To not understand people who talk about being the first in their family to go to uni like it’s a badge of honour?

[Kyrgyzstan]

Sorry if this sounds dismissive of their achievements but isn’t it less of a rags to riches tale of personal achievement and more of a generational difference? I mean barely any of our parents generation went to university and now it’s pretty much expected if you want a half way decent job.

Obviously if you were raised by heroin addicts and managed to still get good grades and go off to uni that’s different but the children of ordinary parents who just didn’t go to university talking about it like a huge achievement sounds a little strange to me?

How old are your parents, OP?

They can't be that old, so I'm guessing that you may have grown up in a very disadvantaged community? Otherwise you would know that lots of people of your parents' age did actually go to college and indeed to uni.

Which generation are you talking about? Silent generation? Boomers? Gen X? Millennials? Gen z?

It'll be a big deal when/if your eldest gets to university, what with having been the child of a 16 year old mother who didn't go and doesn't think it's anything special.

I haven't rtft so I'm sure I'm repeating what other people have said, but I'm nearing 50 and I feel like I'm in the minority for not having been to uni. Certainly everyone went to college - I feel like it was mandatory even then?
Maybe less common in more disadvantaged areas of the UK? My parents generation would have left school early to start work.

Before the 90s

Really, you don’t see why it might be more difficult for a young person to get to uni when no one in their family has done so?

IME that’s incredibly naive. However good the school is you need a lot of support and nouse to negotiate the uni system. Whether it’s having the aspiration to go there, having the support at home to do well in exams, knowing how the system works in terms of which unis are well recognised for which courses, knowing to start extra curriculars well before 6th form so you can do a good personal statement, knowing how to pick a decent set of options for a particular course, knowing which unis are within your reach based on predicted grades, going to open days and being able to afford to go to a few, working out how you’ll afford it, having parents who know they’ll be expected to top up the fees, knowing how to find somewhere to live.

All of this is so much easier if you’ve had parents who go there and/ or other connections, such as a parent who is an alumnus of the uni you want to go to, or a family friend who is a professor. Negotiating this as a 17yr old on your own is a nightmare. Nothing to do with generational expectations, everything to do with family support and generational knowledge/ privilege.

You didn't go though. If it's such a non achievement and so easy why didn't you go?

My family was mired in poverty. I mean real poverty. In 1981, in my third year at University, we still didn't have an inside toilet (it was a porcelain bowl at the bottom of the garden), and we had to bath in a tin bath using water heated up in an old immersion heater. Even now, I luxuriate in feelings of 'having made it' when I step into the shower every morning. I've never forgotten that abject poverty and it was getting to University which changed the course of my life. I was the first to go to University in my family although ironically, my grandmother's uncles, 170 years ago, were Anglican Ministers educated at Lampeter University. I absolutely understand people who say they were the first to go to University .... for them, it might just change their life. It did mine.

My DM said "why do you want to go to university? You're only going to get married and have kids."

I was first in my family to go, but it took until my youngest brother went before any of us actually got a degree. It was hard. I didn't understand anything about why it was important to write essays even if they weren't marked. What the heck was Reading Week? What did Office Hours mean? I was clueless. I failed my second year. Eventually I transferred credit to Open University and achieved a First and then a Merit in an MSc.

My exDH's parents were both Oxbridge and pushed him hard to go to university. At one point because he hadn't gone to university at 18, they told him he could only stay living at home if he went. They set up a meeting with his dad's former tutor and he then got a a place at Oxford where he thrived and did well.

It really makes a difference.

I have two DNephews. Both in Year 11 in different counties. The son of a brother who also eventually got a degree is 15 and all set to study Maths at Cambridge. The other is 16, struggling and says university is for losers. His dad only got an O Level.

It matters.

