AIBU to have no idea how to sort this situation?

[allthegoodusersaretaken]

DD is 17 and has just started her second year of college. She's point blank refusing to even start a UCAS application. DH wants to kick her out after college unless she goes to university, which I think is completely unfair especially given the cost of living at the moment. The problem is, he refuses to even consider a compromise - DD has said she might want to go to university after a gap year, I've suggested charging rent once she leaves education (she does have a job but couldn't really afford to live alone on her wage, even if she was working full time), she's said she's considering careers that don't need a degree. He doesn't want to hear it and is now refusing to talk to her as he feels that she's letting us down. I'm at a loss with what to do now, I can't force her to apply to university but DH is refusing to accept any alternative. Anyone else experienced similar?

Did he go to university? If not, he should make his application right now.

I'm not a 'gap-year' enthusiast. My view is, 'get the education out of the way asap, and get on with life.'

Dd should be free to avoid university if she wishes. I agree she should work and pay rent (appropriately, it won't be much) if she stays at home. I don't know what you can do with her dad, really. Kicking his daughter out because she won't obey him - not a good look.

Your DH is being an idiot. Forcing her into uni is a ridiculous idea- She needs to be 100% of what she wants to do before spending all that money on further education.
You need to stand up for your daughter OP.

Why does she need to live alone? Flat shares exist.

If she doesn’t want to go to uni, she needs to have an actual plan as to what she does want to do and be working towards that. I also wouldn’t tolerate her dossing about for a ‘gap year’.

Your problem here is your shit parents of a husband.

Well, here's the thing DH seems to be struggling with. This young woman has every right to make these decisions, and it sounds like she's being very sensible, not leaping into doing a degree, any degree, but aiming to figure out what she actually wants to do first.

Yes, he could kick her out, if you backed him up on that, but hopefully he wouldn't be that stupid. She has a job already, she doesn't sound like she's planning on lying around all day eating bon bons. (In which case I'd be giving my kid short shrift! She will need to up her hours, perhaps?

She could be asked to pay board, to make it clear there's a difference between being at school, and now she's expected to support herself.

Maybe tell your husband he himself is behaving like a petulant child, tossing his toys, because he's not getting his own way, and to wind his bloody neck in? Not speaking isn't going to help matters. Finding out your daughter's plans, intentions, hopes and fears, and supporting her on her life path, might, however.

Yes because forcing someone to do a degree they don't want to do works out SO well.

I work with students and see adult students struggling all the time because they're there for the wrong reasons. A degree is bloody hard work, and it's expensive, and if you have doubts whether it's the right subject, or what you want, or if you know it's not what you want but you're just keeping someone else happy, you will struggle. At best she'd be unhappy and would scrape an adequate degree in a subject she may not want. At worst she could be extremely unhappy, and drop out or fail. And because she'd have used up her student loans, if she realised in 10 years' time what she actually wanted to do, then tough, it would be too late for funding.

At best she'd be unhappy and would scrape an adequate degree in a subject she may not want.

This just isn’t true. I was pretty much ‘forced’ to do my degree. And now I’m a lawyer. It worked out fine. It generally does.

If she has something else she wants to do, that’s great, they should support her with that. If not, she needs to suck it up and go to uni.

Your husband is a cunt.

Your DH sounds awful. Your daughter is an individual not a puppet to be controlled. Not everyone wants to go to university and I would support a gap year if DD wants to be sure about what degree she takes. When I worked in a university so many students changed their degrees or dropped out in first year because they had been pushed to go.

I would be telling your H for a start that she won't be kicked out and he can go instead if he likes.

Good for you. I was forced to go into university and become a teacher. Now I'm a failed teacher who hated every second of it.

My brother was forced to do a degree and quit in the first term. He went off to do what he wants and he's very happy now and earning good money.

I didn't go to uni, my younger two siblings did (not the older brother) and they've done well but I am earning 5x the amount they are without a degree.

Your DH needs to understand that her doing what she wants that will make her happy isn't letting him down.

I forgot to mention that the older brother who was forced to go to uni doesn't speak to my parents anymore and hasn't since he quit.

It is good for me, yes.

Thanks. You worded this much better than I did.

To sort the situation out you support your child. Your husband sounds awful.

He's being controlling and abusive.

No one needs to go to uni. It might not be the right path for her, and she's sensible to think about it and work out whether it is or not rather than going and dropping out, or going and getting a random degree that has no real practical benefit. It's not your husband's life, it's hers, and she's entitled to choose what she does with it.

I wish we were more accepting of and had better opportunities for people whose talents and skills are not academic but no are less worthwhile rather than pushing everyone towards university. Vocational careers can be very lucrative and fulfilling, same as ones which require a degree. Has she looked into things like apprenticeships? A friend of mine's DD combined a college course with an apprenticeship at a engineering firm and is now employed there full time.

Kick the husband out- seriously. He is being completely unreasonable.

Forcing her into debt just to keep a roof over her head is ridiculous. Why is he so set on it?

Your dd isn’t letting you down, your dh is letting her down. He’s controlling and abusive and I would be showing him the door before I’d make my teenage dd move out.

As an academic at a very good (Russell Group) university, it is not my experience that forcing young people to attend university or to pursue certain degree programmes (we are in STEM and our successful graduates have strong earnings potential) generally works out.

Amongst my own personal tutees and stories from colleagues, students who feel coerced into uni or into our School often genuinely struggle to engage, both academically and socially. We think they are way over- represented amongst the drop-outs and the Ordinary, Third Class and 2.2 degrees that, sadly, HR at the major employers nowadays will not even consider.

I agree your DD should not spend a year sitting around. But if she needs to spend a year doing low key work or volunteering (or running your household) while she pulls herself together, so what? Much better to figure out what she wants, be it uni or not, and pursue it wholeheartedly.

OP, your initial post has made me curious about the background of your DH. Why is he so sure he is right in this situation?

My DS didn't want to go to university either.
We told him he could stay living with us as long as he wanted, but dossing about was not an option - he needed to be in some sort of education or training or employment or otherwise gainfully employed.

The tide is turning - many young people are moving away from the idea that a university education is the be all and end all -clearly it's some important for some future paths, but there are other totally valid alternatives.

Did your husband get a degree? Is he her dad? And is he always this horrible??

Your daughter is old enough to make her own choices.

It sounds like your husband just wants her to move out which probably isn’t going to be the best thing for DD as she seems to need the safety net of living at home while she figures out what she wants to do long term, which is surely better than her reluctantly going to Uni or moving into a shared house?

Think about the situation in terms of nurture vs control - it’s important that the decision that you come to is based on nurture and not control.

It also isn’t explicit in your OP whether DH is DD’s dad, but I think the issue here is that you have a DH problem and need to make sure DD is supported to make the right choices for her.

Well it’s your house too so he can’t kick her out, so just tell him that, that he is in danger of losing his daughter if he doesn’t pack this in and you don’t want to hear another word about it. And then shut him down, every time.

I’m all for a good gap year, but your daughter just doesn’t want to go to university at the moment. Work with her on finding an apprenticeship for now. And as you go work out how much rent she’ll pay.