to feel sad that 3yo dd might never be able to achieve her potential due to tuition fees?

[bytheMoonlight]

I look at dd, who is due to start nursery in January and wonder what is going to happen if one day she decides she wants a career that means going to university.

I feel so upset that her chances are being blighted before she has even entered education. We could offer her little financial support and the thought of her leaving with all that debt is beyond comprehension and would not qualify for help.

I feel so sad about this.

I don't think about it. At the moment dd wants to go to drama school. Dadas which fund the courses will probably not be around then. She will just have to understand that sacrifices have to be made if that is the route wshe wishes to take.

Oh, I see. I hope you're right because it's got to happen. But why isn't the Govt tackling the problem. I suppose they are hoping that the increased fees will make young people really think about whether they need a degree or not.

.TCNY..if you think it is patronising, why have you said it?

I didn't did I? I was pointing out that your statement was one of the variants of this.

I must be a hard mother. DS1 (20) is in his second year at Uni and DS2 (18) applying for next year. It has always been understood that although we will help out when we can they have to support themselves. After all it is them - not us - who will reap the benefits. Neither of them have an issue about paying off the loan as and when they earn enough to afford it. I am more concerned about the government cutting funding to arts based courses.

Coalition - IMO it can only be reversed by market trends, i.e. students opting out of courses. I don't see how any government could survive actually cutting student places now that the geneie is out of the box - and I think the 'natural' process will be comparatively slow - compared to the rapid, government decreed increase in student places.

The difficulty will be that employers will go on insisting on qualifications that used to be taught on the job as long as they possibly can because it's cheaper for them. I used to be in publishing and got in as a trainee - you very rarely see those sort of trainee posts now that you have no end of diplomas and masters in publishing and so forth.

And that wouldn't be so bad if jobs were more secure and everyone wasn't expected to be increasingly flexible about changing professions

blackbag 'I'm worried about my young children, that they'll opt for a medium sized debt in order to work in a call centre with an over inflated opinion of it's self'

But if they work in a call centre on typical call centre wage they won't pay anything back!!

Do you want to encourage a generation to think small, not take risks because they'll never have to directly repay the debt.

Or you could vote this proposal down, see it as a chance to shake up the whole system.
So call centres go back to recruiting intelligent people for in house training rather then forcing them to waste three years doing 'Mediocre Business' at the University of Slough.
Talented, intelligent people with drive and ambition get the chance to study at well funded Universitys with great Research Staff and take risks. So you can leave your family behind in Doncaster, move to London, try your hand at Applied Chemistry rather then opting for the cheaper 'Media Science' course at Doncaster College.

We're talking about 18 year old here, it should be about ambition and risk taking not opting for a massive future financial burden and set in stone career path in your late teens.

The system needs changing but this is not the way to do it, this solution merely puts a plaster over the problem for a few years.

I only hope your kids are n't the ones caught up when the middle ground Universitys when they go into recievership half way through a course.

Don't forget at the moment if you are a financial successful graduate you currntly pay back the cost of your education through income tax. A system that has worked fairly well for a number of years.

Acinonyx - If employers can't get the qualifications they want they will adapt. In general the private sector can adapt quicker than the public. Turn the tap off and they will adjust.

BlackBag - You don't pay back the cost of your education through tax - you pay towards the education of the year after and the year after that and so on. Someone else paid for your education.

Ah OP anyone and any policy could be in place by then- undue stress pointless IMO.

If ds4 wants to go to uni (and his older siblings are unlikely to due to either SN or simple academic ability (or lack of)) then we will find a way to get him there. Apart from that decision, ATM whilst we are broke we can do no more- but we know it's a priority and it would be made to happen.

Riven - Just what I said in the 'Should it be retrospective' thread ;)

OP you have my sympathies - I have young children too and with 4 of them I can't see how I have time to save say £160k in the next 12 years...ha ha ha ha it's never going to happen.

No, my children might get a little bit of help from us but I'm afraid they will be lumbered with huge debts. And I, like you, feel incredibly sad about it.

And I do firmly believe that people by then will be living with their mums and dads until their late 20s/early 30s, due to housing costs and massive tuition fees. Mark my words!!!

"I can't see how I have time to save say £160k in the next 12 years" Why on earth should you? Their education, their future earnings. They will be adults. It is not your responsibility.

They do that anyway Ri. My friend only ahd until she was 50 something to gradiuate and could not have repeated a year with funding.

Heard on the news that someone on £25k would pay around £30 a month. They would spend that on a single night out.

If they were still living the life of the students who are protesting, that is. And if they have responsibilities they will cut their cloth accordingly, as everybody does, and be grateful for their better employment prospects.

The more I read here today the more it seems it will be "same as it ever was".

Those that study a worthy subject will be rewarded financially in the real world and pay taxes. Those doing Mickey Mouse degrees for which the world holds no interest will not earn decent money and will not pay the money back - the situation we're in right now.

The taxpayer always pays is the bottom line.

It's a debt in name only - for so many it won't ever be paid back in full.

Uni debt doesn't affect mortgage applications, credit ratings etc...so you just forget about it and pay it off as and when they take it out of your account or you have enough to clear it. If people want to go to uni they will, they'll just make sure it is worth it and they work hard. I'm sure as hell not going to get misty eyed looking at my sleeping 4 month old DD...she will fulfil her desired potential whether that is the future PM or a plumber. It's up to her.

I do agree that the gap between the baby boomers and the following generations is widening and that bugs the hell out of me, but let's just get on with it. (She says with £15k of debt.)

Riven, for once it would be nice if you would look at the big picture rather than always proving the exception to the rule/yeh but and rubbishing "the world at large"!

Anyway, science degrees are rewarded, but you may need to physically re-locate or chase the money. Dream jobs do not normally just fall in to people's laps - or am I the only fucker who's not had the CEO of X Empire knocking on their door begging me to work for them?

Coalition - how do you turn off the tap?