UNIVERSITY chiefs in Chester have reduced tuition fees only weeks before the deadline for applications is due.
The cost for undergraduates attending the University of Chester has been lowered to £8,000 per year, down from the £9,000 first proposed in April.
Chester joins 24 other institutions across the country who have agreed to lower their fees in return for a guarantee they will be able to take on extra students.
The plans were approved by the Office for Fair Access only weeks before the application deadline for 2012, meaning hundreds of people who have applied for places at Chester could find their fees have changed.
Vice chancellor, Prof Tim Wheeler, said they had taken the decision to slash fees because they recognised the “challenges” facing the UK economy.
He said: “The university has considered the shifts in government higher education policy and the changing demands made on universities, all within the context of increasing uncertainty about the challenges facing the UK economy.
“Under the new arrangements, a full-time undergraduate honours student will pay less and those from lower income backgrounds will qualify for more generous fee waivers over the three years of their degree programmes.”
For example, students who qualify for the National Scholarship Programme will secure a fee waiver of £4,000 in total, compared with £3,000 originally. Students who qualify for the university’s other schemes will secure a fee waiver of £1,500, an additional £500 per eligible student during the course of their degree.
“Because of its increasing popularity, the University of Chester is already heavily over subscribed and estimates that it will have nine applicants per place for the next academic year,” added Mr Wheeler.
More than one fifth of universities are seeking to change tuition fees.