Why raising tuition fees for university in the uk is bad!

Lending more money to students isnt going to work politically or economically, why?

At the moment we lend students around 10 000 to 16 000 pounds to go to uni but thats going to go up to a possible 40 000 pounds.
What does that mean?

Yesterday I was talking to a friend of mine that just finished his degree (a year ago) ; he is very against the tuition fees going up for the next generation of young school leavers.
However he did say: "I dont mind paying mine back for the rest of my life 'cos uni was the best days of my life, and Ill always remember them'.

This friend of mine is working for a chain supermarket and moving up the ranks quite well, something that he clearly could have done
without a degree: and we actually know this for a fact, because his friend that lives up north started working at the same supermarket after his A levels (at 18) with no degree and is already one step further up the chain of command than my friend who worked there during his degree part time and for nearly a year since.

What am I getting at? When young people are told to go to uni because 'they need to'; 'to be able to earn more' but are then given loans to do so, their reaction is like my friends' (most of them actually): to go wild; party hard, not go to uni (ie skive off) drink, binge drink, smoke, and take harder drugs.

In other words: 'If im going to be paying for this for the rest of my life then Im going to have a bloody good time while Im here'.

Unfortunately skiving, taking drugs and having fun at raves doesn't always lend towards good graduation results!!
Instead, what you do find, is people quitting at the end of their first year, and then (maybe) trying again a
year later (thats 2 loans: at the moment 6000 pounds in the near future up to a staggering 18000)

If you are shouting NO this would never happen! then let me tell you: I have a friend who is 28
and has failed the first year 3 times! He has a large amount of debt and is currently unemployed, because he loved dj'ing drum and bass and partying a bit too much. When he was young he was a member of mensa with a huge IQ, he had a great upbringing and really should have been the type of young person to succeed in his choice of engineering.
Unfortunately everytime he went back to uni the loan came and the partying started.

If I know a number of people who did this; in my relatively small friendship group. How many must be doing this country wide??

OK so I hear you say: his fault, he was lazy: so to hell with him and the rest of them.
Hmmmm, Ok, but what about his debt?
He's not planning to get a job in a hurry: he's become so depressed and apathetic because he's got lots of debt but no degree, and as a result he is most likely not going to pay his back, specially as its going up exponentially while he doesnt pay it, and hes a smoker and so likely to die young having not payed it all [or any] off: He is already nearly 30 and he hasnt had many jobs! Really not many!! So whats going to change?

Maybe he will turn it all around and get an NVQ2 and get a reasonable job as a trades man (something he should have perhaps been encouraged to do in the first place) and start paying it back: and maybe he'll live to be 90 and the cancer won't come who knows? heres hoping.

So what of students that do less classic subjects like drama, film, surf science, etc etc etc (there are so many).

By raising the amount of 18 year old school leavers that wanted and could get a place at uni to near 50% during their time in power New Labour basked in the s**tshine of their success saying wow look what weve done!!! Everyones getting a higher education even the lower middle classes!! WOW. WELL DONE. Now the job market in the UK is saturated with graduates with Desmonds (2:2's) in senseless degrees who cant get a gradute job and end up working their way up in a job they could have got without a degree. like my first friend I mentioned.

So, if a large amount of graduates are coming out of uni in almost exactly the same position that they went in, only with huge amounts of debt this clearly shows that the goverment got it WRONG.

Solution: raise tuition fees?
Why raise tuition fees?

In some ways the only choice the conservatives have got is to put tuition fees up.

WHY?
To PUT YOUNG British people OFF going to uni, YES; That is what this is really about.
Half the population of 6th form leavers dont need a degree and the education system is wrong to tell them that they do.

If you put fees up and put kiddies off going to uni, you force them to look for different life avenues. OK then...

Shouldn't tptb be doing this through education????
Isnt the first 18 years of your life long enough for your teachers and parents to spend the time and care getting to know you in order to be able to advise you well on your choices?

