to disagree with the government funding 'career changers' and mature students?

[idontbeeleaveit]

As far as I can see, it's like this.

You do your A levels aged 18, work very hard and get good grades. You go on to university. You incur a lot of debt in order to do so, as well as working throughout your studies. You then (if you're lucky) get a graduate level job when you've left and spend the next ten years paying it off. When you're in your early 30s you have a baby but have to go back to work to pay the mortgage.

Or, at the age of 18, you have a child. You spend three/four years with the child at home and then decide to concentrate on your career once DC is at school. The government provide you with bursaries, funding and childcare fees allowing you to do so. If you're one of the lucky ones, you get a graduate level job when you've finished.

seems a no-brainer

Or there's the person who works for a while, has a baby then decides to retrain, often but not always as either a teacher or a midwife because having their own child gives them an automatic advantage.

I'm sure I'll be told to fuck off and I don't care to be honest but at least tell me why, because as far as I can see that 18 year old who worked hard and did well in her A levels was a fool.

And yes, it was me.

I second this too "Lets not forget OP that your education is heavily subsidised even if you do have to contribute to it. Subsidised by people like me who have been working since we were 16"

In my case I left education at 17, parents agreed to 1 year at college then I was accepted for a second course but they thought "it would be better if you were earning" as via a friend of theirs I had managed to get a job in a very depressed area.

I didnt want to mention class but as someone else did - I do think you are exhibiting a very middle class "not quite as rich as id like to be" attitude.

When I was at college we had a mature student in our class, I admired the hell out of her for having the nerve to do it (and putting up with being in a class with a load of 16 year olds skidding up and down the classroom on our wheeled chairs)

StickEmWithThePointyEnd - fingers crossed for you I hope it goes well.

Actually OP, i think things are terribly unfair. I think it is terribly unfair that you at 18, had family support, and good mental health at 18 to go to university. Then you got a degree, and it was easy to work, wasn't it, because you didn't have children.

When I was 16-18, I did work my socks off. I was a carer for a mentally ill, abusive woman (and "home-educated" to boot), and I knew the only way out was going to be education. I thought it was my duty to support her, because i loved her, and I wanted a well-paid job. I did high-speed GCSEs in sixth-form to catch up. (I even got a congratulatory letter from the exam board on one, because I had one of the five highest scores in the country.) I got on to my A-level courses. Then, I became homeless. The first year of my A-levels, I still did well (ABB), but i was developing terrible mental-health. But I was refusing to admit it, because I had been doing the coping for an unwell adult and myself since I was 7. I thought if I just told myself to "pull myself together" that would work. It didn't.

I eventually came out with CCD, convinced i was too thick for university, any way.

Now, I am trying again. I am paying for new GCSEs and A-levels, up front, because I am not entitled to free ones, having already had that chance. You got yours free, didn't you OP, as you did it at the right age.
I have started my OU degree, which I will have to pay back if I get a job off it.

And i'm doing this while looking after small children. Today, I have to do a spoken essay-thingamajig on a foreign film (in that language), write two course-worky things (in another language) and comprehend a entire chapter of my uni book (on ecology) in time for my tutorial tonight. And I have three year old twins.

Isn't most funding for courses we have a shortage of skills in? its better to train people in the UK than increase unemployment here, while hiring highly trained skill from developing counties who cannot afford to lose them but cannot compete with the salaries we offer.

I think its more about skills shortages than helping one group over another.

Speaking as a university lecturer, ime a seminar is almost always better off for having one or two mature students in it. They are usually very committed, have experience of juggling commitments and organising their work (particularly the ex-SAHMS!) and are able to draw on life experience from outside the classrooms.

Ok,
Did a levels. Decided not to 'waste' money my parents didn't have on a random degree as I didn't know what I wanted to do.
Got a job, climbed to the top of my profession and industry. Had baby, couldn't return to job as it was not baby friendly.
Now what do I do?
Everyone's circumstances are very different it's very easy to live in a bubble where you think everyone's opportunities are the same as your own.

I did a levels then uni because that's what "I was supposed to do". Started a PhD then got pregnant. Left the PhD to return home to my family where I have spent the last 7 years doing crappy part time jobs. I still owe 30K in student loans/debt and stand no chance of getting a graduate job, or in fact any job that will give me a "career". Instead I am facing the prospect of retraining as a science teacher (because it's subsidised) or starting another degree/retraining at my own expense.

It's always easy to say how hard done by you are op, but I accept I made my own choices. If somebody has the chance to do what they want with their life (subsidised or not) I say jump at it, I certainly won't begrudge you.

So, lets get this straight op? U should do ur exams then pick a job and stick in it til death? Great, sign me up! Except no job exists til death now.

I've been in 3 sectors. Redundant from 2. I've seen about 4 recessions. Frankly if I hadn't changed tacks I'd be unemployed. Prefer to pay me full bens do u?

Or should u put me down now as I've not done the job I took up from Uni til death? Shoot all, say over 30's, for temerity of having families, moving, redundancies, failed own business?

I think a Gov should support people to make the best of their lives. For some that's a house, for others it's training. But u know I would say that wouldn't I as in ur world I'd not be good enough.

Some days u think uve heard it all, then an op like u turns up....

I think part of the OPs problem is she thinks of an education as something that is done for the benefit of the individual student, like a slice of cake that is handed out to each member of the class and most unfair if somebody gets two slices.

But that's only part of the equation. The other part is that society needs a certain number of professionals with certain qualities and it would be foolish never to retrain anyone who has those qualities just because their particular profession is no longer able to use them.

My highly gifted SIL has just retrained from a practitioner of Chinese medicine (not much required where she now lives) to an expert in Western microbiology (which will hopefully prove more useful). Where would be the point in somebody as bright as her sticking to her first choice and working as a cleaner because nobody wants her original degree? Do we need cleaners with expertise in Chinese medicine?

Mrs deVere, good you say that about spoilt clueless things. It has a dual purpose. Hopefully the spoilt clueless things will perhaps realise which side their bread is buttered. I am embarrassed to admit that I am often that person but countless times, usually on mumsnet, I have realised how relatively narrow my experience has been. This thread is another example. I'm learning.

I think op sounds depressed and angry. But it doesn't help to focus on what other people are getting. You look at the cards you have been dealt and you play them as well as you can. Often life knocks you on your back. you have to make the best of it.

Op if you want to study/have DC no 2 then you have to work out the best way to do that. It's no good just feeling angry with other people who are trying to make the best of things for themselves and their family.

What is it that you want to happen?

YABU. I teach mature students and they are by far and away the most enthusiastic and motivated students you can get. It'd be far more logical for people to have their kids young, when nature intended, and then be able to go to university when they have a real idea of what they want to do in life so they don't piss about for three years and come out with a mediocre 2.1 in something they're no longer interested in and a shedload of debt.

I hadn't thought of it like that Cuille-but it would make so much sense. I'd be an amazing student now. I did fine then but is be so much more "seize the day" now.

Looks like the OP has given up!