Can somebody tell me if I would have been better off going to uni today or 5 years ago? I started uni in 98 just after the government stopped the grants. I only got 800 grant in the first year and nothing after that. I took the full 10500 of student loan available to me and pay it back on all earnings over 10k which is exactly 150 pm at the mo. Given that my parents income is around 15k, would I be better off going to uni now? Would I get a grant under the new system and would I be paying back less each month?
A lot of course depends on how you define 'better off'. In the context of your question, I guess you're limiting that merely to the financial aspects.
I'm also unclear as to exactly which period you're trying to compare your 1998 experience with. Your opening sentence starts off by comparing it with 'today' - presumably 2003/2004, but you finish off by talking about the 'new system', which has been in the news recently, and which starts in 2006/2007
Currently (2003/2004) IIUIC, you would pay up to £1125 per academic year, (roughly a fifth of what the average course cost is). Exactly how much would depend on your financial circumstances or that of your parents. Tution fees would be paid for you in full if you receive any of a range of benefits.
It's difficult to know exactly without knowing all your personal circumstance, but assuming the latter doesn't apply, and assuming the cost of living and maintenance at university are roughly the same as in 1998 in real terms, then I guess that you're worse off 'today' by the £800 grant you received in your first year.
You're also worse off today in non financial terms. A degree in 1998, when there were less students and because of degree inflation, is worth more than a degree today. Just as a degree from 30 years ago is worth more to an employer, than a degree from 4 years ago. Perhaps not something students in general wish to hear, but it is an inescapable fact.
If the governmemt weren't following blind dogma, and trying to get the higher education population up to 50% - a quite ridiculous aim for all sorts of reasons, but planning for a student population of say no more than 20%, then no doubt they could afford to abolish all fees and provide maintenance grants as well - as they did 30 years ago.
Whilst I'm on this particular hobby horse, it's quite crazy that the government allows anyone to take any course they want - assuming all the right grades etc. I'm no supporter of a soviet style planned economy, capitalism handles that much better, but I do think it is incumbent on the government to decide how many doctors, engineers, accountants, lawyers, scientists, (and no doubt a few more key professions or trades), the country actually needs - and provide courses to match. It should not, repeat not, be casually accepting that just because someone want to study 'golf course management' they are duty bound to provide such courses. Or to be more accurate, fund universities that do.
I have to say I think it is just as arbitrary to say 50% is too high as to say it is too low. My experience is that most people could benefit from higher education if they wanted to take that route. The real scandal is not the expansion of student numbers but the lack of resources - if standards have slipped (for which there is some evidence) is will largely be because the less well prepared students are being taught by staff with higher teaching and administrative burdens and with poorer facilities.
As for restricting courses ... you'd have force students to take different subjects at the post-16 stage as (with the best will in the world) it makes no sense to teach engineering to someone with no advanced level maths or science qualications. Then you'd have to find qualified Maths and Science teachers, but who'd teach Maths or science when you could earn twice as much in industry? Most of these problems date back at least twenty years.
Of course that all depends on how you define 'higher', and higher than what? The truth is that when everyone has a degree, no-one has a degree. 50% is certainly too high when students are dropping out of courses, standards are falling and universities are having to include special basic courses in maths and other disciplines, just to bring students up to the level they should be for a proper degree course.
Who's talking about offering Maths and Science teachers half what they could get in industry? Not me.
In my Regime I'd pay then more than they could get in industry. Let;s have some blue skies thinking. It doesn't make sense the way we're presently organising this educational disaster area.
"Richard Buttrey" wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...
I think that the problem is that "Higher Education" and "Further Education" got mixed together, when the Polytechnics were turned into "Universities". A system that provided good and relevant vocational education suddenly turned into a system to provide degrees in non-subjects, to satisfy a political aim. They also helped to correct the lack of basic training which the schools had failed to provide.
Yes and no. Yes there is more competition for graduate jobs, but if HE is properly resourced there is also a larger pool of educated people to boost the economy. Economics isn't a zero sum game.
As for drop-out rates - they are _very_ low (among the lowest in the world). In my experience most true "drop-outs" (excluding transfers to other degrees or people leaving in the first week because they are homesick etc.) do so partly or wholly for financial reasons. It is hard to argue that someone holding down a 20 or 40 hours week job and struggling to get by financially is dropping out because their grades are low.
That's true, but that is irrelevant to the issue of the true level of people who should be in HE. Underinvestment in education is the major factor. In my discipline most students do little or no maths between age
16 and 18 and (even if they have A or A* at GCSE level) lack the the ideal preparation they need to do a degree.
I wasn't arguing that you were. I'm merely pointing out that you can't persuade students to do engineering etc. until you address more basic problems. I'd start by abolishing SATs and paying teachers more ...
I think this is a myth. If you look at UCAS figures virtually all the students are going into traditional academic degrees or "respectable" vocational subjects such as medicine, business, law.
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There are some contentious subjects such as Media Studies that are popular, but despite the slating it gets in the media it isn't vocational and does have an academic, intellectual foundation. My own subject (Psychology) sometimes gets bad press, but the criticisms come from people who think we teach students psychoanalyze people.
Most of the apparent "whacky" subjects are traditional joint honours degrees with a bit of repackaging/marketing. For example, "brewing and pub management" is probably "fermentation science" and "business studies". In any case there are relatively few such degrees.
There is a shortage of students taking chemistry, for example, and very few of those take up chemistry as a career. The latest wheeze is the two-year "Foundation Degree", which appears to be a renamed BTEC HND. "Business" is not a traditional degree. Maybe the nearest to that in traditional courses is Economics, which used to come packaged as PPE. People going into business usually took a degree in English, History or Modern Languages, for example, and then learnt on the job. Journalists mostly started straight from school, working for a local paper and graduated upwards if they were capable. Some worked on student papers at university and got their foot on the ladder that way.
The attempt to turn vocational courses into degrees of some sort does not work to the satisfaction of employers, according to reports. Taking people direct from school and giving them day release to a local college or poly did and, what is more, provided a much higher calibre of qualified personnel. They did it the hard way, and profited from it.
I never said it was, but it I haven't yet heard it called a mickey mouse degree - it is a respectable vocational degree.
Chemistry is a difficult one, but at root students no longer want to do it - they'd rather do biochemistry, genetics, forensic science and so forth.
There have always been vocational degrees (unless you exclude law and medicine) - so the distinction should be between non-degree level vocational qualifications and degree level. I've yet to hear a good argument (based on evidence) that any specific degree (such as golf course management) is not degree-level. In my experience someone out for quick publicity just free associates on the name. I'm not arguing that there aren't useless degrees, but that you can't assume from the name alone that a degree programme is useless.
Last, I'd repeat that most degrees are either in traditional subjects _or_ well respected, vocational subjects such as Business. You can argue about the quality of the latter degrees if you like, but employers _love_ subjects like Business.
I was a bit shocked to read recently that Kings and Queen Mary in London, which I would regard as fairly high-calibre places, are closing their chemistry departments.
One feature of the debate which has got little comment is that all sides seem to agree that students who end up on low salaries should have their debts written off. That seems rather odd to me; on the face of it people who don't benefit from their education are the people with the least claim to public support ...
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