Tuition fees- Value for money?

DrFluffy

ceewash wrote: »

As a parent of a student who has just started a degree course I have been amazed at how much free time he has. He has a two week timetable and if you put the two weeks together they would not make one. What are we paying for? £3000 a year it is costing for him to sit around getting bored. That is £18000 over three years. These are clever people who need more than this. It seems like a scam to me. The whole course could be completed much quicker. Are there any students/parents out there who agree?

Don't confuse non-time tabled time for "free time"... Your child should be using this time to study. You can't spoon feed every fact to a student - part of a degree is taking on responsibility for your own learning and personal and professional development...

Personally, given the true cost of an education, I think £3k a year is a bargain! It would be nicer if it was free, that is true, but just think what might happen in 2010 when the fees cap comes off and uni's could charge the full £12-22k a year for the course in question...

Is he doing maths?

DrFluffy

Sigur wrote: »

For each hour of lectures he receives he's meant to do 2 hours reading and research. How realistic is that? Probably not very.

I honestly wish I had the time to do 2 hours of SDL for every hour of contact time! At the moment, I'm in the hospital from 8am-6pm, get home for 7pm/7.30pm, work til 11pm, have an hour of 'chilling time', go to sleep, get up at 5.45am... I'm knackered!

Swings and roundabouts I guess!

PasturesNew

I went to a Uni Open Day (mature student) the other week and found out about fees/grants etc. And I'd not get anything special or any bursaries. And I was surprised to find out that I could "earn" £14,000 a year by taking the student loan and working in the holidays (temping) without working term-time at all.

I thought that, compared to how much you earn going to work full-time it was worth it to be able to come out and get access to a career rather than just "doing a job".

In my experience, people in a job can hope and pray that at the end of their working lives, they're scraping £15-17k/year. But as a graduate (who can just present well at interview and apply for graduate jobs) the starting salary is that, so it's well worth any investment.

For the record, I didn't sign up for a degree, they shunted me across to another bloke and told me "you don't want a degree, it'd be silly for you. You need a masters degree" so I am doing one of those instead. No grants for those, I just pay for everything myself. I'm sure it will open doors for me in the future.

An education is an investment in your future. Not a cost. And like any investment you have to look at everything: the person, the subject, the future earnings potential with the piece of paper, location, access to suitable jobs upon completion ... and drive/determination ... who you know (not just what you know) and LUCK!

welf_man

A University took you on to a postgraduate course without a degree??? Do you have alternative qualifications? I've never heard of this before so woul be interested to know a bit more.

Mel.

welf_man

surfsister wrote:

thanks dd going for York anyone heard about this one?

I work at York SU! What course is she applying for?

Mel.

DrFluffy

welf_man wrote: »

A University took you on to a postgraduate course without a degree??? Do you have alternative qualifications? I've never heard of this before so woul be interested to know a bit more.

Mel.

You're assuming the poster doesn't have a first degree already...

studentphil

As silly as it sounds MSc and other PG stuff at 3300 fees a year is great value considering an UG costs the same now. To be frank I can see why more and more people don't bother with UG degrees, do 3-5 years experience and come in for a masters at 22- 25 as you can save yourself 6000 that way.

welf_man

DrFluffy wrote: »

You're assuming the poster doesn't have a first degree already...

The OP says

For the record, I didn't sign up for a degree, they shunted me across to another bloke and told me "you don't want a degree, it'd be silly for you. You need a masters degree" so I am doing one of those instead

which I read as not already having one, yes. I'm still interested in what experience you need to get on to a Masters course withou a first degre, as I'm often asked if this is possible and have always thought it wasn't!

Mel.

DrFluffy

She went for a degree... No mention of first degree...

There are a fair few of us on here who are currently undertaking 2nd undergrad degrees...

melancholly

well i know you can do an MBA without a first degree - you just need lots of experience (and lots of money usually, if you're not being sponsored!).

if it helps anyone complaining about fees, most universities are struggling to turn a profit at the moment.... they're not making huge amounts of money and laughing! they get money from the government due to their research profile, but then also money from students for the teaching - getting pulled in two directions at the same time isn't much fun and makes for a pressurised environment (what happened to the post RAE deadline relaxation?!).

to get your money's-worth out of university, you can use the careers service and student support, often after you have graduated for a number of years. go to the extra courses often offered on 'life skills', and IT skills and study skills. sign up to some heavily subsidised extra courses in learning a foreign language. use office hours of staff.... hardly anyone does and the one on one time is priceless to help do well. use the library and online facilities to get references rather than just using the ones in lecture notes. there's a lot of stuff on offer, but only for those to make the effort to use it.

on a separate note, most university counselling services are really overworked, which is quite sad. they are usually, however, full of helpful and supportive staff who can make a real difference. i had to wait to use them when i was an undergrad, but i can't explain the huge difference it made. a lot of people struggle in the first semester, so it's their busiest time - don't give up.