The holy grail of university education.

Running_Horse

absolutebounder wrote: »

Define middle class

http://www.businessballs.com/demographicsclassifications.htm

Rikki

studentphil wrote: »

I wouldn't go to univ to get 21 000 in debt and I doubt many families can afford to pay their kids through univ debt free. You might as well work and then do PG later for 3k.

You were lucky enough to start at university before the introduction of tuition fees. You also lived at home and were supported by you parents.

Tuition fees are a fact of life now and many students attend universities away from thier homes.

Are you saying it was a waste of time you going to university and if you had to pay you wouldn't have gone?

SmileBeHappy

Ah Phil, you're determined to pick holes in what i say

Yes i do have middle class friends, and i consider myself so. I do not consider myself 'better' but statistically more middle class people go to uni. I am not saying they are cleverer, i have no facts to prove it, but i would suggest they WANT to go more.

Interestingly, i read an article that said more Asian and Black teenagers when asked had a greater desire to go to uni than white teenagers. Just a random fact i read.

University is £££... I will come out with a pretty hefty £20k+ debt, although to me not a debt, it is acceptable, you don't pay bk much a month and its reasonable for what i am gaining.

And to me middle class is defined on:

- Income
- How you spend what you have
- Job
- Values
- Education/qualifications
- Leisure (holidays etc)

musical_norwich

People don't realise how important where you go to University is.

I got a starred-first class degree from a real, but not overly prestigious, university (i.e. not a former polytechnic or technical college) and my department was rated 5** in the RAE (international excellence - the highest you can get) with average student A Levels of AAB. Yet hardly any of my fellow students got onto grad programmes. Little more in terms of career events than disinterested employers (like the Army) sitting in the former sports hall twice per year and most of the jobs on offer were in supermarkets.

Did postgrad at Cambridge. Every student I met expected and got a decent job, and the head of the careers service claimed he was embarrassed by the fact that he had more graduate jobs than graduates. Didn't matter whether you did a useful course of not. Three employer events every night of every term - keen to recruit, and the BBC, Goldman Sachs and the Diplomatic Service rather than cannon fodder seekers. Very few Cambridge degrees are remotely 'vocational'.

If you have a degree from a world-class institution like Oxbridge, or the LSE where Martin studied, it will always be a good investment, in any subject. I'd say the difference in terms of career opportunities between these universities (add in Imperial College, King's, Edinburgh, UCL, etc.) and the rest is stark. Though of course there are degrees which are exceptional in their own right, like medicine.

TNG

studentphil wrote: »

You see this all the time with baby bonds and savings acounts for kids that you must save towards their "Uni" education. Or parents of 6 year olds saying they aim for their kids to go to "uni". It seems puzzling why all other modes of achievement and education are placed secondary to this thing that "Uni" is a must for so many.

It just sounds better than "I'm saving to support his crack habit", phil.......;)

Morglin

anewman wrote: »

A middle class person is one who has a job someone without qualifications could never hope to get. Wage is not necessarily an indicator. I think there's an official list somewhere.

So yes, in my opinion defined by the type of the job you have as a result of the qualifications. If you have lots of qualifications, but a job anyone without those qualifications could get, you're still working class. I'm the latter type.

But, you can be working class (as I was and am), and GET the qualifications to get the job, as I did, that supposedly made me "middle class" (which it didn't..........I was born working class and I will die working class, thanks lol).

Lin

[Deleted User]

Morglin - why do you care about your perceived class? It's pure and utter bűllshit really

The barriers to education and jobs have gone everyone. Hell, they've been lowered for the last 30 decades.

Morglin

ringo_24601 wrote: »

Morglin - why do you care about your perceived class? It's pure and utter bűllshit really

The barriers to education and jobs have gone everyone. Hell, they've been lowered for the last 30 decades.

I was answering a post about class - but I think there is something of a class system, although not as before the war.

Lin

conradmum

anewman wrote: »

You make it sound like the debt is choice :rolleyes:

I'm sure you know it isn't though

Students of parents on low incomes do have a choice. They can work part time and take out a smaller loan or they can not work and take out a bigger loan. They get a grant too. That's what I meant when I said they can take out a full loan if they want to.

lxpeanut

studentphil wrote: »

I see, so all that shows is that univ. is mainly for middle class people and has nothing to with intelligence which is equal through all classes.

I'm distinctly working class and so were most of my friends at Uni. But then I went before fees and while there was still some grant available maybe its changed now. I can out of uni with large amounts of debt if I had to go back to the beginging and do it all again now I'm not so sure that I'd be going.