[HeinzStuckeIt]

Your post is very naive. In the UK, some universities are so dependent now on foreign students paying high fees to break even, that it has been widely reported in the media. And in a few EU countries, polytechnics have been upgraded to university status (at least in their English-language names) in order to attract fee-paying students from the developing world. Finnish polytechnics, for example, run whole marketing campaigns in the Indian Subcontinent in order to get people to come and pay those sweet, sweet foreign-student fees.

[ecshafer]

Are Polytechnics not considered universities in Europe? RPI (Rensalear Polytechnic Institute) or CalPoly (California Polytechnic Institute) for example in the US are just normal universities, usually with more of a technical, engineering focused. But they are essentially the same "level" as a university.

[HeinzStuckeIt]

In Finland, the institutions that now call themselves “Universities of Applied Science” in English for marketing reasons, are still known in Finnish as ammatikorkeakoulu “tertiary professional-training institutions” and this is a rung below actual universities (yliopisto) in terms of both quality of education and social prestige.

[pjc50]

The UK collapsed the poly/uni distinction thirty or so years ago, as it was seen as a source of class discrimination.

[Enk1du]

> The Further and Higher Education Act 1992 (c. 13) made changes in the funding and administration of further education and higher education [0]

It was more about reducing budgets. That Conservative government was not filled with class warriors. Oh, how times have changed.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Further_and_Higher_Education_A...

[graemep]

Really? That was the motive?

It actually made it a lot worse if anything.

[j45]

It's surprising because so many countries have taken billions from international students, mostly from one country, and is now blaming the the students for having parted with their money.

[graemep]

British universities do the same marketing. Seen it there.

The problem in the UK has been ridiculous the expansion of universities. if we shut at least half of them down, reduced some of the others in size, there would be a lot more money for the rest.

AI teaching is the opposite of what the best universities do, which is things like small group tutorials on top of face to face lectures.

[j45]

Too many universities and colleges seem to love opening buildings to name them.

AI might be a threat because it can't take up as many buildings as students?

[graemep]

They often get donations in return for naming buildings after people. They can name other things after people instead - organisations with the university.