Latest UK news

PGCE applications up in shortage subjects

There are big increases in numbers applying for postgraduate certificate of education courses in shortage subjects such as maths and science. Statistics from the Graduate Teacher Training Registry show information technology notching up the biggest gains, rising 115 per cent on the same time last year. Physics is up 23 per cent, chemistry 38 per cent, maths 11 per cent and design and technology up 37 per cent.

Tory call to double loan threshold

The Conservatives have challenged the government to double the income threshold for the repayment of student loans and to charge a market rate of interest on repayments. Guildford MP Nick St Aubyn told the House of Commons yesterday that the £10,000 threshold was a deterrent to widening participation.

Ministers rework endowment rules

Ministers today presented the Scottish Parliament’s enterprise and lifelong learning committee with redrafted regulations to ensure that students moving from higher national courses to degrees this autumn will not have to pay into the proposed graduate endowment scheme at the end of their study.

Scots skin cancer risk in genes

Not one genetic factor but two might make Scots more vulnerable to the most serious form of skin cancer. Scots' fair skin makes them more susceptible to malignant melanoma, but Cancer Research Campaign scientists from the University of Edinburgh have shown that errors in people’s genes are also to blame.