First off, a university degree, to some respects, has become a diluted qualification. With university so accepted as 'what to do after school,' the real case for university seems to have become lost. I know plenty of people who went to university simply because they 'weren't ready to get a job' or wanted to 'put off (my) life for another three years.' These should never be reasons to go to university and benefit nobody. I think some people need to ask themselves if university is where they really need to go to advance their knowledge or career pathways in the future. Obviously, I don't mean doctors, lawyers, courses that fundamentally require a university education. Nor do I mean people who have made all of these considerations and still feel university is their plan.
I know many of you might be thinking, "Fuck you Tom, you do Creative Writing, there's a real concrete course that can guarantee you a job in the future." Yeah, I get what you mean, but I took 3 years out after leaving school, two of those practicing and qualifying in youth work, which I can go back to if I am not successful in writing. I also feel I learned general life skills that many people who go straight from school to university miss out on. I also began paying tax and contributing to the economy, which went towards funding students through university, including my own.
It's worth pointing out that if you apply for a middle-income job, for example as a supervisor in a supermarket, with your 2.2 in business management, compared with the kid thats worked there since s/he was 16, it's not going to be a one horse race. Especially when considering your lack of experience in the world of work. This is becoming the case, more and more.
Approximately 7% of all first year students drop out leaving them saddled with a substantial debt and nothing to show for it. The breakdown is HERE if you don't believe me and I know it's from 05/06 but if anything the figures have gone up. I think if people really do think that university is where they see their future, then they need to be absolutely sure that the course they enroll on is the right choice. You are aware you can with take a few years out to assess your options, right? And no, going on holiday to 'find yourself' on a beach in Thailand doesn't count.
Fair enough, going from a fairly comfortable wage to scratching a living at university is hard but If that's where you see you're future then you have to take that gamble. And come on, you've just spent the last 14 years in education, don't you want to try something new for a bit? With the fees for tuition set to rise in 2012/13, if you know you will be coming out of university with a minimum of £27,000 debt you need to assess whether or not it's worth the hit. After all that debt, and delaying your life for three years, is your 3rd class honors in Sports Science ultimately going to make a difference to your life or career prospects?
I think that there needs to be a much bigger emphasis in schools that university is not the be all and end all. In my high school we were pretty much told that only thing waiting for us after our GCSE/A-Levels was university. While we were given glimpses of apprenticeships, college, foundation courses, open university degrees, these were all considered as soft options by our teachers. All of these are possible ways to further you're knowledge without getting yourself into such debt.
So with the tuition fees rising, how can a student pay this loan back? Well, it is also possible to get paid employment while in university and you can earn up to £6,000 per year UNTAXED as a student. Obviously there are living costs but you can start to put aside what you owe while still in university. I know that you are at university for education, NOT work and don't suggest that students should distract from their studies entirely. There is plenty of bar, restaurant and retail work in student cities in which it is possible to earn a living and concentrate on a university course.
Bursaries and grants are apparently in place to help people from the poorest backgrounds but nearly all of my classmates receive a bursary, and most spend it on a few more nights out or flash new sound systems. It is possible to live on budgets for three years but most of the students I know are the most financially fickle people I've ever met. While university is about having a good time, most importantly it's about getting an education.
Many people seem to a be a little confused about the debt that they will get into under the new system (see the gentlemen from the "slums of London" in Part 1). When people are saying, 'how can we afford it?' Well you don't, you get loans like everyone always has done and hopefully by the time you have finished university you will have a job that pays a good enough salary for you to begin to pay it back. I mean, that was the point of going to university, right? To get a good job? And it's only when you begin to earn over £21,000 per year that they begin to take their money back, I think it works out about £80 a month. Those who think that purposefully trying to earn just under the threshold so as not to begin paying the money back show a complete lack of ambition in life.
While it might seem like an intimidating black cloud of debt to a lot of people, how many people under the old system considered debt as a factor before going to university? Debt was still an issue but you rarely hear anyone complain about the old system. Also, it's not commercial debt, as in, if you don't pay it back on time, bailiffs will be round to your house taking your television. It's not the same as the debt students consistently get themselves into when, despite all of free state money they receive in loans, grants and bursaries they max out overdrafts on two or three debit cards. That IS debt and the bankers can ask for that back tomorrow if they felt like it and then bailiffs will be round to your (or more likely, your parents) house to take back your stuff.
The cuts to EMA are a contentious issue as well. I was never really sold on EMA as I feel the 'means based' structure seems to factor in people who shouldn't entitled to it. Just because you have divorced parents doesn't mean you need more money. Many of the middle-class people I know with divorced parents get more money from their parents than people who have parents that are still married. It's my personal opinion that guilt has something to do with this. I find the means-based method a fairly inaccurate way of defining how much a person gets, but that's a separate issue entirely. If I'm that arsed, maybe I'll go on a march.
EMA also seems to be an incentive to continue in education. If you need to bribed with money to stay in school, then you don't consider education as a prerogative and therefore can have no say with regards to tuition fees rising. You can say, I need my EMA, I don't live with my parents. If you're under 18, living independently, you can get a government allowance, similar to job seekers allowance. If you are living with your parents and they can't afford to support you financially, then THEY can get government funding to support you. And if you're still not happy with ten quid your mum gives you a week, then get a job. Many retail and hospitality industries employ people as young as 14. Some may prefer to, as they can pay them less (but still a government defined 'minimum wage').
I can however, completely agree that even with grants, bursaries, part time jobs etc, the amount of debt that a young person will leave university with, looks daunting, especially to people from the poorest families in Britain. It was pointed out the me that the businesses who benefited from the boom in spending during the early years of the millennium continue to grow economically, even in this time of budget cuts. With this in mind, I think that businesses should be encouraged to help those in their community. Similar to tax free charitable donations, I feel that sending young people from the poorest backgrounds to university, whether it is with accommodation or tuition fees, should be pushed on businesses.
Let the arguing commence...
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