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Thursday 4th February 2021| PALATINATE
News
Chad’s furlough: the college lost around half of its expected income last year Continued from front
responsibility to all its students to ensure that they have equal access to student support. Therefore, we would like to see the University provide financial assistance to Chad’s to
mitigate against the need for the furloughing of support staff, and I have already engaged with the University about this.” Dr Margaret Masson, Principal of St Chad’s College, told Palatinate: “We have partfurloughed or furloughed a number of staff across our teams.
This includes staff who have student support as part of their remit (but not the only part), and in their current working hours, these staff are prioritising student support.” “We do believe that there is sufficient welfare provision for our students; it’s something which we see as very important – and particularly in such difficult times. If we see that the demand is greater than our current capacity, then we will bring staff back out of furlough. We appreciate your concerns that student welfare representatives are not unduly burdened at present, and are checking in with them regularly.”
“There is sufficient welfare provision for our students”
Tom Wright, the college’s Senior Welfare Rep, said: “In terms of demand, we haven’t had an increase in demand so far but I expected it would increase. We continue to do biweekly drop-ins so people can still contact us and it might increase as the summative season continues. In terms of provisions from college, College Support Staff have done an amazing job for us in supporting us and talking to us about any concerns we have in our weekly meetings. I feel confident that
if I, or any of our team, had an issue, that they would be able to support us.” Dr Masson continued: “the University has been very supportive to the College, but we do not need extra financial support from them at this stage. We are being financially prudent, given the significant losses we have sustained over the last year due to Covid-19, and we do believe and trust that, with careful management, and thanks to the generosity of our alumni in our recent fundraising campaigns, we are sustainable in the long-term.” Jeremy Cook, Pro-ViceChancellor (Colleges and Student Experience), said: “We’re working very closely with St Chad’s, and the College has reassured us that the current welfare provision available to students is sufficient to meet demand. As would be expected St Chad’s have reassured us that, if demand changes, they will reassess the situation.”
“We are being financially prudent, and we do believe that we are sustainable in the long term”
The furloughing of staff follows an emergency appeal launched
by the college over the summer where it raised over £90,000, allowing the college to adapt its facilities to create “social bubbles.” The fundraising appeal stated that the college lost around half of its expected income in the last academic year as a result of the pandemic. In terms of the broader adequacy of Durham’s welfare provision in the face of current challenges, Ewan told Palatinate: “Although the University has lots of entry points to student support, we know that there are lots of pressures on staff and services and so would always push for greater funding for student support, especially to match demand during the pandemic. For example, we maintain communications with the Counselling Service who are able to outsource staff this term to match increasing demand which is much welcomed. “ “One issue we do see, however, is that virtual fatigue is leading to a lot of students not accessing the support groups, wellbeing classes, or direct support opportunities on offer. As always, the University needs to better promote its support offer and keep looking at how they can remove any barriers to reaching out.” (Image by Adeline Zhao)
Offer deferrals rose by over 60% in 2020 Patrick Stephens News Editor A Freedom of Information request by Palatinate has revealed that the proportion of undergraduate offers for 2020 entry which were then deferred was over 60% higher than in the previous year. The data refers to applicants who received offers to begin their studies in 2020, and then had their offers deferred so that they would start the following year. 1.8% of applicants had their offers deferred, compared to 1.1% in the previous year and between 1.0% and 1.2% for the three years prior to that. To place that in context, in 2018-19, the last year for which data is available, Durham received over 20,000 applicants for study at undergraduate level. Almost 72% received an offer. Less than 17% of the total applications led to a “registration”, which indicates that they began their studies at Durham. For international students
applying for undergraduate study, the relative increase was larger because fewer international students typically defer their offers. Around 1.4% of international students applying in 2019/20 had offers for 2020 entry deferred, compared to 0.4% in the two previous years. The University does not hold data on how many students requested to defer their offers.
As a proportion of undergraduate applicants, deferrals were 60% higher this year For postgraduate students, deferrals among applicants in 2019/20 were over 70% higher than in 2018/19, with more than 10% of offer holders deferring their applications, compared to 6% in the previous year. Postgraduate applicants can defer only their application, not their offer, which means they are then reconsidered for an offer in competition with the other
applicants in the cycle they have deferred to. Among international postgraduate students, 11.5%
deferred their offers compared to 6.4% in the previous year. Applicants for 2021 entry are permitted to request to defer
(Aubrey Stoll via Flickr) an offer, not just an application, because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
