Lengthy government security procedures in the UK create disruption in the research process of postgraduates and PhD students. Due to lengthy procedures, doctorate students go elsewhere causing damage to university research.
According to Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office guidelines the process of security checking shouldn’t take more than 30 working days. According to reports of Russel group, they complete a survey on 1,450 students and staff in UK universities where the Academic Technology Approval Scheme (Atas) took 53 working days to complete the procedure on a average.
In one case a postgraduation student forcefully waited up to six months for getting the approval. This way most of the funded students go elsewhere for their research instead of the UK or postponed their arrival for months due to this.
Because of the delay in the security check by ATAS several students from the university of manchester take their studentships to other countries. Because of this, the universities have to face major disruption in research and industry sponsorships generation also became harder.
According to Tim Bradshaw, chief executive of the Russell Group the lengthy security check process became a huge problem over time. “undermining vital research and putting off some of the most talented people from around the world” said Dr Bradshaw.
He also added that the UK is always been a magnet for talented persons so government should take this matter seriously and try to bring this process within a steam line. The security check process should be clear, efficient and properly resourced.
The students also have to face lots of problems during the verification. There is a huge communication gap between the adviser and the applicants causing unwanted trouble to the applicants(who do not have English as their primary language). This causes more delays in the process. Sir Peter Mathieson, principal of the University of Edinburgh, also criticises ATAS strongly.
The government of the UK should take the fact seriously and overhaul communications to applicants to reduce confusion, this way duplicate applications can also be identified easily and unnecessary delays can also be prevented in the process of verification, Russell Group said.
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