Our government vomited out the idea that we should PUSH PUSH PUSH our kids in to UNI: for what??
Shouldn't the government work harder at helping industry and business to raise the amounts of apprentiships available to record levels?

Shouldn't governments work on changing our schools to better raise, inform and prepare young people to make wise choices when they are 16 and 18 instead of encouraging teachers to throw a UCAS form at them, while they passionately day dream of a nice bottle of Rioja from the supermarket that the same poor kid will end up in when he gets his worthless degree (after a high education spent getting high: no doubt, because they've got to make the bloody most of it for that money, dont they?!).

Now the conservatives are slyly forcing a coalition government (of which half of the parties (libdem) were (apparently) completely against) in to raising tuition fees to unprecedented levels in order to fix the problem: in a (I must add) very naughty and underhand, sly dog, kind of way.

And what does it actually mean?
Well there arent many apprentiships to go round cos there hasn't been a drive to create more 'different' opportunities, and because of the lapse immigration laws (well done again labour) the disenfranchised (lower classes) youth who decide not to go to uni cos they dont think they'll be able to handle the debt, also find themselfes in a competitive job market in which the 'lesser' more 'meager' jobs ares still hard to get!!! And the mediumly rubbish jobs are all being taken up by the saturation of graduates with crazy 2:2's that dont know how to, or even want to use their degrees to try and get good jobs.

So when young people cant afford houses or to start families, when the middle class graduates spend longer working boring jobs to pay off debts they shouldnt have bothered getting: You'll find that the population of Britain will get OLDER.
If the young dont have houses or families they wont create more young, and our population will age.
Pensions? No way!! who is going to pay for them!? Young people are OUR COUNTRIES (and yours) future, if our young arent educated and pampered a little: given a good start in life then the number of them that succeeds in life goes DOWN.
When the amount of young people leading successful lives goes down and our population ages: shtf.

When we lend more and more money to apathetic youngsters who come out with partied degrees: REMEMBER: that money had to come from somewhere!! When these young people dont get a job and go on benefits, or get jobs below the pay back bracket and dont pay back their loans: shtf.

Mistakes are being made in the UK, the kids know it. Not all the Adults do.

Hope you made it through. thanks for reading.

If this is in the wrong section please move it, I searshed where the other threads about the protests where and it was this forum so I posted it here buy if belongs in off topic rant or whatever please move it. thanks.

Great post. Kids are being priced out of a decent education, and it makes me sick. You can't put a price on the future of the country.

It's madness, pure madness. I fully support any course of action the students take (barring murder/attacking people ect fighting the police back doesn't count as that) Sometimes something IS worth fighting for.

Since when is it the responsibility of any government to pay for college?

In days of old only the brightest of the poor received tuition help. Now everyone feels he has the right to a free degree. If you have to pay your own way, the odds are you will try harder.

I agree, violence is not something any of us would ever encourage or promote and yet you have to feel a certain amount of pride towards our young people for feeling so strongly about their education: their and our futures.

reply to post by samkent


In days of old in England EVERYONE got their degree payed for, this only changed in the year 2000 my friend: when Fees where introduced and Grants abolished. Anyone over the age of 29 had their degree for free, FUNNY how its this age group of people that mainly call students 'bludgers' . I couldn't disagree with you more. sorry

The problem with paying for a whole bunch of people to go to school with the extorted funds of others eventually becoming top-heavy and unsustainable aside.......

going to college because it's just what you're supposed to do is seriously screwing everyone over. There are more law students graduating in a given year than there are jobs available. So what happens to all of these new lawyers? They become cheap rate ambulance chasers or go grab a generic MBA and manage a department store or work sales.

This need for college that people have trumped up is saturating the market with useless graduates. Graduates who have degrees that are a lesser quality than that same degree 10 years ago because the universities had to start rushing students through to deal with the volume.

College is a ridiculous scam. Big Uni is right up there with Big Pharma, Big Banks, and Big Gov as far as con jobs go.

