Student Protest

[Jeremy]

Huguenot Wrote:

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> There is however a desire to see 50% of all 18 to

> 24 year olds in HE - a shift from 1.8m today to

> about 3m.

Is that 50% of all 18-24 year olds in HE at any given time?

Or 50% of all 18-24 yr olds are in, or have had HE?

[Huguenot]

Don't know mate, I guess it's the latter, because I believe the figure for the former would be closer to 4m. However, I don't know.

[DJKillaQueen]

The one thing that no one has pointed out is that there has never been free-for-all higher education. When I got a grant and all my fees paid it was beause my parents income was means teated. Those with parents earning over a certain amount didn't get grants. And only certain degree courses at certain polytechnics and universities qualified for that financial help. The first move towards paying for tuition fees effectively took away free education for the poorest students but didn't change much else.

America has had a fee paying system fof a long time and as a result has a two tier HE system. Why we can't return to system of BTECs, HNDs and fewer students actually needing to spend four years on a degree course is beyond me.

It is one aspect for which I am very critical of New Labour....the leveling out of educational qualifications in the mythical belief that all children are the same and one size fits all. The result has been a dumbing down of the state education system and the processes by which qualifications are attained, whilst the public school system continues via traditional methods to churn out pupils that will go to the better universities and do better in life as a result (generally speaking of course).

[DJKillaQueen]

Just add, Bucks 'new' University do a three year degree course in Airline and Airport Management. So every year they churn out say 30??? graduates with the know how on how to manage an airport. And we have how many airports? Who in their right mind would spend 30K on doing a degree like that?

[Huguenot]

There's definitely fewer jobs than there are adults.

Consequently I think there's also social stability benefits to having young people in education rather than walking the streets, even if it's a course in Golf Course Management.

I suspect that a loans based educational system may see fewer 'unproductive' courses.

[tog_in_sox]

Hi DJKQ, agree with you, much of the argument is made with selective memory. When I went to Uni my parents were fair enough to not try and re-jig their finances to make me eligible for a grant so they stumped for all my expenses barring what I could earn in supplemental jobs.

MP,

According to NSO publication here and associated docs available we do have a naturally growing population. The overall statement of an ageing pop is because we had higher natural expansion previously so the distribution is skewed to adults and aged. Whether this will continue to the point where more people are dying than are being born in the pop (to citizens or not) is not yet fact. What appears to be fairly level is the year-on-year fertility rate so the expected domestic youth pop projection is fairly stable for the future (barring acts of God).

All,

Why is having a degree so important to the future welfare of our youth?

Presuming it's for the intellectual well-being of the individual and potential benefit to society of said happy individual, why the expectation of higher earnings and the offering of higher remuneration?

Having such a high proportion of graduates in the workforce appears to merely force employers to use HE qualifications as another means to filter applicants regardless of how relevant such a filter might be. Seems to me the implementation of our lofty ideals has gone awry.

I fully endorse that all should have the opportunity of higher education for the betterment of self BUT I do not endorse the expectation that having such a certification bequeaths an entitlement to higher pay.

Given that taking a gap year to volunteer or travel is also said to be a good thing for mind and spirit should we perhaps not encourage our youth to do that? Fund them for doing so?

According to (via Prospects.ac.uk)

"

1.According to latest figures released by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), the average salary for full-time first degree graduates from 2008 whose destinations were known and who were in full-time employment in the UK six months after graduating was ?19,677. This figure covers graduates in all roles across the UK economy, including those occupied by graduates but which might be considered 'non-graduate', and comes from the Destinations of Leavers from Higher Education (DLHE) survey, which is the annual survey which explores graduates? destinations six months after graduation. DLHE covers all graduates from UK higher education.

2. Figures derived from the latest 2007/08 issue of Prospects Directory revealed that the average starting salary offered to 2008 graduates is ?24,048 and the median salary* is ?23,500. Prospects Directory is an annual graduate recruiters' directory published by Graduate Prospects and features thousands of jobs and hundreds of employers, and the salaries are therefore derived from job advertisements. The latest 2007/08 issue is aimed at 2008 graduates. The salaries offered ranged from ?14,732 to ?39,000.

