Are we sacrificing the young to save the elderly?

[RubyandBen]

Reading another thread where someone was accusing the OP of wanting to sacrifice the elderly re CV. But the longer this goes on the more education and the economy are screwed is it actually the other way round?

@Enoughnowstop

So much hysteria. How about a bit of pragmatism and teaching young people what it means to be part of a whole society rather than looking after their own needs above all else? Sure, my teens are fed up and I can see their lives are different to mine. But my 16 year old is working and is at college, albeit online sometimes. He has made new friends and they chat online regularly. If I were to constantly tell him it’s unfair and he’s missing out and his whole future is being sacrificed for a few old people who’ve loved their lives anyway, maybe he would be more frustrated? But as it is, he accepts the situation, follows the politics and gets on with life as best he can. We discuss how we think a global recession may impact him going forwards and we think about what we can do to improve his chances in the workplace.

Personally, I would rather a young person able to see the bigger picture, ready to adapt to whatever comes next, with some compassion for the elderly and vulnerable than some of the adult-sized, feel stamping toddlers some of you seem to be rearing if these threads are anything to go by. The world has changed. Use your knowledge to,prepare your teens, not make them demanding and resentful.

Completely agree with you @Enoughnowstop

Should we be sending less of the young to Uni & concentrating on vocational qualifications?

Yes.

WTF - I don't even know where to begin with those comments on university. Learning should never be the preserve of just a few in society - and the mark of learning certainly should not be just how much money you can earn after. Societies need people with many different types of education, including the creative and arts degrees - because culturally rich and diverse societies benefit us all.

Knowledge is universal, and for a long time, access to university was just for rich, white learned men. Do we really want to go back to that? Or is it just the general hoi poloi that people want to stop going to university - not taking into consideration that so much of what we venerate as 'intelligence' actually equates to privilege.

But as the comment says, we are sending (some) kids to Uni to do airey fairy degrees when we have more pressing needs. We import a lot of Labour for roles that we could be doing ourselves. We just choose not to.

Well, that privileged era of choice could be coming to an end. Hence the government ads on retraining Ballet Dancers for the ‘big reset’ & courses in the pipeline for retraining etc.

No

It may well be that too many young people attend university now, but it will be interesting to see who we think shouldn’t be allowed to go.
It won’t be the children of middle class Mumsneters, will it?
They’ll still benefit. Naturally.

@HelloMissus

It may well be that too many young people attend university now, but it will be interesting to see who we think shouldn’t be allowed to go. It won’t be the children of middle class Mumsneters, will it? They’ll still benefit. Naturally.

I'd be happy for my DC not to go if they'd be better off in the long run doing a vocational course. In fact I'll advise them not to go to university unless they are studying a STEM degree or something with an obvious job at the end. If I could go back to 2000 I'd tell myself not to bother with my pointless BA.

@MrsFrisbyMouse

WTF - I don't even know where to begin with those comments on university. Learning should never be the preserve of just a few in society - and the mark of learning certainly should not be just how much money you can earn after. Societies need people with many different types of education, including the creative and arts degrees - because culturally rich and diverse societies benefit us all.

Knowledge is universal, and for a long time, access to university was just for rich, white learned men. Do we really want to go back to that? Or is it just the general hoi poloi that people want to stop going to university - not taking into consideration that so much of what we venerate as 'intelligence' actually equates to privilege.

You don't need to go to university to gain knowledge though. Especially not these days with so much available online.

If they can find a suitable course then I would be recommending university. Hunker down for 3 years. See what the job market is like afterwards. The worst that will happen is that they will have acquired student debt which only starts being repaid when earnings hit a certain level.

Spain was definitely re infected by the number of holidaymakers as was france both done really well enforcing masks etc.
I'm sure they were grateful the economy had restarted but look at the life and longterm medical cost.

You don't need to go to university to gain knowledge though. Especially not these days with so much available online

But university is about more than gaining functional skills and knowledge in order to get a job. It’s also about broadening horizons, gaining important transferable skills such as critical thinking (more important than ever in today’s complex and confusing world) and developing ‘soft skills’ by living independently and interacting with a range of people from different backgrounds.

I came from a working class background (first in my family to go to university). Studied Modern Languages at Bristol - highly academically rigorous but hardly the ‘vocational’ education our current government seems obsessed when. My time at university, and especially the year abroad, left me with a lifelong curiosity and love of learning and exposed me to a world I never knew existed.

I find the increasingly utilitarian approach we now have to education, and the assumption that everything can now be done equally well online incredibly depressing.

Temps,

I think that good degrees from good universities, regardless of subject, have the value you allude to.

However the Blair con that all universities were created equal and that 50% of the country is suitable for tertiary education has badly let down a generation.

We need to go for an ‘academic’ cohort (tops 20% of population) who will benefit from academic study. The rest would be far better off joining the work force at 18 and completing their studies (whatever it might consist of) while working.

@GnomeDePlume

If they can find a suitable course then I would be recommending university. Hunker down for 3 years. See what the job market is like afterwards. The worst that will happen is that they will have acquired student debt which only starts being repaid when earnings hit a certain level.

I agree. I do think there are too many universities and courses and we need a return to the polytechnics and more practical qualifications as well as more investment in FE for things like courses to be a plumber, electrician etc. But at the moment, it does make sense to hunker down for 3 years or more on a degree and then see what the jobs market is like afterwards. And those who think only STEM subjects are worth studying come over as quite blinkered to me - other subjects hone very important skills. In any event, a lot of students aren't any good at sciences/technical subjects, so what's the point of making them do something they won't be any good at?

