MPs call for higher repayment threshold
MPs on the cross-party education select committee have told higher education minister Baroness Blackstone that the government should consider raising the earnings threshold at which students start to repay loans above the present £10,000.
The minister said that all students could expect to earn about a fifth more than non-graduates, so that higher education is an investment in their future.
Musician quits Glasgow rector race
Norman Blake, lead singer with the rock band Teenage Fanclub, today pulled out of the race for Glasgow University rector. The other nominees are Stuart Murdoch, lead singer in Belle and Sebastian, Greg Hempill and Karen Dunbar of TV’s comedy programme Chewin’ The Fat , and author Alasdair Gray.
Blunkett's war on waffle
Education and employment secretary David Blunkett callled for a war on “waffle” today. He told a regional development conference in Wakefield that there was a tendency for initiatives to be met by “mindblowing, boring avalanches” of paperwork. He urged cities, districts, agencies, universities and colleges to “bury the hatchet” and work together.