Did you want to be a teacher, nurse, social worker or AHP but couldn't due to finances? Please have your say!

[FarleyHatcherEsq]

Hi,
I'm trying to write a letter in response to the government's decision to not to treat students on full time workplace based courses to receive UC equivalent to wages.

This legislation has meant that I my £1,200 bursary is classed as other income rather than wages (so deducted pound for pound rather than 55p per pound). I also have no way of claiming for childcare costs whilst working full time on placement.
As a single parent of two, it would have been impossible for me to do this course and achieve my goal of becoming a social worker had I not had a good support network of family who could look after my children.
It cannot be fair that these fast track masters schemes disadvantage those on universal credit to the extent that many single parents will be unable to apply.
My goal is to persuade the government to reconsider this, especially as we are so short of nurses, social workers, probation officers and teachers.
When I speak to others who are interested in applying for similar schemes, many of them say that they would be unable to make ends meet if they didn't receive UC. Surely the point is that those retraining hope to do so in order to not need top ups from UC? However the current legislation means that it is more beneficial for the individual to stay in MW jobs for life, and receiving UC, rather than to retrain.
I'm interested in ANY perspectives on this topic.
Thanks

Yes. I've worked as a Registered Manafer in mental health services for over 20 years so tonnes of experience. I would like to either qualify as a social worker or a nurse to add to my career prospects or diversify. There is absolutely no way I can afford to do the training for either!

*registered Manager

@piscofrisco would it be your first degree?

I’m facing redundancy at the moment. I would love to retrain as an OT, but as a single parent and private renter, I just can’t make the numbers work to go back to uni. I’ve bags of experience but few qualifications to get another job paying close to what I earn now, so will no doubt have to take a lower paid job to keep the bills paid

I managed to get my OT training in the two years that they cancelled the bursaries. There was clearly a blessing in disguise there.

Not sure of this is the same but a (fairly long) while ago I considered leaving my day job and doing a PGCE course with a bursary but was told ANY earnings would mean TOTAL loss of the bursary. I was also doing a very small amount of private tutoring at the time...
So I didn't do the course.

@onlyjustme that's not the case on my bursary, in fact many other students without caring commitments are working evenings and weekends to supplement their bursaries.

@FarleyHatcherEsq
That is good to know. I hope it is also the case for teachers now too!
So many problems with UC.

I think about this so much too.
I went to uni in 2014 and believe I was maybe one of the last cohorts to receive an NHS Bursary (OT), which also paid for my childcare as my child was in nursery at the time.
As a single parent, there is absolutely no way I could have afforded it and I have no family or support network in the city I live either.

Without the bursary I wouldn’t have been able to go to uni and would still be working in hospitality and privately renting. I’m now a Band 7, have bought a house (still a single parent) and working in the NHS to give thanks for helping me to achieve my career.

At a time when staff retention in the NHS is in crisis, you would think that helping parents retrain and qualify would be a wise investment.

Bump for the evening crowd

I wanted to retrain as a primary teacher. Got offered a PGCE place at a Russell Group University course. Then I started looking into applying for the funding & realised the much touted childcare funding & other funding supposedly available for mature students wasn't available to me as my husband had a job earning too much. We had two children, one in nursery & the PGCE would have meant we'd have needed full-time childcare; plus there would be additional travelling expenses, books etc. The course didn't attract any sort of bursary, so all I'd have got was the standard £6k student loan.
It wasn't enough to cover the increased costs of the course, so I had to decline the place.
I met lots of other students (mostly recent young grads) who were all applying for the paid PGCEs (Maths, Sciences etc) as even though they didn't have caring responsibilities or mortgages etc they couldn't afford to do the course without the additional bursary; most didn't want to do those courses - they planned to train & then switch to the subjects they wanted later.

