DH is limiting Y12 DC to universities in the north due to ££££

[BatteredHonda]

DC is in Y12 and wants to apply to KCL, Bristol and Exeter - alongside other unis. DC will qualify for minimum maintenance loan and we are therefore expected to top up/pay the accommodation. We struggle to make ends meet as it is so DH has said DC canNOT apply to southern unis - let alone London ones. He is recommending Leicester, Newcastle, Swansea, Belfast etc instead. DC is furious but I do get where DH coming from. What are your thoughts?

I think that's definitely the case. I know an awful lot of parents that are very worried about how they will support their children at university, particularly if they have 2 or more children close together.

It's all very well saying that if you earn too much for your DC to get the full maintenance loan that you can afford it - many families at the lower end of this bracket don't have a spare £500 a month (or £1000 for 2 DC) that they can free up without doing something fairly drastic like moving house. I think we'll see an awful lot more students studying via distance learning or going to their local university (if one exists) in years to come. Going to university will go back to being the preserve of the very rich or those who can access loans and bursaries. A bit like private school but more so!

In my day, I was limited to Unis in the local city (a uni and a tech college at the time) because I could live at home and get the 7am bus there and 6pm bus home. Which was awkward as the 6pm last bus home was the opposite side of the city to my practical labs finishing at 6pm 3 days a week in 1st year.

Luckily the govt started to reduce fees so 2nd and 3rd years were half fees so I was able to get SC accom in the city (as 3 nights my labs finished at 9pm! Science is a busy course).

Younger DSibs were able to choose further afield for the same reason - fees were gone.

But it was an absolute restriction for both the 2 elders as that was all DPs could afford was for us to live at home. Drop us to the town 10
Miles away for the 7am bus and while we could walk from the village twice a week, we both had the same 3 nights we couldn't catch the last bus to village at 6pm so had to eat in college and catch the next bus to nearest town at 9pm where DPs collected us again....

It was an incredibly long and tiring year but worth it.

I'm sure there are good courses, maybe not the number 1 on adS list, but perfectly good education in the subjects he wants, in some of those. And once he's working, it is very easy to do more by night, remote learning or taking some time out. I know it's hard but perfectly doable (I've done a couple of diplomas and a masters since leaving uni with my degree).

Exeter Holland Hall £9,160 catered for 23 -24 ... just saying.

Just so I understand…it that what you need to pay for one year as well as paying a similar amount for tuition fees? So you’re paying almost £20k for a year

Yep ... that's it ... and hardly any contact hours in my DS's case. Nice view though.

Exeter - La Frowda - shared bathroom. £5,500 just sayin'...

It tends to be ex-boarding school students that opt for HH btw.

Mine ... state school to the bone ... was put in HH. We could have said no, I suppose but yes, it does attract a certain sort.

Exeter Llewelyn - £4,600.

No need to pay £9k at all.

So they chose to stay - why did they put it down in the first place I wonder? Far less demand for the cheaper accommodation.

Recollections hazy but I think it was all that was available with a late application.

I agree. You tell him how much you can afford, and he decides what he does with it.

My DD dropped out after a term. She has a loan that she has nothing to show for, and I still have boxes of stuff that was bought for her flat and was used for ten weeks.
She ended up having to start all over again and go to a local uni and a different degree.

Forcing someone to go to a uni they don't want, is going to end in tears and ££££

@redskydelight
I am slightly ? about which parents do not do any research. I get they don’t all have spare money but as Exeter shows, there are cheaper places. No one is forced to pay £9000 if they get their act together. There’s SO much info about university costs now I think it’s quite an unusual parent who hasn’t been exposed to this publicity. In fact I don’t know anyone who hasn’t thought about costs if DC look like they might go to university. Even to the extent of making sure they are on benefits and DC get a bursary at university as well as a full loan. No contribution needed at all then! It’s amazed me what research people will actually do!

I'm talking about topping up the maintenance loan to the full amount which is expected (granted, not forced) of all parents whose DC only qualify for the minimum amount. That's £1000 a month if you have 2 children who are close in age and at university at the same point.

Clearly you know different people to me - whilst some people are very clued up, an awful lot of people know there are loans, but don't realise they don't cover the full amount, or only start thinking about this when their child is in Year 11/12 and therefore have minimal time to save.

I don't think going on benefits so that your DC get the full loan is a route to be morally advised. Although one of my friends at school had parents who pretended to split up so that she got her loan based on her mum's (much lower) salary alone, so I don't doubt it's a route that some follow.

@redskydelight I agree with you. I was aware of student loans for years but it was only when one of our family friends' DD (older than other young people including our own) was going up to uni that I clocked that the loans weren't the same for everyone. You'll find that there are a lot of well-informed parents who don't have a clue until it slowly dawns on them when they start contemplating a university application with their eldest child.

