AIBU for pressuring my son to apply to unis close to home?

[SassyBear2]

My son is very academically capable and wants to study Electrical Engineering. From what he’s researched, Cambridge is better for engineering than Oxford because it’s more hands-on and practical, and the acceptance rate is slightly higher.

Despite this, we’ve been encouraging him to apply to Oxford. We live about an hour away by car, and if he went there he could commute from home, which would reduce how much we need to fund his uni life.

He says he wants to move out for uni because he wants to "experience proper student life" and he believes uni accommodation is an important aspect of that.

We’re also suggesting he look at London unis instead of other options like Warwick, because they’re only about an hour away if there’s no traffic.

AIBU for pressuring him a bit to apply to local unis rather than slightly better ones further away? Is an hour commute really far uni? Also do most students move out for uni or do they stay at home?

Everyone has different and difficult personal circumstances. We've given our DC everything we can

The privilege on this thread! Perhaps the OP can’t afford to top up the loan!

Then he gets a job and funds it himself. My dc1 wants to live in at uni, so he’s working this year and saving hard to afford it and will be getting a job once he’s there too.

How is it experiencing independence if they aren't paying their own way? Independence absolutely doesn't mean all the rights with none of the responsibilities. I actually suspect it damaging for a young person to get in the habit of having unearned freedom, to be honest.

Absolutely don't stand in the way of the boy choosing which uni he goes to. But he should be paying his own way if he chooses to move far from home.

Because their studies suffer if they have to keep down a job as well.

I suspect very few students “get in the habit” of being funded. My daughter doesn’t want to be a burden to anyone but she lives in a city with a high student population and although she spent two weeks before lectures started last year applying for jobs, nothing came of any of them. She is truly grateful for the help we give her and she’s certainly not out clubbing all the time. As soon as she can start earning, I know she will aim to be independent.

Yes indeed this.

DD started at uni in 2019 so relatively recently; her halls were about £100 pw (actually the halls at Leicester are still very good value – just checked and for example you can get a single halls bedroom with washbasin for £82 pw) and she found that £25 pw was plenty for food. She is a veggie who doesn't eat loads but still I am not sure that would be enough for her six years later. Her rent in year 2 was less than £100 pw. I gasp at some of the rents I see quoted on HE threads – I mean I don't doubt they are correct but some hall fees are very high.

@alittleprivacyStudents never have paid their own way in the uk unless they are adults who have saved up. Young people going at 18 or 19 haven’t had a chance to do this and it’s expected parents pay to support them. You might not like it, but it’s how it works. Of course they mostly spend their loan or parental money and some work in semesters or in the vacations. That’s getting to be quite difficult now. More students are working but that’s meaning fewer jobs available for new students. They are increasingly taken. The told yo expect a graduate to work is after graduation, and that’s a challenge too.

My parents paid my rent all the way through uni. I was financially independent from the very first day I started working in my graduate job, as were most other people I knew.

For electrical engineering there is a lot a variation between universities, firstly make sure it is accredited, secondly the very traditional universities teach a more academic approach which employers don’t necessarily think is the best, there’s also various sub degree programmes eg robotics which are highly sort after by employers and not available at Oxford or Cambridge. Finally if finances are the main worry he should be looking at a gap year working to save up and looking at advanced apprenticeships etc. my dc was sponsored by the mod for instance.

Yep me too. As I said upthread, my parents had to contribute even tho they were relatively low waged, even tho I received a grant. I got a graduate job and never needed their help again.

We’ve had this discussion with dd. Her maintenance loan barely covers the cost of the cheapest halls in her top choice uni because of our income. We’ve been clear we can help a little but she will also need to get a job. She already works so is saving from that job but she’s desperate to move out and have a little of her own space to find out who she is.

one of DD’s considerations of all else is equal is the cost of halls.

if your son stands a better chance of getting Cambridge and the course is better, wouldn’t you want him to have the best opportunity he could get?

