Operational Real Estate Expert, Consultant, Speaker, Podcast Host. Talk to me about PBSA, BTR, Coliving, ESG & AI. Founder of RESI Consultancy, Good Management and Co-host of Housed
This is VERY interesting! Students at Russell Group of Universities are less satisfied with their university experience than at other universities... How much does accommodation affordability play a part? Times Higher Education has recently published it's 2024 Student Satisfaction Survey. The results should ring alarm bells for unviersities and local authorities with falling satisfaction and rising rents. The University of Sheffield is the highest scoring RG university. It's also one of the cheapest for accommodation because Sheffield City Council opened the floodgates to PBSA developers around 5 years ago. I look down this list and these are ALL universities where the cost of student accommodation in particular is reasonable compared to the likes of Bristol, Exeter, Durham, Edinburgh and Glasgow which are way down the list of student satisfaction and have the highest rents in the UK. Some notable cities where there is reasonably affordable PBSA stock include: Lincoln (# 1), Plymouth, Liverpool, Wrexham, Sunderland, Sheffield, London (outskirts), Cardiff, Aberystwyth. #pbsa #intled #studentaccommodation #highered #studenthousing #studentsatisfaction #housing #students
Alan Preece
3mo
This seems a bit of a stretch of cause and correlation. The NatWest Student Living Index 2023 tells us that Cardiff, Newcastle, Manchester, Leeds, Birmingham and Oxford (all RG locations) are in the top ten most affordable student cities. It even says Newcastle is the cheapest for rent. I'd suggest two things: 1. Some universities have got pretty good at optimising their return on the NSS. Anybody who has sat in an institution knows there are ways of doing this and if you want to go up the Complete University Guide it is one lever to pull. Another reminder of the perverse and distorting impact of league tables and rankings. In this case the propensity of the Times Higher Education to turn everything into a league table offers the usual aggregation of data that is of no use to a student trying to find a university that suits them. 2. It is possible that RG universities feel less need to support their students and/or that their students have higher expectations. I can imagine the howls of protest as I write this and there isn't enough space to outline the rationale but it's at least as plausible as the accommodation cost theory.
Daniel Radnor
3mo
Thanks Dan Smith. Very intersting, however, do you have a theory regarding the variances between 2 universities in the same city? For example Liverpool Hope which is 5th and Liverpool John Moores at 26th, and presumably the University of Liverpool further down the table? Surely the students have the same accommodation costs (apart from the uni owned/operated halls of residence of course)?
Daniel Capewell
3mo
Great to see The University of Sheffield performing so well
Interesting view
Tim Jones
3mo
Dan Smith I worked in HE for many years and have spent a lot of time trying to understand the subtleties of the NSS. I’d say it’s nothing at all to do with accommodation though. HE has become commoditised and from my experience the students are only really interested in the degree classification they believe they have purchased. How the staff are with the students makes a big difference, but if they get the result they want they will forgive most things. I think (without any personal experience, but a lot of conversations with students) that one of the reasons the Russell Group Uiniversities don’t always do well in student satisfaction is because some of the staff are living in the past and are not pandering to the needs of the students. I’ve heard lots of reports of students not knowing when they will get their marks, partly because of strike action, but also because there are no boundaries or KPI’s set for academics. Where I worked we had a 3 week turn around. Having said all of the above, it does appear pretty random as the students don’t appear to understand the context of the questions. Whole thing needs a re-think, as does the sector. My advice, don’t waste time trying to understand the NSS. Just give a damn good experience
Nelson C.
3mo
Thank you Dan. Interesting points. Looking at the 27 questions of NSS and the 7 themes are focused on teaching quality, learning opportunities, assessment and feedback, support, organisation of course, resources and student voice. Also value for money has increased in the HEPI survey data too.HEPI annual survey data does indicate cost of living is #1 reason students drop out of university. Unclear how cost of living or housing comes into play for NSS?
Aditya Babbar
3mo
Interesting Read this Dan ! I know these are Student Surveys and fairly good at capturing the Student's thoughts and experiences. I am not sure about this but if there is a parallel to this in terms of Accreditation of these Universities, that would be a good indicator. Like for example, in India, all HEIs end up get accreditated using a criteria laid down by NAAC. Student Housing ( which falls under Infrastructure and Learning Resources) has 10% weightage, annually.
But they all qualify for a AA*** With Distinction at these % 🤣
Operational Real Estate Expert, Consultant, Speaker, Podcast Host. Talk to me about PBSA, BTR, Coliving, ESG & AI. Founder of RESI Consultancy, Good Management and Co-host of Housed
3moOK - so taking Liverpool as an example in terms of the rankings on this list if you average out the costs of university accommodation (either their own or nominated) then the order follows the list. The more expensive the accommodation, the lower the satisfaction. Maybe this is primarily to do with the first year choices where students typically rely on universities to book their accommodation. If the university only has options over £160 as per Liverpool then this will undoubtedly impact student satisfaction.