The rise of the not-so-silent partner

What do parents have to say about the lecturers' pay dispute? Quite a lot now that they are paying for their offspring's education, says Harriet Swain

Amid student protests, union defiance and employer threats over the pay dispute, one partner in the higher education relationship has been a significant but, until recently, more silent presence - parents.

Their role was acknowledged in the Association of University Teachers' "important message to university students and their parents from the academic trade unions" issued at the beginning of the dispute. Their influence has also been recognised by universities such as Edinburgh, which offers on its website guidance for students that "may also be of interest to parents and others outside the university community concerned about the possible impact of this action".

In theory, this partner should have little to do with a dispute between lecturers and the institutions at which their adult offspring are studying.

But when you consider that they are often the ones paying the tuition-fee bills that caused the dispute in the first place, it is small wonder that they are taking such an interest.

Universities UK reports receiving a handful of letters from parents worried that their son or daughter may fail to graduate. "Of course parents are concerned," says a UUK spokeswoman. "We know that because our members are talking to their students and their students' families." She says headlines predicting meltdown of the sector have not been helpful, and UUK advises parents to check what is happening at individual institutions.

Meanwhile, institutions also report receiving a number of letters and calls from parents, as do the Universities and Colleges Employers' Association and the AUT.

David Garner, press officer at York University, says callers to his institution have asked what kind of contingency plans are in place to ensure exams and marking go ahead. "Certainly the media coverage has suggested that an awful lot of students might fall foul of this dispute and not graduate, and parents as well as students have invested a lot of time and money in three years of higher education," he says. "Clearly they are worried."

No side has enlisted parents to its cause, however, because it is rarely certain where their sympathies lie. A Ucea spokesman says some letters have expressed support, some not, and most have been critical of all parties involved. He says they tend to be along the lines of "this is not what my offspring signed up for, get it sorted".

Students are also unwilling to appear to be running to mum and dad at the first sign of trouble. Gaston Dolle, president of Bristol University's student union, who led protests against the industrial action, insists that the onus is on students to take action. But others recognise that parents have a vested interest - and a use. "You can get embarrassing parent syndrome, where parents want to intervene even when you don't want them to," says Irfan Zaman, president of Liverpool University's Guild of Students. "But here it's actually something you want parents to intervene in because you feel you are not being listened to."

The true extent of parental involvement in all this may not become clear for a few months, once the slow processes of appeals and legal actions have begun. Mike Reddy, deputy adjudicator and chief executive of the Office of the Independent Adjudicator, says the OIA is bracing itself for an increased workload in about six months' time when students will have exhausted internal complaints procedures at their universities. "We have had quite a few inquiries from students and student unions asking about the situation, and clearly it's likely that we will see quite a few complaints," he says.

Parents are responsible for a little under 5 per cent of the complaints received by the OIA every year, usually connected to the degree mark awarded. "Sometimes the students have moved on and it is the parents who don't let go," he says.

Jaswinder Gill, education specialist at the legal firm Ormerods, says many parents fund legal actions in cases where their student children are not entitled to public funding. "I have dealt with a lot of cases where I have had mum and dad with their son or daughter sitting in my office saying that, whatever the cost, they want to see justice."

He has advised those who inquire about the possibility of taking legal action related to the dispute to wait and build up a more detailed picture of ways in which it has caused them to suffer over time.

There is also the possibility that the dispute could have a long-term impact on parents' relationship with institutions in another way, if it is taken into account in weighing up the pros and cons of their children going to a particular university, or even going to university at all.

Once, if your child was offered a university place, deciding whether it was best for him or her to take it was relatively straightforward. While a few parents felt their child should be earning at 18 rather than frittering away time in an ivory tower, at least they knew they would have to cover just living expenses - and even then only if they could afford it. And if they took a longer-term view it was clear that companies would be queuing up to offer their offspring, one of a privileged elite, a well-paid job immediately after they graduated.

The decision has become progressively more complicated over the years.

First, parents had to fork out more for living costs, or their children had to take on debts as the maintenance grant was reduced and replaced by access to a loan. Then tuition fees were introduced, and as the higher education sector has expanded, students have found that securing a well-paid graduate job is no longer a given.

Robin Naylor, professor of economics at Warwick University, has researched rates of return of higher education. He says the choice of degree subject and institution has become increasingly important in determining the financial benefits to students once they graduate, as has the class of degree they achieve.

Moreover, as he sector has expanded, undergraduates have become less likely to complete their degrees. Research carried out by John Bynner for the Higher Education Funding Council for England just before fees were brought in found that those who dropped out of university were more likely to be out of a job and more likely to be depressed in their 30s than those with A levels who had not been to university in the first place.

While Bynner has not carried out follow-up research, he says the expectation was that the fee regime would exacerbate these findings.

So now not only do parents have to make a larger investment in their children's higher education, they also have to make sure it is the right investment. If their child chooses the wrong course, institution or subject, or comes away without a good degree classification, or with no degree at all, they could end up a lot poorer and a lot less happy.

Hence their concern over the threat the pay dispute poses to assessment and final exams. And hence the reason why parents have become so much more involved throughout the university careers of their offspring. Anthony Keeble, senior administrative officer at Reading University, which produces a parents' guide and offers departmental talks for parents, says they not only routinely attend open days with their children but also sometimes even without them.

Parents' guides and special open-day sessions have become increasingly common, which can only be a good thing, according to Ormond Simpson, senior lecturer in institutional research at the Open University's Institute of Educational Technology. He has interviewed groups of students identified as potential dropouts and found that those least likely to drop out were those with the strongest local support networks. Asked to list their sources of support when doing a degree, they put family and friends first. "That's when I thought we really ought to be trying to enhance family support,"

Simpson says. He adds that universities should be tapping into parents not as customers but as sources of help in their children's education, and as future sources of funding. "If their sons and daughters have a good experience, then I would have thought that some would be happy to support fundraising activities," he says.

This will become even more important with the extra investment that top-up fees demand, he adds. When his younger daughter starts university next year, he will be looking carefully to see what he, and his daughter, get for their money. "If you look at the hourly rate of university lecturers, then £3,000 should buy something of the order of ten hours' tuition work for 30 weeks in groups of ten," he says. "I will be looking to see if my daughter is getting anything like that."

No doubt other parents will be making the same calculations as they flock in increasing numbers to university open days this month - just so long as these open days haven't been cancelled by industrial action.