Wales has a long and proud history of excellence when it comes to higher education. Our universities are deeply embedded in their communities, and drive growth in local and regional economies. They also act as Wales’s gateway to the wider world.
But the sector is under severe financial pressure, and the percentage of Welsh 18-year-olds choosing to go to university is declining.
As an immediate priority for an incoming Plaid Cymru government, we will commission an independent, comprehensive and sector-wide review of higher education and how it is funded in Wales. The review will build cross-party consensus on a sustainable way forward for our universities.
A key issue for the review will be ensuring that more of the money that the Welsh Government spends on higher education is kept in Wales. We want to encourage more of our young talent to stay in or return to Wales, as well as attracting more people to come to Wales to study and work.
A Plaid Cymru government will review and reform the Seren programme, so that it better supports students to apply to Welsh universities, and targets support at closing the participation gap between students from Wales’s most and least disadvantaged communities.
We will continue to call for Wales’s share of UK research funding to be devolved.
We will also support the joint proposal by Bangor and Aberystwyth Universities to open a new Dental School, and an independent Veterinary School in Aberystwyth.