Veterinary Students In Serious Financial Difficulty
18 years ago
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Posted
6th February, 2006 00h00
According to a recent survey the percentage of final year veterinary students who consider themselves to be in serious financial difficulties has risen from 19.9% to 37.7% in just six years. The level of student debt now also shows a marked difference between students at English universities and those at the Scottish ones. The increase in debt for first degree students over the last six years has increased from between 100% to 300% in the former, compared with between 2% and 36% in the latter. For students studying at the English universities, the introduction of the £3,000 tuition fees in the 2006/07 academic year will mean average debts increasing to £30,000 on graduation.
In view of the difficulties faced by many students in gaining a university place increasing numbers of students are taking another degree first in order to access the course. But for these second-degree students and overseas students the average debt of a fifth-year is now over £68,000, up from just under £25,000 in 1999.
Pointing out that almost 1 in 4 (24.2%) students had stated that their level of debt upon graduation would have a large effect on their choice of job, British Veterinary Association (BVA) President Dr Freda Scott-Park stressed the implications for rural practices already desperately attempting to recruit. “The BVA calls again”, she said, “for Government to extend the relaxation of tuition fees already given to medics and dentists to the fourth, fifth and, for Cambridge, sixth years of the veterinary undergraduate course. The extra mural studies that veterinary students have to undertake seriously restricts their ability to finance their study via part-time work. As we have said before, at the very least we feel some sort of relief should be given to those graduates who enter into rural area practice.”
Alexis Holley, President of the Association of Veterinary Students also stressed this point. “A huge concern is how rising debts will influence the choice of job for many graduates. 47.8% of students say that their debt will encourage them to work with small animals in order to earn a better salary. This will exacerbate the problem of decreasing farm vets in the country.
“The level of increasing debt in vet students is definitely a worry and could easily get out of hand especially as it has generally been underestimated by students applying to vet school and in the earlier part of the course. So many students have wanted to be a vet for most of their lives and worked so hard towards getting there. It is such a shame that in some circumstances, money might get in the way of that. Something needs to be done!”
Other points of interest in the survey include:
- The percentage of veterinary students who are female continues to increase. In 2005 76% of the students were female, compared to 69% in 1999 and 73.2% in 2002;
- The average debt faced by a fifth year first-degree student has increased significantly over the last three years, with a rise from £7,964 in 2002 to £17,236.51; and
- There has been a significant shift in the composition of the student population when looking at the two Scottish universities, who are taking increasing numbers of second-degree and overseas students. This is particularly noteworthy when compared with the four English universities as the treatment of fees differs. The survey shows that the tuition fees have not just had an impact on the students, but also on the universities themselves.
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