£60,000 for a degree

southoftheriver

dmg24 wrote: »

I don't understand why people get into masses of debt in order to get a degree. Bonkers.

I may be having a moment, but what is masses of debt? I am just over £30,000 in debt with a year to go on my degree. But I have been at uni 7 years. Couldn't have even entertained the idea of doing a degree without this debt. I don't actually mind paying for my education either, it's a small price to pay for having a better standard of living than my parents.

ThinkingOfLinking

Well DMG, I'll be a mature student (25+), and I'm also teetotal and vegetarian. I don't smoke, I don't like takeaways, I don't like Topshop, I hate clubbing, so I'm not being frivolous with the loan money. I'm also trying to save up some money to fund my MA. And at the end of my degree(s), I'll be in a better position to earn money. I'm currently working part time for a little over minimum wage alongside my course so I can afford the books I need. Given that two of them cost over £50 each, I'll let you hazard a guess at where a lot of my money goes.
I don't have parents to fund me either, so without the SLC, I wouldn't be able to access education. Not all debts are "bad" debts and this is actually the cheapest debt most people will ever accrue. Furthermore, there are tonnes of people on the DFW boards here, having run up more than £30,000 of debts, all on things like holidays, cars, clothes, and whilst I'm not judging them, at least my debts are productive and I'll really have something to show at the end of the next few years.

ahai1

Flickering Ember you seem to have yourself sorted but the thing is that a lot of people in my uni came via clearing because they applied late which meant that nothing was ready for them on time.

I agree that certain people do need the loans from the SLC and that kind of stuff but than there are certain people who think it magically appears from the sky.

devildog

Angelic, agree with most of what you say however, exactly what help do you think should be made available to people with certain backgrounds?(and what are the certain backgrounds you mean?)
Those with low income parents get plenty of help as it is with grants and bursaries, families on middle(average?) income get little to no help and the students of these families leave uni with debts of around 30K, yet, in theory the students from lower income families should(if very careful) leave uni with little more than tuition fee loans only.
Where is the fairness? They both leave with a degree so why should one be saddled with a debt possibly 3 times more than the other?
The system does need to be made fairer, but by that I do not mean that more money should be given to students from lower income families, it should be balanced so that all students leave uni with a comparitive level of debt(based on tuition fee/maintenance fees(and not personal type loans for clothes/beer/parties etc)

ahai1

It is not only those degrees that are expensive as the Met Film School charges £19,500 per year for a 2 year degree. The AA charges something £10,000 a year for a 4 year degree. Also note Richmond does not do science or health related degree so that is a urban myth.

olly300 wrote: »

So how people suppose to pay their tuition fees if they are parents who aren't wealthy and do a scientific, technology, engineering or health course where the course taught and lab/clinical hours are equivalent to working full time?

devildog

I agree that those parents with "good" wages can afford to help their student children but there are those that earn average/middle income wages who according to Student Finance are not required to contribute to their childs costs however that same child gets little to no grant, no bursary and a huge loan for both tuition fees and living costs-how is that fair?
I agree that students from high earning families get all the help from their families and in theory should have no loans to repay(and shouldn't be entitled to more) those from low income families get Gov help in the form of grants and bursaries so in theory would have a loan for tuition fees, those in the middle sector get no bursaries, the tiniest of grants, and therefore need maintance loans as well as the tuition fee loans so just which group is the worst off??
Somehow(and I don't quite know how) the system does need to be fairer, middle income families are definitely the losers here.

ahai1

My parents were not well off but I did not get into debt.

We have in this country a mentality amongst the working classes where they rely on the state for things like student support when they should be using their own resources.

The_One_Who

As a student who received a bursary/grant, I would be more than happy to take a loan in its place if grants were stopped. No means-tested system will ever be fair, there will always be someone just over the cut-off point who loses out.

Students need to realise the true costs of a university education and be incredibly grateful they get it for the incredibly low price they do. It's unsustainable and will need to go up sooner or later.

ahai1

You are right and it is good to see someone who realises that it can't continue.

I think that Harvard costs $200,000 over 4 years for any subject.