"

So according to this the average graduate (not just the lowest quartile) can expect to be exempt from repayments at least in their first year(s) of their career.

Is it possible to elect to begin early repayments irrespective of earnings subject to the same timescales?

[mockney piers]

This is a total offtopication, but all I can glean from that togs is that from a point of near stagnation in the 80s, increased immigration has caused a dramatic rise in natural population growth (new immigrants and poorer people have more babies), which again, was rather the point of the policy (and of course the stuff of far right nightmares*).

Anyway, as you were.

*see about a billion exceedingly dubious books in the states full of schadenfreude, unable to contain their glee at the prospect of an islamicised Europe. Weird if you ask me

[StraferJack]

Still, this all worked out for the best didn't it?

[StraferJack]

So, now what for the loan book?

[StraferJack]

sorry - meant to post link - but I'm guessing anyone interested in the topic will already have read the story

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/10982037/Student-loans-under-threat-say-MPs.html

[vgrant]

get this lot sorted in default category tranches. Mix them up a bit to hide the high risk bits amongst the low risk stuff, get them renamed as student loand bonds, get them marked as AAA by the rating agencies and flog them to retail investors who dont know any better. this cannot fail.

[Loz]

My first question would be: how can Australia make this work and the UK can't.

[StraferJack]

but woody, Vince Cable just announced that he was calling off the sale - no-one was buying. They even looked at retrospectively upping the interest rates on existing loans as a sweetner. Still no takers

[vgrant]

I know.Vince Cable is the marinus van der lubbe of this century - a deluded sap who is going to be remembered for taking the blame for everything that the cleggster and disco dave have sidestepped.

[DulwichVillageLady]

Rent a mob at it again. Its always the unions, unite against facism, students that tend to be the most destructive. Left wing annarchy.

Without giving away a Ladys age I went to University right after grants were abolished. I will have finally paid back my student loan after 10+ years of working.

[StraferJack]

money well spent

[DulwichVillageLady]

It is. I gave into the system rather than take take take. Why should studnets get an easy ride. They can self support themsevles through jobs and pay back the loan the same as the rest of us.

[vgrant]

Loz Wrote:

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> My first question would be: how can Australia make

> this work and the UK can't.

Australian education is a machine that vomits vocational workplace drones like the Cidermen factory in Dr Who.

[vgrant]

How come the best Universities in Germany charge on 250 EUR a term and seem to prosper ?

[Loz]

vgrant Wrote:

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> Loz Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

> > My first question would be: how can Australia

> > make this work and the UK can't.

>

> Australian education is a machine that vomits vocational workplace drones like the Cidermen

> factory in Dr Who.

The Cidermen? Ha ha.

You make universities preparing students for a successful career sound like a bad thing.

[vgrant]

it is.

[El Pibe]

thank god we went to a uni that didn't have a clue about that (back then!!!!)

[Jeremy]

University should be for academic, not vocational studies. And it should only be for people with the ability and willingness to learn.

Tuition fees and the prospect of huge loans might be discourgaging tomorrow's engineers/scientists/doctors/etc, while others from wealthy families piss away three years and get a 2:2 in tourism.

[Loz]

Jeremy Wrote:

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> University should be for academic, not vocational studies. And it should only be for people with the

> ability and willingness to learn.

> Tuition fees and the prospect of huge loans might be discourgaging tomorrow's engineers/scientists/doctors/etc,

> while others from wealthy families piss away three years and get a 2:2 in tourism.

Engineers/scientists/doctors/etc are careers as well as academic.

But I agree that far too many people go to university. There needs to be other establishments for the media studies and tourism type people. Packing them into unis is not the best way to do things.

[maxxi]

When I was being higher-ly educated there was certainly no question of a 'training' element in the scheme of things.

I and the oiks around me all felt we were bloody good value for money. We would have found the idea of student loans inconceivable - in fact I stood on a picket line during an NUS 'Day of Action' back in the day to call for higher grants!

But it was a little tougher to get in and friends who went straight into work at 16 were earning far more by then (having missed VIth form) and had cars and flats rather than 'thumbs' and bedsits.