How is your child covering tuition fees?

[Carrythelight]

I'm trying to calculate to what extent we (exH) can help fund DS through uni. The thread 'how much do you give your child at uni' has been extremely helpful, but nobody mentions how tuition fees are being funded. Many of DS's friends' parents are apparently covering them (and accommodation and even living expenses) - but is this really the norm?

I'm not in a position to cover fees and accommodation (he's eligible for min ML and will get a job), however I could extend my mortgage. Do people do that?

For other parents, the Telegraph article only applies to Plan 2 where the interest rate is variable. It does not apply to Plan 5 which is currently in place.

You could say the same for insisting everyone stay in school until they are 16. Or letting people do a degree in medicine and then give up, or go part time. Is that worth the cost for society? If there were stricter terms on cost and repayment, would you get enough people willing to sign up to it at all when they are only 18 years old? Or would it become a wealthy person’s game again?

Those are definitely questions worth asking and looking at the evidence around.

Imvho, it was wrong to sell a degree as the best way of boosting your lifetime income, as though there was a direct and indisputable link between degree status and skills for employment, as opposed to socioeconomic background and employment. Of course there is a problem when there is no longer so much social cachet in having a degree and it becomes a must-have for no better reason than that so many people now have university degrees that leaving school and training at 18 is the new leaving school at 14, but at the same time, employers are no longer willing to fork out on training employees themselves, because they think someone else should have been doing that for them for the last 21 years. You end up with lots of graduates who did not go to university to learn to think for themselves (and therefore didn’t…), but went because they just felt the need to jump through another hoop, and lots of employers wondering why their employees are asking what hoops they need to jump through, now.

@Walkaround Define “enough”. 2024 entrance rates? 2010? Pre 1992? When was “enough”. We have had issues funding an expanding HE sector for decades. No one disputed the need for a higher educated workforce but it’s long been the case that young people and their parents think that a degree leads to a better income and that’s what they want. Not getting that does lead to disappointment. It’s surely the least well off that need the jobs as opposed to the luxury of learning for the sake of it? Or no social mobility at all.

We have expanded HE by apprenticeships (not enough were going to 18 year olds) and many employers train beyond the degree. Try being a chartered engineer or architect without employer training. Or a lawyer or getting CIPD for example. Not possible. There’s an apprenticeship levy on employers and don’t forget poorer people get bursaries at some universities too. My DN used hers for holidays and driving lessons on top of full maintenance loan. So more than many students got and no need to work. The squeezed middle is where the bigger problem is and I think it’s these people who do need to consider value for money as parents are funding a lot. The IFS has decent guidance on this.

Its certainly an issue regarding where the least well qualified A level candidates and degree holders go and how well do they do in the jobs market as RG plus are still leading the way. Careful evaluation is therefore a good idea in terms of where a degree might get the holder. Facts should be available so dc make informed decisions and choices match aspirations.

@TizerorFizz - enough is clearly what society is willing to bear the financial cost of. And actually, many people clearly do dispute the need for a “higher educated workforce,” because there is no actual consensus on what being “higher educated” really means and should mean, given that an awful lot of employers seem to dispute that the requisite skills, knowledge, resilience and resourcefulness have been acquired by many young people as a result of more years in education.

@Walkaround I agree about employers not getting people who can train on and do the jobs. Not all degrees are evidence of a good work ethic or useful skills. Often grads haven’t paid attention to being employable. They are ok at getting the degree but have ignored personal development and skills needed at work.

I don’t think society as a whole knows what it wants. Some degrees are falling out of fashion and some degrees are, if anything, too popular. This is due to universities having to maximise bums on seats instead of quality and any meaningful evaluation of what we need by any government. At the moment universities decide on their offerings. Some do of course design degrees alongside employers but lots of degrees at low ranking universities seem to have no reason to exist and have poor employment outcomes. Students pay or borrow the same for these as Oxbridge! I know that was never the intention but it’s happened.

A very significant problem with tuition fees is it turned universities into retail spaces where success was measured by number of products (courses) sold and degrees designed to attract students not meet the needs of employers or the country at large.

In other words, in the long run, universities do not get to mould the future academics they want, because a significant proportion of their —students— customers no longer particularly want to learn those skills or stay in academia, but they do want to purchase a product they think will help their employment prospects and the universities need the money, so are increasingly diverted from their central purpose; and other employers do not get the future employees they want, because universities do not, and never did, exist to churn out oven-ready employees for the commercial sector (although polytechnics often did a pretty good job of this). Meanwhile, the consumer begins to realise that choosing any subject they think they could tolerate studying for three years even if they are not academically inclined, then complaining about the way their degree is being taught and insisting it be customised so as to suit them and their learning style and get them a good mark at the end of it, is no longer seen as a sign of amazing employability in the job market, it just makes them look less unemployable than people who went straight into unemployment when they were 18?

@ViolasandVioletsPost 92 expansion of the University sector could not be afforded by the taxpayer/government. The Cons unleashed the hounds of university expansion and they gobbled up all HE. All of the HE colleges and polys became universities. A casual glance at the foot of the quality table will show some universities that should have stayed as much broader HE colleges meeting local employer demand.

