to feel like we were scammed into going to University?

Yanbu, at all. And not only because of the debt. My daughter started uni (BCU) to do a vocational degree and dropped out after the first year because it was completely disorganised, the quality of the tuition… when the lecturers bothered to turn up.. was appalling, and she felt she was being treated like a complete cash cow. When she left she started an apprenticeship and is loving it and learning loads all while being paid for the work she is doing. It’ll take her a couple of years longer to get to where she wants to be but she’ll still get there. Unfortunately, she now has £13k of debt for fuck all.

Uni is a complete scam in a lot of cases.

DH feels very differently
DS isn't sure about Uni but DH says he is worried he will be the only one of us without a degree if he doesn''t go. Not sure what that matters but hopefully DS will get a Degree Apprenticeship and everyone will be happy

I think you do have a good point, OP. The cost (and debt) is absolutely staggering now.

My DS1 is in his first year at university, and he is thriving. He's studying history, and obviously really absorbed and stimulated by what he's learning. He's also doing beginner Mandarin and advanced conversational French because he wants to, not as part of his degree. Financially I don't know if it will have been the right decision, but in terms of intellectual and academic development, it's right for him.

Several European countries offer free university education, so the problem is tuition fees and student loans in UK rather than the choice of attending university

Honestly, I loved Uni, had a blast, best time of my life and really enjoyed it. I would go back in a heartbeat.
I graduated in 2010 with a major/minor.
Since then I have done 3 other degree level courses (paid for by me).
Having several degrees has not improved my employability levels, but it has given me skills that I have used in employment.
I don’t pay anything towards my student loans and they will be cancelled when I turn 55 anyway. They do not show up on any financial documents and when doing my taxes for my Self-Employment, I simply tick the box to say I have a certain type of student loan (as dictated by the Student Loans Company) and therefore I don’t pay anything as I earn well under the threshold for repayment.
Having said all that - uni is not for everyone, many of my friends failed out of uni or failed to complete their work on-time and received nothing but debt they are forced to repay (because they didn’t achieve anything). So yes, not for everyone and definitely not an easy way out either. To me, children should be given all the information and given a couple months leeway (maybe freshers term?) to see if they suit uni life before committing to it.

I agree, it was like educational grooming. I had been prepped for it since my early school years.

We were also told such nonsense like that we could be whatever we wanted to be, which is just such a stupid thing to convince children of.

If I were 18 & making those choices now, I would definitely be looking at degree apprenticeships.

You can pivot into post grad study for many courses if needed, and many are shorter than Undergrad, plus scheduled in a way that you can work around them, so I would definitely be looking at that to avoid debt (& I work in a high paid industry where degrees are essential).

It's mad to me that only around 45% of people have good (5/C +) grades in both English and Maths at GCSE, but that for a long time there was a push to get 50% of people going to uni.

And there need to be more routes for further study as adults.

You are 100% right. It was a way of massaging unemployment figures and turning education into a business model money-making scheme. The way they keep shifting the debt boundaries is immoral. I hope a whole generation refuses to pay. My DC had a small legacy of 30k from a relative and I suggested they use it instead of taking out loans. But they chose to keep it for house deposit instead. I'm still not sure if that was the best use of the money.

Yes and No.

My adult kids both do jobs relevant to their degrees, and literally nobody can do those jobs without a degree.

I myself didn't go to Uni, and was able to work my way up to management, however, when that job ended in redundancy, all of the jobs that I looked at with comparable salaries required a degree! I was very stuck at that point! I started my own business instead which is thriving, so it all worked out in the end, but still!

Let her focus on that and you focus on yourself,
I have only ever heard the phrase ‘University is a waste of time’ out of people who didn’t go, not out of anyone who did, I suppose in a way it makes them feel better about themselves and their decision not to go.
I went and i’m extremely happy that I did, if I hadn’t had gone I would have regretted it and I think my life would have been very different

It was far more common to go straight into work or an apprenticeship at 16 when I was young (53 now). Only about 6 of my classmates went to university, it was right for them and they did well.

I think universities are a good way of keeping unemployment figures down, bringing in money for the government and private landlords/companies. I would love to see a change back to apprenticeships and more technical colleges. I think a lot of young people feel so overwhelmed by what they perceive is expected of them when they leave school that they just give up. I hope that a time will return when people who are not high earners can actually afford to buy their own home. It must all feel so out of reach for young people.

DS took the decision that there was little point in going to university and running up hefty debts just to get a qualification which would be of little practical use to him in later life. At the time I was dubious about it, but with hindsight I think he was absolutely right.

@GiraffesAtThePark Also there’s a difference in having a target of 50% in higher education versus investing in specific areas which will benefit society.

Completely agree. We keep complaining about our skills gap but not tackling it

So many people I know have media studies/psychology/sociology/business management degrees and are saddled with university debt. None of them are working in these fields and most are on under 30k a year. I feel that so many degrees are such a waste of time but I do acknowledge that university and living away from home equips you with certain life skills.

