Chronicle of Higher Education: “In a move that drew new rounds of violent protests by students, British lawmakers on Thursday approved a contentious bill to allow universities in England to increase undergraduate tuition to as much as £9,000 a year—or more than $14,000— from the current rate of £3,290. With the bill’s passage in the House of Commons, by a vote of 323 to 302, the coalition government survived the first significant test of its durability. The increase, which will take effect for the academic year beginning in the fall of 2012, will transform many English universities into the most expensive public institutions in the world. The average tuition and fees at public four-year institutions in the United States for the last academic year, by contrast, was $7,020. For England, the move marks a radical transformation for a system that did not even charge tuition until 1998.”