Do engineering degrees still include placement term or year? If so he should be willing to relocate to do that. From what I can make of the OP and updates, the parental income is high enough but the parents have a lifestyle that means they can't or don't want to give their child the amount of money he will need to live in uni accommodation.

Though the OP has posted that they are not financially struggling.

They don't, unless the student has specifically been given permission.

https://academic.admin.ox.ac.uk/residency

No. She’s said that they aren’t struggling but also don’t have loads of spare money. Trying to make up the sort of money needed to pay rent for a uni student when you have your own mortgage and everything else is difficult.

That doesn’t mean that they won’t struggle financially, if they have to fund their son through university. Maybe that’s what it is. They are okay now, but might not be going forward? 🤷‍♀️

Terms at Oxford and Cambridge are 8 weeks long. They are intense and commuting would make it extremely challenging academically and absolutely disastrous socially for your son. I grew up 45mins away from one of them and living at home never entered my head. I'm not even sure it's permitted - having a job certainly isn't. When I was there, it was widely accepted that engineering was bastard hard and had a comparatively high drop out rate - don't make it even harder.

Yes YABU. What uni your son goes to, especially with a vocational qualification like engineering will affect his future career opportunities. Plus uni is the perfect time for a young person to spread their wings and gain a bit of independence. He may not want to live at home again or even come home regularly. Rent and living costs is what his maintenance loan is for assuming he gets one as you state you are not hugely wealthy. Some people I knew deliberately chose a uni as far away from home as they could and clinging to him now is more likely to push him further away later. Let him choose a uni on their credentials for his chosen course not your desire to keep him.

All this is why I worry DD won’t get the chance to go to University. My income has plummeted since health issues reduced my ability to work, and I can’t really save anything as my budget is so tight. Her father (my ex) does help pay for music lessons etc, but that money wouldn’t go far at Uni. She would have to get massively in debt to get a degree, and I’m just not sure it’s worth it any more unless it’s for a course that leads to an extremely well paying career. Essentially, unless she was doing extremely well academically, and studying something like law or finance (or whatever else seems likely to lead to high paid employment in ten years), I’d be advising her to find a different route, which I find really sad.

That’s very sad. Look at the degree apprenticeship route as they cover a broad range of roles and all training is paid for. It’s very competitive, especially as younger candidates are often up against older ones but so worth it.

You can’t commute like that at Oxford. You have to live within a certain distance of Carfax tower.

Of course AIBU!!!

It is his choice 😒
however and that is the biggy…you are in no obligation to fund it so he does need to :
-choose and fund all by himself or choose with you and take your help.

what he doesn’t get is choosing a life he can’t fund…like the rest of us.

So do your budget and give it to him. Then it is entirely his choice.

Yeah there is that too.

Literally you have to…

Exactly. One of my DC only afforded it as he took a shared room. So no need to top up. Other DC needed us to fund a few £k for one year. It's a lot of money.

YABU to pressure him. It has to be his decision.

But you can support him to make an informed decision, where he weighs up the tradeoffs. He needs to look at the full costs of living over every year of the course. Including rent, energy, food, laundry, Wi-Fi, clothes/shoes, transport, books, cost of hobbies/sports, socialising.

Bear in mind average rent for a room in a shared house/flat is London is just short of £1k a month, exclusive of bills. In Oxford, just over £800pcm.

Once he knows how much he’ll realistically need pcm, he then needs to weigh this against his loan, any likely part-time earnings or savings from working holidays and what you can offer.

Then, he’ll need to factor in time. For day-to-day chores like cooking and laundry, as well as studying, working, hobbies/socialising, travel. Long commutes can be costly in both money and time, as well as restrictive, e.g. staying late in library or socialising.

My DC lives at home, as can’t afford to rent separately and even then has to be careful with money, even with p/t work. The eldest tried it and ended up in debt.

How much parent/s can help depends on family circumstances, wealth, income and housing costs. If parents own their home mortgage-free, it’s a big difference to those renting. Retired parents or those on low incomes can’t always be tenancy guarantors.