Maybe do some basic research on social mobility in the UK and entrenched disadvantage? As a headstart, look up the report published by the Sutton Trust today (plus many of their other excellent reports). Or look up the work of Lee Elliot Major, Professor of Social Mobility at Exeter uni. Or look up the work being done by the 93% Club, Impetus and/or UpReach. Then come back on here and tell us how it is not an achievement for many to be the first in their family to get a degree.
Also, being poor or disadvantaged is not being disfunctional, how incredibly insulting and narrow minded of you to say that.

There are still lots of adults who went to university when only a small minority could, you needed serious A level grades to get in, (plus a letter of recommendation from your HT, and mine was definitely not my fan) so I'm still proud and grateful, thank you for the full grant, Essex CC -- that I went when most kids couldn't.
And of course it's much better that so many more are able to go these days. I don't feel it detracts from my achievements.

I'm 44 and my parents, like I said, both went; they had a lot of friends and colleagues their age who did too. Parents are 60s and 70s. So what era are you talking about?

🙌🙌🥰

Hard agree and youre amazing!

60s, I grew up in a normal area

God love you pet, that's not long ago at all

Both comparative examples youve given, or like bragging about a car in the 1920s or iPhone in the 2010s are materialistic and yes, distasteful. Talk of universities is about achievement and access to opportunities not had in the family before. If you're not mean spirited about it, it's nice to see this positively and celebrate the achievement.
But I suppose it depends on whether you're kind in your thinking or not 🤷

speak for yourself, my parents absolutely went to Uni, most friends I know about similar. Even our grand-parents went to Uni, where did you get "no one did"? At least the grand-fathers did go, Universities have been in existence for a looooong time (research it, you'll faint) , they had to find their students somewhere 😂

It was a huge achievement for the entire family if you came from a working class background where your parents had left school after their leavers’ certificate at 14 or 15.

I was the first in my family to go to university. I'm 51. To some extent it was expected of me by school and my parents even though they hadn't been. I never thought much of it and it's not something that crosses my mind to tell people because in no way was I held back by family expectations (or lack of). However, my DD has just started uni and I can totally now appreciate the difference in support having 2 parents who both went to uni. They have grown up always hearing that they can go in any direction that suits them, but having parents casually talking about their university experiences throughout their school life, having an understanding of the process and what it's like to go through, I think is a huge advantage for my DC over my own experience of figuring it all out for myself without any shared experiences from my parents.

I was the first in my family to go to university and I was and still am, immensely proud of myself. It took hard work and dedication to get into the uni of my choosing. It took even more grit and determination to get through 5 years of uni, and then a further 2 years training.

Neither of my parents have any qualifications and I worked a part-time job throughout my teens. Had both my parents been doctors, it would have been much easier for me! I’d have had so much more support with the application, the fees, the understanding of what going to uni entails, and the contacts. That isn’t to knock my parents (they are amazing) but there is a difference.

I don't think people are claiming it's a massive marker of strong character - but people do have a different experience if they are navigating without parental advice or experience. My parents had no idea how one chooses a university or that some were better than others or better for particular courses. They couldn't tell me how to choose a uni or a course or how to fill out an UCAS form. My school officered some help but those of us applying were very much in the minority at my school, and I don't think my school had ever sent anybody to Oxbridge.
The need to figure it all out on your own doesn't end when you get in. Balancing work and study and getting enough 'experience' to succeed after graduation is something that is tricky without advice. I'd never heard of an 'internship' or how to get one. I had no idea how to get a graduate job or what the 'milk round' was. My ds if he chooses to go to uni will have so much more contextual knowledge from mine and dh's experience to draw on than I ever did. I envy him that.

Already said because I was a young mother. I will go soon and tons of people my age have been. When back in our parents days barely anyone went. It’s not jealousy just an observation that it’s a generational difference

It’s a huge achievement. When you do go to university you will learn to critically read research and other literature, some of which will help you understand more about why this is.

I was the first person in my family to go to uni and you can damn well be sure I'll be proud of it. Even now, I'm still only the second person and I'm in my 40s.

I am from a very very working class family, where no one could afford to to. Plus everyone in my family has been much more hands on/trades kind of people.