Universities tell students: You’ll lose your place if you defer

TOP universities are preventing students from deferring places in an effort to avoid half-empty courses and a drastic drop in tuition fee income.

As new research reveals that more than 40 per cent of sixthformers are considering deferring until 2021, universities including Oxford and Edinburgh have told teenagers they will have to start their degrees this autumn or lose their places.

The move means those with offers will be forced to enrol on £9,250-a-year degree courses at a time when Covid-19 restrictions may result in online lectures, little or no face-to-face teaching and limited contact with staff and other students.

Those who refuse to start in September will have to apply again in 2021, running the risk of being rejected. Critics said colleges were effectively holding applicants hostage, forcing them to pay full fees for a vastly inferior service.

Oxford is ‘expecting to welcome a full cohort of new undergraduates in October 2020, so wil l not r outi nel y s upport requests for deferral’. Edinburgh said deferrals ‘will be limited’.

Cambridge has advised students to ‘commence their studies as planned’ and that only deferral requests ‘unrelated to the pandemic’ will be considered. Sussex University said: ‘If your reason for deferring is linked to the current global pandemic, we’d encourage you to hold on to your offer for now.’ The London School of Economics has decided not to let applicants for postgraduate courses defer in 2020.

Research by Leicester University found 41 per cent of UK students are considering deferring until 2021. Professor Alan Smithers, of Buckingham University, said: ‘Lectures online, little contact with staff and a restricted campus is such a limited university experience that deferral should be an option.’

‘Applicants effectively being held hostage’