UK higher education is caught in a “fortuitous trap” and will keep using international fees to plug financial shortfalls until a crash forces universities to face up to the challenges they face, a sector leader has warned.
Shitij Kapur, president of King’s College London, said the surge in international student flows post-pandemic had helped the UK put off fighting political battles over the need for more funding for higher education, but this was a “dangerous” path.
“What worries me is we are not properly funding what are the legitimate needs of the next generation in the UK,” Professor Kapur, who returned to the UK from Australia to take over the running of the highly ranked institution in 2021, told the International Higher Education Forum.
“We’ve fallen into a very fortuitous trap. I call it fortuitous because it is fortunate, a trap because that is exactly what it is.
