Labour's pledge to lower the cap on tuition fees to £6,000 would benefit the richest graduates most, according to an analysis by a thinktank

AQA research shows students with lower A-levels from poorer schools do just as well as pupils from 'favourable circumstances'

Over the weekend, Ed Miliband said that Labour would cap tuition fees at £6,000 instead of £9,000 – quite a turn-up for the books, since he opposed the hike in fees last year. "This is a step towards a graduate tax," a Labour source told the Guardian's Nicholas Watt. "We would like to go further, but we can only do what is affordable."

MORE than eight in 10 primary school children are in classes that are bigger than the EU average. And it is expected to get worse after the next Budget. Latest figures show that 86pc of primary pupils are in classes of 20 or more, with one in five in classes of more than 30.

Three Swedish universities, which had placed job advertisements requiring certain applications to be filed in English, are now being told to change their approach after a recent decision that gives a primary role to the national language.

University students take on any summer job just to earn money rather than seek work experience in a career they are interested in, according to new research today.

There are three clear lines of attack on the government's higher education reforms that I have seen, not least on the pages of Education Guardian. The first claim is that we are removing the public subsidy for higher education. The second is that we are explicitly seeking to copy the US system of higher education. And the third claim is that we are reductionists who value arts and humanities less than sciences.

The custom of sons following their fathers to the same Oxbridge college has spread to institutions across the country. But what were the universities like for earlier generations?

How much will it cost in fees to study full-time at university from 2012? And will it be money well spent? Most readers of The Independent will know that the figure in most cases will probably be something less than £9,000 a year and that the most sensible answer to the second question is probably "it depends". It will also be evident that without a clear answer to the first question, it is difficult to answer the second.

American University in Cairo accused of excessive fee hikes, mismanagement, staff exploitation and pro-Mubarak regime bias