When we get 38% of young people going to university, is it fair to charge the average worker and taxpayers for the whole cost? We had to have loans. Back in 1992, a university education really did mean higher earnings and a boost to productivity. The earnings advantage has been steadily eroded due to competition from abroad and by our own students due to sheer numbers. Only the employers who are highly selective with vast numbers applying pay grads well. Many grad starting salaries have been static for years. Obviously not all but for many it does not feel like the degree pays off.

It’s unfashionable to say the sector is bloated but many universities are too big and now they owe £billions. Students are stuck in the middle. They believe they need degrees (many do) but there is a need for better guidance on what course and where. Not MN parents of course!

The local poly was well known for churning out identikit grads to meet local employer demands. Though both student and employer have now changed and it no longer is what it was in that respect. But that was a crucial difference between polys and universities which were principally research establishments. HE colleges tended to be much more specific in their provision to meet needs of specific sectors. Turning them all into universities ignored the value of these different identities and meant they started to compete for students with subjects like Law - which students misleadingly think provide equal access to the legal profession.

@ViolasandViolets When I went to a poly, loads of us didn’t do degrees. They were available but many didn’t need them to access processional qualifications. So we didn’t bother. I found being taught by people who had worked in business to be very valuable. Not sure I had an identikit qualification but it was a great launchpad for me and I was as good as any graduate. Well almost!

Loan for the tuition fees
We paid the accommodation fees
They took the maintenance loan to live on (food, toiletries, clothes, travel, going out, sports etc etc)
During the holidays they lived back at home with us. I fed them and they worked retail and catering jobs to pay for anything they needed and saved up for any trips eg the uni ski trip

That is my point. Polys had their own identify and purpose that was distinct from universities. They trained for professional qualifications and employer demands (the local identikit graduates were in high demand from local employers because they were trained according to industry requirements).

Obviously I meant professional qualifications! Identikit means boring and no character. I actually think what was studied and the different perspectives of the lecturers made it not identikit. The practical knowledge I was expected to have and how I applied the knowledge was useful on the course and at work. I don’t understand why this style of learning was jettisoned.

Students are stuck in the middle. They believe they need degrees (many do) but there is a need for better guidance on what course and where.

I am recruiting at the moment. I had to fight my HR department to remove "a degree in a related subject" from the job listing as while the role needs a certain kind of person with a certain skillset, it does not need a degree. Part of the problem with young people feeling that they MUST have a degree, is employers needlessly making this a requirement of a job.

@CandiedPrincess Absolutely correct. A decent jd should inform what skills you need on the person spec. Not the lazy shorthand of a degree. However there might be times when the skills developed via a degree are what you need but eventuating of the skills needed will tell you this.

And the problem with making a degree a requirement, it's a tick box exercise which means if you don't have a degree - even if you have a wealth of experience - you won't get past the first sift from the applicant tracking system.

It does depend on the job, of course. I couldn’t do my current job without a STEM degree. It’s always been a requirement, it is certainly not a recent thing. People who were retiring when I started out had to have one, new recruits still need one. Therefore, I’m perfectly happy to support DS doing his STEM degree (as it happens, he’s doing the same one I did 30 years ago). I can definitely see the value.

Yes absolutely @OublietteBravo no doubt about it, my DD is at uni doing a STEM course - she can't follow her chosen path without it and will need to do a PhD most likely, but I'd hazard a lot of jobs don't need a degree. When I was first into the world of work, a lot of the jobs that are now requiring degrees, were on-the-job training, with a college course to get a qualification.

@@CandiedPrincess Lots of people doing sciences needed a degree. DH did engineering. A huge slog to get anywhere and limited career prospects without one. However there are other careers where a degree doesn’t prove much.

The big bit of work that needs doing is why grads don’t get grad level work: are they unable to meet job requirements or are they not really bothered about getting a grad job or are there simply too many grads? Even with employers saying they want grads, plenty don’t get grad level work. I’d like to know why.

We certainly seem to have been churning out loans to fraudsters from Romania wanting the free money but not studying https://news.sky.com/story/investigation-launched-into-student-loan-fraud-allegations-13334503 "Most of the suspected incidents are believed to be at "franchised" universities - colleges paid to provide courses for established universities - and officials are concerned there is "organised recruitment" of Romanian nationals, the Sunday Times reported.
The investigation into the system came after the Student Loans Company noticed suspicious applications involving fake documents, it said."

Tuition Fee Loan the same as the vast majority of people I know.

Why wouldn’t they when it seems so easy to do with little risk?

Not RTFT yet but often the replies on this board are skewed.

Many of DS's friends' parents are apparently covering them

I would say the majority take out the loan for tuition fees. And use the maintenance loan for rent which is topped up by parents who also give an allowance.

So DD gets the minimum maintenance loan and once we've topped up her rent, we give her £40 a week for food. We pay for her travel card & phone.

She has a part time job to fund her social life but lots of students struggle to get work (her employer lets her switch between restaurants when she's home and at uni).

If we could afford it, I would cover tuition fees and not have her take any loans because the interest rates are scandalous. But I'm not extending my mortgage or stopping my pension contributions to do so.

Just speaking up for the normal parents!

Why would an interest rate that is set at inflation be scandalous @TheSecondMrsTanqueray ?