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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to feel sorry for today's university students?

145 replies

Lucydogz · 12/09/2016 09:57

I live in a city with a couple of big universities, so this last weekend the place was full of new students finding their way around, most of them with mummy and daddy. When I started uni (admittedly decades ago) you were put on the train with your bags and left to it. It was sometimes hard and lonely, but I don't think having my parents along would have helped. Why do parents have to be so involved these days?
Plus (while I'm on the subject) student halls of residence used to be pretty spartan - shared bathrooms for the landing, and one TV, in the Common Room. Even if you were shy, you couldn't hide in your room all day. Now they seem to live in little pods and never need to actually socialise.
I expect I'll be flamed about this, but doesn't anyone else think that student life was better in the past (and that's without the issue of loans)

OP posts:

MiddleAgeMiddleEngland · 13/09/2016 13:25

Times have changed but I don't think it's bad that they get driven by parents. My parents took me, stayed for about an hour then left. We took DD1 and did similar. We are contributing towards her living expenses so wanted to see her room and we bought a couple of bags of food.

DH is amazed they have ensuite toilets nowadays - he had to walk across an unlit quad in the dark if he needed a toilet during the night and doesn't think it did him any harm

Taytocrisps · 13/09/2016 13:28

I went to college in Dublin in '89 and most students were driven to Dublin by their parents at the start of the academic year (and usually collected at the end of year also). There was no campus accommodation provided for students so students mostly stayed in bedsits or digs for the first year or (if they had older siblings/friends in Dublin) shared a rented house. Anyone staying in rented accommodation needed duvets/pillows/bedding/towels etc. It would have been very difficult to manage it all travelling by bus or train.

Bobochic · 13/09/2016 13:32

My mother or father always drove me and my sister to university at the start of the year (1980s). Our only friends whose parents didn't drive them were those who owned their own cars (this was not very common).

Wordsmith · 13/09/2016 13:34

My Dad took me for the first time (a poly in the 1980s) but that was because I only got my place a week beforehand and hadn't sorted out accommodation. There was no room left in the halls of residence and I was allocated a room in a tatty private house in a dodgy area. My dad drove me there, took one look and turned round saying "There's no way you are living here!" (I would have been happy with it!) I ended up sharing a room with another girl in a lovely house with an elderly landlady - both of whom incidentally came from my home town. She really mothered us for a year and it was a very gentle introduction to independent living! We moved out after the first one and things got a bit more studenty.

I do feel sorry for today's students though as I don't think they'll have the freedom that I did back then - jobs upon graduation were fairly easy to come by, you didn't have to worry about paying back loans and you could claim housing and unemployment benefit in the holidays! Amazing to think that now...

brasty · 13/09/2016 13:44

When I went to university I had a full grant and stayed in very basic halls. I ran the current student grant into a cost of living calculator. and the current full student grant, is worth more now than it was in the late 80s. But I know students say it is impossible to live on now. But we went for a cheap pint in a student bar, not cocktails in town.

brasty · 13/09/2016 13:47

I didn't get benefits in the holidays, they had been abolished by the late 80s. I lived totally on my grant and paid work during the summer.
And by the time I graduated jobs were hard to come by. People seem to forget that there have been other recessions.
But our expectations were a lot lower too, so we enjoyed our freedom even though we had little money.

Gatehouse77 · 13/09/2016 13:49

As far as I'm aware the en suites are not for the students as such but so the universities can rent out the spaces during the holidays to generate income not because we have a generation of softies. Sure, they benefit but it's not for them.

As for driving them, times have changed. Most kids have more 'stuff' (another debate as to whether they need it or not) and are, generally, used to a more comfortable standard of living. And I think it depends how far you have to go.

Parents are much more invested in their children these days. Maybe over invested in some cases. it doesn't necessarily equate to being pampered or spoilt.

Also, given that mental health issues are more recognised and diagnosed at a younger age now perhaps that is a consideration as to why parents are more present?