Yes, it's true that better-off families have always had to supplement a minimum grant (more recently the student loan) but the difference is that in the past, student accommodation was generally a lot cheaper. If it wasn't available super cheaply in some expensive university towns and cities, Housing Benefits used to be paid to assist students!

Expecting most families to easily find an extra £6K to £10K a year to supplement a low student loan amount with spiralling costs is a challenge for most. Yes, students can get part-time jobs to help but they run the risk of impacting their academic outcomes and still having a shortfall between income/loan vs outgoings.

Indeed @titchy plus room availability there appears to exceed demand.

Whilst there is no getting away from Exeter being a white middle-class destination of choice it is pretty open and transparent about hall costs and also shows the rate of applications for each hall and room type. Plus the number of rooms available. All on the same easily found document.

Lafrowda standard room at £5.5k has an applicant ratio of less than 1. Whereas East Park en-suite self catered at just under £8k has a ratio of 2.1. Demand twice that of supply for the significantly more expensive option.

the ultimate irony for Exeter of course is that it has The Centre for Social Mobility. But seemingly pays no heed to the research emanating from it.

I don't think the state has been anything clear enough. Blair brought inthe first loans and my daughters' fees were £1k a year, their brother £3k and the twins later £9250 each a year in all cases plus having to find the rents.
Look at this from the state "up to 9978" for example. Instead it should say right up front you may well only get £4300. If parental income is very low a few people might get more. Instad it goes on and on about the maximum sums as if everyone gets them. You almost feel they should be reported to trading standards for unlawful advertising.

https://www.gov.uk/student-finance/new-fulltime-students

@Xenia you are right. It comes as a real shock and again a very blunt instrument is applied to determine the level of loan given. Particularly with some wealthier people playing the system too!

Just because you earn over £60K a year doesn't mean that you can easily find that extra £6K+ per annum (potentially for more than one DC with university overlap). You may have a sizeable mortgage, and sufficient younger dependents that a relatively modest family life is led already.

And have the loan amounts risen in line with the cost-of-living crisis? I think they may have done for the young people from the poorest backgrounds (who get the maximum loan) but suspect they won't have done for those with parents who are middle/high earners (who are essentially lumped into the same category).

The system sucks.

“”Up To”. This means exactly what it says! I know literally no one who hasn’t understood this. If DC remotely thinks about university, everyone I know has looked into what Dc might get and what they need to find. Including parents of twins! They are by no means all well off either! If Dc are bright enough for university, surely a bit more research isn’t too much to ask rather than make assumptions? I know Martin Lewis has banged on about this for years so are we really still saying no one is listening?

Parents have paid maintenance too - for decades! Decades! From at least the 1960s I think when polytechnics and other universities were built. The fees for tuition make no odds because you will get a full loan but maintenance has never been fully provided to everyone! It’s a myth that’s gained traction so it’s somehow now the “truth”. Start saving from birth!

Instead it should say right up front you may well only get £4300. If parental income is very low a few people might get more.

Average household income is under £40,000, so a student from an average-earning family living away from home would get a maintenance loan of about £7,800. It's not "a few" people who get more than £4,300: it's the majority.

If you are a first generation student, maybe studying at a large FE college where there isn't the level of application support that you get at some schools etc then the system is not necessarily easy to navigate. Also a young person may be academically clever but not necessarily at practical life admin.

I think they may have done for young people from the poorest background

@LouisCatorze they haven’t.

the lower parental earnings threshold has been frozen since 2008 at £25,000. The IFS calculated that had it increased in line with earnings it would now be closer to £35,000.

both the IFS and Russell Group identify that maintenance loans have failed to keep up with inflation, being now roughly, at the max loan end, some £1500 below the level it would be had it increased by actual inflation since 2020/21.

very different picture for students from Wales of course.

The House of Commons Library published a Student Loan Statistics research briefing just before Christmas. Briefing ref SN01079. A useful, and factually accurate, document for anyone with an interest in either, or both, areas.

But flipped the other way, it's only those with parental income of £25000 or less that get the full loan. Which means that most parents will be expected to pay something.

This is not wholly the case given the undergraduate student body is not a socio-economic representation of society as a whole.

however neither is it too far out. The published stats show an average maintenance loan of £7,000 in the most recent year analysed. It would be interesting to see the median figure of course.

however in the more rarefied environs of the higher ed board it is probably less reflective. Were aliens to arrive in the UK this afternoon on a higher education fact finding mission and only had this board as their access to information they’d probably conclude the UK had perhaps 30 universities at most. The average maintenance loan for the top quartile is likely nearer the minimum given their more skewed student profile.

But flipped the other way, it's only those with parental income of £25000 or less that get the full loan. Which means that most parents will be expected to pay something.

I wasn't arguing with that. I was arguing with the assertion that only a few students - and only those with families on very low incomes - receive more than the minimum, which is clearly untrue.