Everyone needed to go to college is like the "Everyone must own a home" crock that set the foundation for government encouragement of bad loans and people's ideas that they were somehow entitled which in the end screwed everybody on the plant. College is another messed up bubble inflated by false promises, government encouragement and financial scamming.

As it is even Harvard and Yale are hardly better than state schools. Your grandfathers Yale isnt your fathers Yale and the only part of our peers time at Yale that has anything at all in common with the university that gained world recognition is the name. The cost has quadrupled and the quality has sunk to public High School level.

Just like having the gov pay for healthcare hits a wall when more people consume than pay in the concept of the college education hits a wall when too many people have degrees. Employers used to see a degree and hire you on the spot. In the past 5 years employers are taking experience over education at exponential rates. They dont want some conceited douche-bag with a piece of paper who just stepped out into the real world. They want a guy who has a record of getting the job done who will continue to get the job done.

The college degree has all but lost its value entirely. The next step for the college grad is mockery at wasted years and wasted money.

Unless your desire for a college education is wholly intrinsic avoid it at all costs. Have your drunken anonymous sex in high school where it doesnt cost you anything then pick up a trade.

Why don't students in the USA riot? Community college is double digit thousands of dollars here. "Real" colleges you're going to spend 50 grand plus in loans.

I'm 19 and have aound almost 8 grand in federal student loans already.

For 30 yrs parents have been told that unless your child goes to uni, they wont do well in jobs or get financial rewards. So the push for children to go to uni has been paramount for parents and believing the practise of enhancing their child's quota in life. The reality is that the jobs are not out there for them.There are many graduates in Britain that have not ever got the jobs they intended to get throught their education. They are straddled with a loan they maybe have never been able to pay back fully. Now lets take foreign students. They also use our system and graduate in the uni's. They get assistances with their fees.
Uni's are now so full in sept they turn children away. They also have to abide by quota's on ethnic, social backgrounds, monetary finances and abilities. For the main, most students get a government grant. Where does this money come from and what finanial return does it make? How many loans do you think get payed back? It can only be paid back if the student is in a viable and finacialy rewarding job. If they are on benefits due to unemployment, who pays the 20 thousand they borrowed? We are not talking one or two students, we are talking millions over the last 30 yrs. (foreign and british).

reply to post by thisguyrighthere


Exactly my point reiterated brilliantly. thanks for the reply

And sussy above: totally correct.

You can't put a price on the future of the country.

Yes you can. It’s done all the time and it’s not that hard.

What was the earning potential of Bill Gates in 1990?
What is the earning potential of a Cashier at the Foodmart?

Some people are worth more to society than others. You just have to put aside your emotions and look at the facts.

In the states some colleges are fighting tooth and nail for every student. You see tv ads running on every channel. But most of these colleges are nothing more than degree mills. They create 2 year degrees on anything popular. Most of them are worthless in the real world. Next year (I think), the government is going to require actual job results from the graduating students. That way the incoming students will know that 2 year degree in CSI is worthless to the local police departments.

reply to post by Lagrimas
A very good post but you miss the whole point. Look back at history before the industrial revolution. I know you'll think it does'nt have anything to do with today but bear with me. Back then we were ruled by aristocrats and big land owners. That was because the mass of people worked for said people or worked servicing those workers. The tenet being keep em ignorant control em. The industrial revolution came along and gave the working class somewhere else to work but it made a new minor aristocracy in mill owner and mine owners. This did not change till after WW2 when men had fought for the country and decided they wanted a better deal from the country hence the unions were enabled. This being the only way a working man could get a better deal. This worked through the good times of the 60s but when the priviledged classes were losing control of the money that they thought that they should be getting a certain Mrs Thatcher came to power manouvering the unions into a position that the only chance for their survival was to strike. As history shows she broke their power but it was also the power of the working man to defend themselves from a bad government. Thus at a stroke the working man was emancipated. Now comes the time to take complete power from the working man ie the chance to be educated to become the next MPs. A perfect example of this hypothesis is the way the working class was secluded from being a doctor or a lawyer. Both of these professions had an inbuilt filter because you needed to know latin. As only private schools taught latin a working class kid had aotomatically lost before he started. That's what this is about not fees. Don't believe me! Look closely at our MPs now. You will find the vast majority, even labour MPs, come from highly educated backgrounds. If you have'nt got the education you've no chance to become an MP. Only a tiny minority, a token amount, come from humble families. After only one generation the only people that can become MPs are the priviledged classes. Job done the working class put back in their place. It's happening NOW. Look and ye shall see.

