Growing UK University Tuition Fee's

killerpeaty

Hello Russel,

In regards to your question, there are options for your son. My friend did a studentship at a council, she has no student debt and earns a good wage for someone starting out. It is definitely worth your son to ring around councils to see whether this is possible for him. Also the studentships can also be advertised on the council sites, so check on those.

In terms of a traditional uni course, I would suggest looking at the location of the university as well as rankings. In my opinion, my friends who have done the best (relative to ability) are those who have been happiest.

There have been problems with apprenticeships, when your son looks into this have him make sure that he gets the appropriate training and work experience. I have no personal experience of this, my knowledge is cobbled together from the news, documentaries and http://apprenticeships.org.uk/ this site.

I obviously don't know your son, but if he is interested in accountancy, many firms recruit trainees straight from A-levels. I know this happens with other industries as well but I can't recall another one off the top of my head.

Lastly I have to say, I have loved university despite the unfortunate incidents that happened in my private life. Throwing myself into the university routine has helped me to gain confidence and work on my inter-personal skills so I honestly would do it all again. If your son chooses the university route, then I'm sure he'll love it.

wantsajob

Pupnik wrote: »

What is far more important than the university is the student - not everyone is cut out for uni, you do need to have the right mindset as you get out of it what you put in. Should I ever have children I will be looking at their university options on a case by case basis to determine whether university is right for them or not.

I think there's still a valuable life experience for them in going and failing/dropping out. Also, how do you think they will feel if you give one an opportunity you don't give to the other, on your say so?

To be fair, if parents are minimum wage earners and genuinely hard up, ultimately it will be the offspring who fund University. Maybe if they recognise they're going to pay for it themselves in their wages later and see how much it costs, they'll put more effort into successfully completing it, than had their parents just thrown money here there and everywhere.

I wonder how many parents earn a relatively good wage but splurge their earnings on a big mortgage, 60" 3d TV, and nice car etc? Then later find out what they earn means they need to pay for their offspring's education and living costs whilst at University, then suddenly it's more an inconvenience and burden.

TrickyWicky

Russel245 wrote: »

I are being forced to consider his options as to whether it is viable for him to still go to university or not.

You sound like my controlling parent who was always making my life decisions for me.

Want some honest advice? Let your kid get on with it. Student loans don't have to be repaid until you're earning something like £25k so if you screw it up and drop out the odds of having to worry about repayments are low = debt not a problem.

You're putting too much pressure on the kid with all this debt worry stuff. Stop piling on the pressure and making his decisions for him. His future is not your decision.

Pupnik

wantsajob wrote: »

I think there's still a valuable life experience for them in going and failing/dropping out. Also, how do you think they will feel if you give one an opportunity you don't give to the other, on your say so?

Well I disagree about valuable life experience in failing, not unless they do other things during their time there that make it worth it. My brother is failing his degree, he has already had to repeat a year - I always knew he would not be great on a degree course because he can't manage his own workload, 'self initiated study' means nothing to him, if he is lucky he will get a third but he is still going to have thousands of pounds of debt. He - just like everyone, will have plenty of opportunity for character building failure during the rest of his life without the chance of building up so much debt so early on just for the misguided belief that a degree will lead to a job.

They can feel what they want to feel, I wouldn't force anyone to do anything but as I am one of the thousands and thousands of people in this country who went to university just because it seemed like the thing to do and everyone else in my year was going I wish I had felt like I had more options at the time rather than seeing university as the only option and falling for the idea that non-university going people were dropouts in some way. I wish I had gone later as a mature student when I had more direction, I got a lot more out of my MSc which I did in my late 20s than I did out of my undergrad because I approached it in an entirely different way. If people don't feel strongly about getting a university education at age 17/18 then I'd say don't bother, they can always put it off and do it when they are older and have a good idea of what they want to do with their life - surely better than going for the sake of going? If they are passionate about a particular subject or have a career in mind already then fine, that's different.

thatlemming

If you need advice about uni, send your son over to thestudentroom please, most of the posts in this thread are utter rubbish, and if you post there you'll hear from people who are actually at uni at the moment.

Savvy_Sue

Dunroamin wrote: »

Let your son do the research and explain the funding situation to you and then let him make his own decisions, with financial issues well down the list of priorities.

Absolutely agree.

heretolearn wrote: »

I'm fingers crossed going to do a masters when I finish my degree and I'm looking closely at Goldsmiths.

I don't think of Goldsmiths as even an ex-poly: in my day it was a teacher training and arts college ... however I know where you're coming from: you will find more than one university in many places, and working out how they're offering what they're offering can be interesting.

So, moving on: it is worth taking a brief look both at the history of a university, and its geography, and considering what will suit the potential student. And it's the student who should do the research and make the decisions.

saintjammyswine

Depending on the subject, contact your local FE College who may offer level 4 & 5 qualifications (degree level). Many now do as add ons for example in Health & Social Care, Engineering & Construction and others. You will find the fees are much lower than Universities.

Russel245

FATBALLZ wrote: »

Studying abroad might be worth a look, I believe you can get a degree in the EU (taught in English) at a decent Uni for fees in the £100s, rather than the £10,000s you would measure the cost in here. Learning a new language and the initiative to go abroad would look v good on a CV too.

The tuition fee situation is a !!!! take, so whatever he does make sure it leads onto a good career. My brother is applying for Music degree courses... he can play the guitar a bit, like 1 million others. Waste of time.

Never really consider a foreign move. Will pass it on

podperson

Does your son have an idea of what he wants to do for a career - obviously for some careers university study is fairly essential, for others work experience or an apprenticeship could be a viable alternative route.
Also, how does he feel about attending university - for a lot of young people the experience can be just as valuable as the qualification - meeting new people, gaining independence, managing on their own etc.
If he is actually wanting to go then please don't let the costs affect that - there is a lot of help for people from lower income families. He should be able to get a loan which will pay his fees and give him an amount to live on as well as possibly a grant for the year - he won't need to start paying any of that back until he is on a decent wage (I think it's around 24k now).

Savvy_Sue

Another point worth making is that if it's possible to earn some money before university, this comes in very handy later! Especially if the job can be transferred (eg some supermarkets will let you transfer to a different branch for term times), or if you're studying locally.

All my sons worked for the local cinema (small independent) in 6th form, it is a brilliant job at that age! Youngest is studying locally so still works there. Middle son used his savings to fund the 'fun' parts of university life, and his loan / grant for the boring stuff like food.

It's also handy when you fail to apply for your loan before the deadline, and only realise when everyone else's is dropping into their bank account and yours isn't.

I know the job scene isn't easy, but rather than getting all doom and gloom about the costs of university, think what can be done to help the situation.