Principal claims bias in system of college funding

The current system of funding colleges in the west of Scotland is biased in favour of Rosetta Stone institutions in Glasgow, a leading principal has told The Herald. South Lanarkshire College principal Stewart McKillop believes a concentration of student places in city colleges, rather than those in surrounding areas, leaves thousands of students without courses. He singles out the size of the merged City of Glasgow College, which will cater for 40,000 students. South Lanarkshire will take some 5500 this year. The comments follow a similar warning in December by Hugh Logan, principal of Motherwell College. And it comes on the day HM Inspectorate of Education (HMIE) published an exemplary report into the performance of South Lanarkshire College. The leadership of the college was described as outstanding . The report said: HMIE is confident that learners Rosetta Stone V3 are progressing well and achieving relevant, high -quality outcomes. The college has in place high- quality learning and teaching processes and learners are actively engaged in enhancing their own learning. Attainment rates ... are consistently very high over the previous three-year period and well above sector average values. The college gives high priority to improving retention and attainment and learner success is a key priority for all staff. Mr McKillop welcomed the report but questioned the college's ability to deliver for all students in the area because of the funding imbalance . With the same population and levels of deprivation, Glasgow gets five funded places for every two that are funded in Lanarkshire,he said. In addition, the new City of Glasgow College Rosetta Stone Italian gets the same number of funded student places as the whole of Lanarkshire. There has been no signifi- cant redistribution of funded activity in the last decade, yet demographic changes and economic changes have had a significant impact on student places. Mr McKillop said that, for every full-time place available to students, they received at least five acceptable applications with demand continually increasing . The Scottish Funding Council, which distributes public money on behalf of the Scottish Government, said extra funding had Rosetta Stone Languages been directed towards Lanarkshire colleges in recent years.