Monochromecat · 13/09/2016 13:57

I think moving to a new town/city is daunting for a lot of people - whether it's a young adult going to university or an older adult (!) moving for a new job. It's nice to have a family member come with you because that's what people who care about you do. I went to uni in the early 90s, patents dropped me off, helped me unpack a bit (yes I could do it myself but it's a way of showing they cared).... As did everyone else's parents...

ifyoulikepinacolada · 13/09/2016 14:11

When my mum went to uni I went with her to buy books for her course, and on her first day we went for a celebratory drink. She also moved house a couple of years ago; I helped her unpack. I thought that was just what you did for people you love but does that make me a helicopter daughter?!

Monochromecat · 13/09/2016 14:13

Ifyoulikepinacolada - exactly what I was trying to say

trufflepiggy · 13/09/2016 14:22

Brasty you know there's no such thing as a grant anymore? It all has to be paid back?

And the VAST majority don't get the amount published on the website.

I got £3500 loan and no help.

My accommodation (the cheapest halls accommodation there was) was £6000.

JamieVardysParty · 13/09/2016 14:35

Exactly truffle - you really, really cannot compare your university experience in the 80s to the experience today.

It is just so frustrating that generations benefited from free higher education and were given money to live off and then just pulled up the ladder behind them for future generations.

I appreciate it wasn't sustainable to provide free education to a much larger percentage of young people going to university, but I find comments like brasty's inflammatory when you were obviously in a much better position (free university, grant to live off that covered living expenses) than students today.

brasty · 13/09/2016 14:49

According to this there are grants and maintenance loans in England.

www.gov.uk/student-finance/continuing-fulltime-students

brasty · 13/09/2016 14:50

And lots didn't used to get the full grant in the past either. It was only students from the poorest backgrounds who did, and they were even less likely to go to uni then.

TheFairyCaravan · 13/09/2016 15:01

It's all loans from this year. Only students who are in their second or third year will be getting maintenance grants.

DS2 is a student nurse. His bursary doesn't cover his rent. He works part time in a pub, too. Next year HCP will have the pleasure of paying to be at uni and won't have a bursary either.

WindPowerRanger · 13/09/2016 15:03

I don't get the young person hate by one or two in this thread. Of course we often find them irritating, we are middle-aged and they are young. Their generation has to live with the world we gave them and insists on doing some things differently, the little bastards.

But the idea that we, en masse, were better/cleverer/more independent than they are, en masse, is bizarre. We had better music and eyebrows, that's all.

trufflepiggy · 13/09/2016 15:04

Just to add - I started uni in 2012, finished in 2015. Currently studying a masters

HairsprayBabe · 13/09/2016 15:06

My loan didn't cover rent and I worked in several different jobs to top it up. I started uni 6 years ago. Not sure why you think students are living the life of riley when most of us had to rely on part time jobs and emergency supermarket vouchers from the uni.

teatowel · 13/09/2016 15:09

My parents took me in 1980 as did most of my friends. Some students did arrive on the train with huge trunks. We shared 4 to a room and the washing facilities (huge room with about 20 little cubicles) and toilets were one floor down. Two phones did 60 of us. There was always a queue. It was the happiest three years of my life! I took my own off spring on their first days . Why would you not do that for someone you love? I would do it for a friend.

DilapidatedGlamourpuss · 13/09/2016 15:30

I started Uni in 2007 and my parents each took a carful of stuff. I was given a bag of baked beans and pasta, a bottle of wine and they bought a few days shopping for me when we got there.

Our halls were 7 people in a corridor, with one shared toilet and a shared bathroom and shower room. We shared a microwave and a kettle. The heating went on at the whims of the maintenance department, which usually meant you needed to put on another jumper.

I met my now DH there, who lived 3 rooms along from me. The accommodation wasn't luxurious but that time of my life always makes me smile, I was so happy.

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