My sister dropped out of midwifery after a year because she worked full time in that course very stressful for her etc and had no way to earn anything to top her up. It wasn't just the money but we rented together and I did psychology got a first class degree while also working full time hours around my course. It was a very clear and stark difference

I've had to drop out of uni in my final year of a social work degree as they moved me over to UC and I can no longer afford to stay in the course. The final year is mostly placement as you'll probably know and I just can't afford the childcare, travel and parking expenses as well as the general expenses of being a single lone parent to 4 children. I'm gutted as I know I'll not ever be able to afford to return to the degree, you only have a maximum of 2 years out, no returning to it after that time so I've basically wasted years of my life and £10,s of £1000's studying for a career I'm never going to get into now after achieving such great results during my 2 years at uni.

I have a first class degree and so got a £10k bursary to do primary teaching 10 years ago whereas now I believe you get nothing. At the time, when you'd interview for jobs there would be dozens of other potential teachers looking round; now you're lucky to get any choice of candidates for roles. It doesn't make sense given the recruitment and retention crisis is really bad.

This has been the case with social work bursaries and for those accessing finance and universal credit. I cannot see it changing. Not all those people who apply are awarded a bursary, the university recommend students based on certain criteria. Loads of students dropped off my course after the bursary was announced and they didn’t get an award. It is very difficult but someone make it work.

@FarleyHatcherEsq it would have been my second degree-I have a BA in a related field. When u looked way back when there was no way to convert it-so there would have been some overlap. With social work as my only point of reference it seems short sighted that there is no sort of conversion course-maybe a years training in specific douche work systems and practice-for people with years of experience in the field who already work with the same cereal processes (ie in my case I worked with vulnerable service users, knew how to assess, care plan, access services, signpost, safeguard, risk assess, was up to date with legislation etc-basically a very similar job-but to become a (desperately needed) social worker it would have been another three years, with no bursary, learning lots of things I already knew really. I think there are some courses now where you work as an unqualified social worker, get paid (a bit) and get your qualification at the end of it but they still seem quite rare.

Social work systems! Not douche work. Though I'm sure that's how some people see it

@piscofrisco there's Frontline,Step up or Think Ahead which will pay for your masters and give you a bursary.

I retrained as a nurse when I was a single parent. I was able to get UC but as they counted my student loan (which I have to pay back, clue is in the name!), the £900 I should have been entitled to reduced to £150 a month or thereabouts. I did complain at the time that it was a loan (and student loan doesn’t count for tax credits) but they said this was the policy.

As an aside, I left my professional job to redo my nurse training. I attended the job centre to sort my application and I have NEVER encountered such rude, nasty staff in any capacity in my life. I was shocked and glad I only had to go once. I actually came out and cried, I’d just left a job in the prison service where I’d been spoken to like shit everyday and never batted an eye lid but they tipped me over the edge! Feel sorry for anyone who has to deal with these people on a weekly basis. Bastards

No specific experience, but lending my support, as it is important we remove obstacles that prevent adults retraining to move into these critical professions. The UK’s population is ageing and we cannot rely on school leavers only for recruitment into these roles.

I wanted to retrain as a midwife. Finances made it impossible.

Giving support as well. In my old life a long time ago I was involved in this area and the bursary for nursing and social work enabled many, many single parents and others to train and then work in these areas. Seems almost impossible that these people would have been able to now and is awful.

I may be naive but it seems a pretty easy fix too, make placement based courses exempt from the £1 for £1 UC rule. The minister for education wrote back to me to say that there was no barrier to me finding work alongside my course, my course being a 40 hour a week, 1 1/2 hours commute away from my house placement. I cannot ask my family to have my children on the weekend so I can work and I would actually fall apart myself.
Fair play to those who do, and I know many many nurses who work bank shifts as HCAs and then do placement alongside but the point is that we shouldn't have to.

Yes, current politicians would rather force a miserable regime onto single parents and keep them in poverty, rather than funding anything that would genuinely help improve their circumstances and public services.

I did my degree years ago whilst receiving tax credits and student loan/bursary was not counted as income. UC doing this differently to tax credits is shortsighted. I couldn't have done my degree without tax credits and student loan plus bursary.