I attended uni at a similar time to you and I totally agree that anyone who was slightly academic was given the hard sell about attending university. So much so that back then at the age of 17, I had the preconception that anybody who didn't was not academic.

I'm a lecturer at university and I agree with you.

University is presented as a mandatory step on the career ladder, and in a sense it has become that. But university is ill equipped for the role of training up tomorrow's managers and workforce. It's a system designed for a very specific purpose - to transmit academic knowledge to those interested enough to dedicate three years learning it, or to those who absolutely need to have that knowledge before embarking on their careers (doctors, lawyers, psychologists, engineers). The problem is that this purpose often gets in the way of preparing young people for the jobs that they actually want, but can't even interview for without a degree.

70% of my students would be better off working. They don't want to learn my subject, they don't need to learn my subject, they are just paying a fortune to live in crap accommodation and write essays they don't care about, just for the certificate at the end.

The labour government of the 2010s pushed everyone to university in order to fudge the unemployment figures. It's a farce. It's ruined university for the people who actually want to be there, and it's ruined the early 20s of the people who don't want to be there. It's also lead to a poorly trained workforce.

Totally agree @Schleep. I was really encouraged to go, but didn’t. I got an apprenticeship and haven’t looked back since.

I remember all the push at the time, but I just said to my parents - before interest it’s £30k+ - there isn’t a single subject in this catalogue I am sufficiently interested in to spend that kind of money on it. Luckily my parents supported that.

I think Uni is still necessary for some jobs, but I do think most people would do better on an apprenticeship.

I felt the same, but it was 1996 so before tuition fees. It was a selective all girls' (grammar) school and we were pushed so hard to go to Uni. The "careers advisor" was basically a University advisor.

I went along with it for ages but couldn't decide on a course and didn't really want to leave home either and there was no commutable uni nearby. So I chose to enter the career I was considering straight from school.

I told the careers advisor this and he barely spent any time with me after that. It very much came across that if I didn't want to go to uni I was on my own.

There were about 180 girls in my year at school and about 15 of us didn't go to uni!

Many of whom that did have gone on to have amazing careers and are very high flying, but if everyone had had to pay tuition fees there would be many more that would be in the same position as OP and her contemporaries.

I have spoken to many young people in my life over the last number of years and have always advised that unless their chosen career path is massively advantaged by a degree or it's necessary, then they should consider something else. The apprenticeships scheme is much better for many chosen careers nowadays.

It's a gamble. Pays off for some, not others. It will definitely do so for my eldest due to the choice of career. I was more worried with the youngest.

However, it is paying off for them too. His friends from A levels went straight into an entry job and 4 tears later, earns almost double than my ds who is only starting now...but, his friends has now no immediate opportunity for pro.otion. My ds, if progressing the same will have those opportunities because of his degree.

However, I do agree that for many, usually those who went ro Uni because they didn't know what else to do and didn't want to start working FT, it's turning out to be an expensive choice with little rewards.

I come from a family of well-educated people who studied fluffy, abstract subjects and often ended up in self-inflicted poverty. My mother was the first in the family to study physics and then married an engineer. They did not offer me much guidance but they would be mortified if I went for gender studies, social media marketing or a similar "modern" degree.

Think it's only worth doing a degree if it's the only way into a well paid field e.g. doctor, dentist etc. I wouldn't recommend it for basic degrees like philosophy or drama etc. My friend got a degree in the NHS, and ended up working in a shop! She has a mountain of debt to repay! I'm encouraging my children to look at apprenticeships instead.

When did you go?

Local housing authority advertising an admin post paying <£24k that requires “a relevant degree”.

TBH I’m sure no degree is needed. Relevant or otherwise! It’s silly.

I think it's ridiculous these days. I went to Uni when it was free to everyone.
My ds has just finished sixth form at a prestigious, specialist performing arts college. He is a very talented Musician and is aiming to make it in the industry. He has a band that is doing very well locally already and works pt to support this. Quite early on in his education, he decided against uni and we fully support this decision. He thought it through long and hard..He doesn't need to learn anymore per se for his chosen career and he didn't want to rack up a huge debt, come out after 2 years and be no further on. He would have wasted that time that he is using to grow the band. He is also getting other opportunities his friends at Uni aren't - learning on the job, being asked to support other bands and he's currently just taken on some promotion work. He said that from almost Day 1, college were pushing Uni as the next option, the expectation was that all students would go. Everyone was made to complete personal statements etc. There was very limited support for those wanting to enter straight into the industry. Many of his friends actually said they were going to Uni because they didn't know what else to do. They will leave Uni with huge debts and sadly, probably no further on career wise. I am glad our son has taken another route and don't think Uni is nor should be the default it once was.