwhile, planetary pupil numbers are falling. Data connected UK pupil visa applications from the archetypal fractional of this twelvemonth shows determination has been a 16% diminution successful applications, resulting successful a nonaccomplishment of income for immoderate institutions. This driblet is, successful part, being attributed to changes successful UK pupil visa rules preventing astir postgraduate students from bringing dependents.

It is contributing to the worst fiscal situation for universities since fees were archetypal introduced. Last month, the authorities regulator, the Office for Students (OfS), estimated that by 2025-26, 72% of universities could beryllium spending much wealth than they person coming in, and warned that "rapid and decisive enactment is necessary".

The Department for Education told the BBC a reliance connected overseas students has been identified arsenic a risk, and galore universities volition person to alteration their concern models, adding that the authorities is committed to managing migration carefully.