Personally, I would rather a young person able to see the bigger picture, ready to adapt to whatever comes next, with some compassion for the elderly and vulnerable

Pity the elderly and late middle aged vulnerable didn't think of the young and their prospects when they (in general) voted for the UK to leave the EU. Not much looking at the big picture there - but blue passports and all that.

I do think there are too many universities and courses and we need a return to the polytechnics and more practical qualifications as well as more investment in FE for things like courses to be a plumber, electrician etc The trouble is, many of the former polys do do more practical qualifications building on their links with industry (my DS's maths degree from a poly was more applied and less theoretical, and his sandwich year and the applied focus of the degree stood him in very good stead in the job market) - and then they are sneered at for not being "academic"

We certainly need more support for both FE and for adult education.

Just as when, in the era of grammar schools, secondary moderns were underfunded and did not meet the needs of the children sent to them, today FE is underfunded and not meeting needs. And today's emphasis on "making the right choices" means those who didn't "make the right choices" have very little chance of turning their life around after. Availability of adult education would allow people in their 30s and 40s a second chance - and would allow those who have lost their jobs due to Covid a chance to retrain.

Pity the elderly and late middle aged vulnerable didn't think of the young and their prospects when they (in general) voted for the UK to leave the EU. Enough of both those groups voted Remain for "in general" to be inaccurate, please stop with this "you're over 60 so this is what you voted for" nonsense.

The other big factor is that 68% of those with a degree voted Remain compared with only 30% of those with nothing above GCSE. And which age group has only about 10% with degrees and many people with nothing beyond GCSE/O-level? So which is the driver, age, or lack of education? And if the latter, then sending 50% to university doesn't look quite so silly.

It is brutally unfair that the young will have a vastly different world. But that would have happened whatever we did about Covid.

'It is brutally unfair that the young will have a vastly different world.'

The words 'it's unfair' used to be mainly used by children. Life has never been fair, although the unfairness is far more intragenerational than intergenerational.

I also think that it is crazy to project from one bad year on to their entire lives. If you grew up with no internet and no mobile phones, it was very hard to predict today's world.

Who knows what the world will be like for the young-it could be infinitely better or worse.

@MummyPop00

But as the comment says, we are sending (some) kids to Uni to do airey fairy degrees when we have more pressing needs. We import a lot of Labour for roles that we could be doing ourselves. We just choose not to.

Well, that privileged era of choice could be coming to an end. Hence the government ads on retraining Ballet Dancers for the ‘big reset’ & courses in the pipeline for retraining etc.

Those adverts were beyond offensive to anyone who knows how long someone has to train for, if they want a professional job in the Arts.

If you're not convinced, imagine Lockdown without music, TV, film, or books.

@celan
“Those adverts were beyond offensive to anyone who knows how long someone has to train for, if they want a professional job in the Arts.

If you're not convinced, imagine Lockdown without music, TV, film, or books.”

Is it too much to ask though, at a time of national emergency, to ask people whose jobs are not possible at the moment (but will be in the future) to temporarily retrain and temporarily fulfill a different role for a short time instead of being paid for nothing?

I agree we need the arts and those who can still work definitely should do so, but like the airline staff who have been working in hospitals, there are probably numerous really useful short term roles they could do. In return for a regular, decent level of pay?

there are probably numerous really useful short term roles they could do. In return for a regular, decent level of pay? Hmm ... there's been a whole series of government adverts emphasising "transferable skills". You see a smiling person doing their job, then the picture morphs into same smiling person, same pose, different job. For example - Building Society advisor morphing into till operator; Waiter morphing into care assistant. One thing the destination jobs have in common - they do not attract a regular decent level of pay. They are all jobs which tend to offer zero hour contracts and minimum wage.

@larrygrylls

'It is brutally unfair that the young will have a vastly different world.'

The words 'it's unfair' used to be mainly used by children. Life has never been fair, although the unfairness is far more intragenerational than intergenerational.

I also think that it is crazy to project from one bad year on to their entire lives. If you grew up with no internet and no mobile phones, it was very hard to predict today's world.

Who knows what the world will be like for the young-it could be infinitely better or worse.

“This is unfair” are also the words used by almost any activist throughout history. We can thank people who thought ‘this isn’t fair’ for women's right vote, the equal pay act, NHS.

@Likeafriendivealwaysknown you know absolutely nothing about me or what I've sacrificed for my mother already. I moved back from abroad to help look after her 5 years ago, bringing my kids with me, disrupting their lives and making them do a transatlantic flight to see their Dad. I've fed her, and wiped her bum. She moved away from where I grew up so I moved to a place I didn't know anyone. As a result my career has been decimated as I could no longer commute. I know she would not want our lives to continue like this indefinitely. Just as I myself would not want to eek out another couple of years bedbound with dementia wearing adult diapers if it meant my children could not live their lives. You might want to think more carefully before making public judgements about other people. I responded to a request for opinion, not to be personally attacked. Get a life.

@Likeafriendivealwaysknown You sound like a horrible person. Your poor friends.

If you end up in critical care with Covid pneumonia you are almost twice as likely to die than somebody who’s admitted with a pneumonia not due to Covid - so it is still something to be worried about

That’s interesting- do you have a link?

Well Manchester is close to running out of hospital beds. Yet schools remain open even in tier 3 areas. Seems to me that tbe Govt is doing all it can to protect childrens education.
www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/greater-manchester-hospital-beds-covid-a4572070.html