The college degree has all but lost its value entirely.

If you were in charge of hiring, which would you hire?

A 22 year old with a spotty work history or one with a 4 year degree?

Hint with one you know they can read and write and stick it out to the end of a project.

reply to post by crayzeed


Thanks for your reply. I found it interesting and revealing. I'm sure you're very right in what you say about the government wanting to control who can become an MP, and possible future Prime Minister.

reply to post by samkent


If those were my only choices probably the one with the degree. But if I had to pick between some guy who has been in school for the past 10 years over another who has been working in the industry the past 10 years I'd take the one with the work experience. It doesnt help me to have to take graduate student with no work experience and train him like he's a 15 year old new hire.

He can go work at Borders with the other grad students.

reply to post by thisguyrighthereYou are rihgt in your thinking but it does'nt work in real world. For instance my sons work for a large company since they left secondary school. Thay are office workers. My youngest son paid himself to go to college to get a degree in computer technology. Without bragging he is an essential employee yet was easily past by for higher and better paid positions by a university graduate. Good enough but the degree the person had was for river management. Now how does that compute.

reply to post by crayzeed


It doesnt "compute" in that situation. My own anecdotes show otherwise. About 10 years ago the red carpet was rolled out for college grads. Lately, past 5 years or so, college grads are essentially ignored throughout the state for the work I'm in. In a few special cases where complete restructuring lead to a ground up rebuild grads were hired. They were going to have to be trained anyway. In the other 95% of cases grads were ignored.

I personally saw a position filled by a high school diploma candidate over three PhD's and two MA's and a dozen or so 4 year candidates.

Right now, in my line of work and just about every professional offshoot I can think of a college grad is a liability and a burden.

In the end it all comes down to who is hiring you I suppose. Can't say I know anyone hiring college grads.

Can't say I know anyone hiring college grads.

Here’s my thoughts on why.

Fewer jobs need grads. The lions share of job openings are for retail work. And they know grads will only stay until they can find a better job.
The experienced (layed off) worker pool is filling the jobs that need some one with skills.

reply to post by samkent


For those low level jobs sure.

I'm talking about professional work throughout the state that held a mandatory masters degree requirement until about 5 years ago.

I'm not taling petty retail. Administration and executive work and some high level tech jobs.

Those retailers dont want to hire grads who will just leave. We dont want to hire grads who will come in dumb and blind requiring years of handholding because theyve never done any of the work they're here to do but only studied theory and principle. Not only are they oblivious to the work world they come in and expect huge salaries for their piece of paper and no experience.

In the U.S. the college degree is dead.

Originally posted by thisguyrighthere
The problem with paying for a whole bunch of people to go to school with the extorted funds of others eventually becoming top-heavy and unsustainable aside.......

going to college because it's just what you're supposed to do is seriously screwing everyone over. There are more law students graduating in a given year than there are jobs available. So what happens to all of these new lawyers? They become cheap rate ambulance chasers or go grab a generic MBA and manage a department store or work sales.

.

edit on 13-12-2010 by thisguyrighthere because: (no reason given)

I agree with your post. You may disagree with my post. What we are seeing in the graduate numbers is the classic marxist crisis of overproduction. We have produced too many graduates and are now suffering. More is not better. Better is better.

However we have no real manufacturing sector so are reliant on our intellectual capital. The trouble with intellectual capital is that people can emigrate. We have a conumdrum.