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In this current generation what is the key to social mobility for working class & lower middle?

114 replies

Nurserymumm · 07/01/2023 23:50

With brexit, not living in a gramme area & the huge cost of living crisis, social mobility seems impossible for most..

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WednesdaysPlaits · 07/01/2023 23:51

Education

Nurserymumm · 07/01/2023 23:53

@WednesdaysPlaits totatally agree with this. There's also the soft skills that are intangible so to speak, how do the kids access this?

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Lentil63 · 07/01/2023 23:59

Naff all to do with Brexit! 🙄
Is now, has always been and will always be education.

Interested in this thread?

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inloveandmarried · 08/01/2023 00:02

Education. It's increasing hard to get a decent education in poor areas. It can be quite hard in affluent areas.
Education usually increases earning potential.

Nurserymumm · 08/01/2023 00:05

Education is the key but most kids are really up against it after all the missed schooling due to covid..

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DreamingOfAGreenChristmas · 08/01/2023 00:10

Education.
Financial Education.
Cultural access

blueshoes · 08/01/2023 00:13

Then as now, Education.

WednesdaysPlaits · 08/01/2023 00:14

Nurserymumm · 08/01/2023 00:05

Education is the key but most kids are really up against it after all the missed schooling due to covid..

No they’re not. It’s easier than it has ever been for kids from working class backgrounds to go to decent universities. Contextual offers are commonplace and this offsets any educational disadvantage. Grades are higher than ever. More kids go than ever before. student funding means working class kids from lower income families are quite often able to access more money than middle class kids who don’t qualify for the full loans.

welcome2023 · 08/01/2023 00:16

Technical and IT skills
Seriously get some programming and useful IT skills or certificates and rent a room in London while you start new job (virtually all hybrid so can commute 2 days only once get one)

Every single job wants IT almost

Forget music languages geography
Focus on IT workplace wands

I know kids on 55k from wc backgrounds with only gcse and btec or similar to 18, now only mid 20s

welcome2023 · 08/01/2023 00:18

Also loads more WC kids in city than people usually say - just in more behind the scenes and tech roles when prestige is not important eg sales. Tech support. Implementation. Engineering. Digital marketing. Project management

Ignore the 'legal and trader' stereotype.

QueenOfHiraeth · 08/01/2023 00:19

Agree education but would also add soft skills.

The Amol Rajan programme recently about how to succeed came to the conclusion that you had to become like the people you aimed to be (although it tried very hard not to admit it)
I think listening and speaking well, having reasonable general knowledge and current affairs awareness and a reasonable amount of confidence/polish helps

blueshoes · 08/01/2023 00:19

@welcome2023 interesting, good advice for the current times.

Nurserymumm · 08/01/2023 00:26

@QueenOfHiraeth@QueenOfHiraeth polish & confidence is what private schools teach in spades.. Definitely agree with the soft skills & they are the hardest to emulate

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WednesdaysPlaits · 08/01/2023 00:29

QueenOfHiraeth · 08/01/2023 00:19

Agree education but would also add soft skills.

The Amol Rajan programme recently about how to succeed came to the conclusion that you had to become like the people you aimed to be (although it tried very hard not to admit it)
I think listening and speaking well, having reasonable general knowledge and current affairs awareness and a reasonable amount of confidence/polish helps

I agree. It’s hard to progress unless you appear to fit in. But that can be learned behaviour.

Fordian · 08/01/2023 00:29

Education. Engaged children. With parents who value it. And schoolteachers who provide it. The Japanese model of the three legged-stool. Mutual support.

Frankly, the last 5-12 years in the UK have amply demonstrated that we're fucked.

In some ways, we need the spanking that's coming our way, but the collateral damage will be considerable. The drunken, suspicious, small-minded Anglo-Saxon feudal peasantry of England have, once again, been persuaded to champion the rich, via simple sloganeering ('Leave Means Leave' /'Levelling Up'). Largely due to a suspicion of experts (cf Gove); under-development of critical thinking skills (today's bog-standard (not my term) comps staffed with hideously stressed young teachers, pupilled with kids whose parents see teachers as the opposition).

It won't be pretty. But- most of us who have the skills to see, and the ability to act- are. My DC have dual-citizenship. As a result of my more curious mind-set as a younger person. We'll be okay.

But the key, as asked, is to DEMAND good education. For everyone. Esp post 16. Don't let your non-academic, uninterested 4-5 GCSE at grade 4-5, followed by a hodge-podge of sixth form cobble-togethers go to university. To accrue a £45k debt that may well yet be CALLED IN. Where is the quality vocational and technical education? Non-existent and utterly undervalued.

Rant over, but, god, the Germans would have slain Brexit, were it them, not us. They value technical education. And skills. So, as for 'naff all to do with Brexit', previous poster- you're wrong. One of the many reasons I voted Remain was because I knew- and know- we do not have the ability or will to capitalise on what would have been needed to 'Make Brexit Work'. Like ambition, vision, commitment, education, training, shared values.

Which is why we are where we are.

Nurserymumm · 08/01/2023 00:38

@Fordian I completely agree with you on Brexit, globalisation is a real thing & out kids will be competing for jobs on a global market not just UK based & the vast majority unfortunately won't be equipped to fight it out.

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UWhatNow · 08/01/2023 00:40

I live in a deprived WC area and those who do well here are the trades - especially those who property develop. One of the parents at our son’s school recently bought a £4 million Manor House (to go with their holiday home in Florida). They aren’t educated to any high level - he’s just got charisma and a business brain and has worked his way up.

Similarly every plasterer, tiler and plumber who comes to quote drives a flashy car, has numerous long haul holidays and lives somewhere desirable (and they’ve all got acres of land).

It’s not always just about education. Sometimes it’s about just raw intelligence and entrepreneurial mindset.

Nurserymumm · 08/01/2023 00:46

Would say the same of electricians & plumbers. They are raking it in. The ones I know of have their dc in private school, beautiful homes (although being in a trade & having friends to trade favours with obviously helps a lot) & enviable hols. They have very nice lifestyles & obviously very clever to boot. My hubby went to University of Edinburgh & can barely change a light bulb but that's another thread.. 😭

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HeddaGarbled · 08/01/2023 00:52

Yup, definitely education. And some maverick resistance to teenage popularity pressure. The geek shall inherit the earth.

mackthepony · 08/01/2023 02:04

Education

Then move abroad

mackthepony · 08/01/2023 02:07

Great post, Fordian

RambamThankyouMam · 08/01/2023 02:08

TikTok/Instagram/reality TV fame.

YerAWizardHarry · 08/01/2023 02:11

What does “education” MEAN though!?

YerAWizardHarry · 08/01/2023 02:12

Going to a Russel group university and getting a shitty arts degree?
going to a private secondary school?

frozendaisy · 08/01/2023 03:12

Emotional intelligence