Pounds 22.4m cash bonus

THERE were winners and losers this week as the Higher Education Funding Council for England confirmed universities' shares of a Pounds 22.4 million grant for access.

Some institutions scooped more than Pounds 1 million extra while others got nothing. The council received 184 bids from universities, colleges of higher education and further education institutions providing higher education courses.

HEFCE confirmed the extra cash as part of its final recurrent grant allocations for 1998-99. The biggest single winner was the Open University which received Pounds 3.4 million for 2,200 extra students. It will spend it on expanding new technology and moving further towards open learning.

Others such as the University of Plymouth did well considering their relatively small size. Plymouth receives nearly Pounds 1.3 million for an additional 300 full-time undergraduate places, 215 undergraduate part-timers and 18 part-time postgraduates.

Durham University's extra Pounds 907,952 is welcome support for its new Stockton campus. It will provide for 250 full-time and 50 part-time places, and help start up courses in applied psychology and business finance.

At the other end of the spectrum Sussex University put in two individual bids for extra places but got nothing. The University of East London also bid and received nothing. Goldsmiths College was turned down for additional funded numbers for new undergraduate degree provision.

The London Institute receives Pounds 489,609, the biggest single grant to a specialist institution. Newcastle College receives Pounds 231,200, the single largest amount of any further education college. The money will create around 100 extra HND places in music and performing arts.

Table of allocations, page 6