Lost for Words

[Adasta]

Having expended five hundred quids worth of words on a fifty pence argument...We are essentially agreeing violently on the issue that student loans are not enough to sustain life.

Yes.

 

[vernon]

With half of school leavers going on to university these days the difference between free education funded by the taxpayer and education paid for through student loans is in the former the half that didn't go to university are paying through their taxes to subsidise the half that did. Is that right?

This is best explored in the Politics and Life forum.

I'm sure that it will have a long and active life of its own over there >>>>>>>>

 

[funnymummy]

My eldest son is still undecided on whether to go to Uni or not, has has always been an A student, on the G&T programme at middle & senior school, was told he was potential OxBridge material when he started college.
As a single mum I have struggled to support him, I didn't want him to get a PT job as i felt he should be able to concentrate on his studies, sadly that became no longer viable last year & he took a job, his studies did suffer as a result.
He has several options open to him, but the one thing he is certain of is that he does not want to spend the next decade paying off a debt, that he may as well forgoe Uni, get a lower paid job but start his 'adult' life debt free!
I am sad that my son may miss out on Uni & the experiences he would also gain from it, but I can totaly understand why he is thinking this way.

Oh..thought I would add
He is a Tory, he is studying polictics, he is also a Member (youth) Parliament representing Adur/East Worthing, and on the local council.

 

[Red Light]

This is best explored in the Politics and Life forum.

I'm sure that it will have a long and active life of its own over there >>>>>>>>

Well either this whole thread should be over there >>>>>>>>
or my post was valid here in this thread.

So do you think its right that the half that don't go to uni should subsidise the half that do?

 

[Andy in Sig]

My eldest son is still undecided on whether to go to Uni or not, has has always been an A student, on the G&T programme at middle & senior school, was told he was potential OxBridge material when he started college.
As a single mum I have struggled to support him, I didn't want him to get a PT job as i felt he should be able to concentrate on his studies, sadly that became no longer viable last year & he took a job, his studies did suffer as a result.
He has several options open to him, but the one thing he is certain of is that he does not want to spend the next decade paying off a debt, that he may as well forgoe Uni, get a lower paid job but start his 'adult' life debt free!
I am sad that my son may miss out on Uni & the experiences he would also gain from it, but I can totaly understand why he is thinking this way.

Oh..thought I would add
He is a Tory, he is studying polictics, he is also a Member (youth) Parliament representing Adur/East Worthing, and on the local council.

He sounds like a sensible lad in opting to work. As a society we somehow seem to have come to the view that as many kids as possible should go to university. It is possibly preferable for kids to get jobs, work for a while and let them come to the decision whether or not to study when they are ready which will inevitably mean when they are a bit more mature. I went to university at 18 (and was able to enjoy a full grant in those days) and while it was generally fun and interesting, I tend to think that on the whole it was a bit of a waste of time or at best a time filler. With 20:20 hindsight it would have been better to have started work at 18, gain a bit of experience and also save a bit of money and then either go to university at around 26 or do a part time course while still working.

By that age I would have worked out where my interests really lay and also what subject would have been best suited to my further career development.

 

[funnymummy]

. It is possibly preferable for kids to get jobs, work for a while and let them come to the decision whether or not to study when they are ready which will inevitably mean when they are a bit more mature. I went to university at 18 (and was able to enjoy a full grant in those days) and while it was generally fun and interesting, I tend to think that on the whole it was a bit of a waste of time or at best a time filler. With 20:20 hindsight it would have been better to have started work at 18, gain a bit of experience and also save a bit of money and then either go to university at around 26 or do a part time course while still working.

By that age I would have worked out where my interests really lay and also what subject would have been best suited to my further career development.

It's what I did!
I didn't even go to college - I got a job in a factory on a YTS -anyone remember them?
Some of my friends sneered at the time..Within 6 weeks of training I was put onto the factory floor & was paid 'piecework' earning £150 a week (this is 25yrs ago!!) I then went to evening classes doing the same subjects as friends were doing during the day - They stopped sneering then
I got a part-time job in a pub at 18, was earmarked as potential management & through that I was sent on a variety of courses, accountancy, business management, catering/chef courses to name a few - By the time I was 21 I had my own pub, earning great money while some of my friends where still struggling at Uni.

I look back on my younger years & have no regrets, but I was never a great academic like my son (I have no idae where he gets his mega-brains from!)
Oh.. But I did go to college/ do a uni course - eventually, At 30 decided I wanted a whole career change