Uni choices: what you like vs what pays the rent. What would you tell a teenager?

[CForCake]

A younger relative will choose her A level subjects next year and wants to talk about university choices to me and my partner at a family event in a few weeks.

I am curious about comparing views and experiences on how other people have framed the matter of studying what you like vs what pays the rent.

My view is that (almost) any decision can be the right one if it is an informed decision.

So don't study business law or banking thinking you will get the most meaningful, creative, impactful jobs making the world a better place, but at the same time don't study gender or media studies thinking that you will get a high-paying job.

From previous conversations, this girl like STEM subjects and liked the idea of becoming a teacher.
My issue with that is that she may not appreciate that 1 or 2 generations ago a couple with two teacher jobs could buy a flat and raise a family in London, while that has become impossible now, without financial help from the family (which she won't get). She always said she's frugal and doesn't care about money, but there is not wanting a Ferrari and there is not being able to afford rent and childcare. It's easy to say you don't care about money when you don't work and everything is paid for by your parents.

If she brings up teaching again, I would mention that she needs to appreciate that being a teacher is financially very challenging in London, and might mean relocating somewhere else with a cheaper cost of living.

At the same time, I would never tell her to consider banking or law or tech just because of the money.

So what is a reasonable balance?

@OhDear111 I didn't say lawyers in general, I specifically said business law, the kind of lawyers who work 80 hours a week and make £160k or more as newly qualified.

Be careful op, it’s a good thing that she already has an idea of what to do, leading people down the ‘don’t pick this or this’ path can push them into absolute uncertainty. And nobody knows what will change or how her life might go to lead her into a job that could be better than you thought

It’s pretty impossible for our generation to pontificate and advise our young people anyway with the huge spectre of AI coming round the corner.

Dd2 loves and enjoys a particular academic subject so although it doesn’t lead to a profession like dd1s degree we’re encouraging her to go for it. She’s smart and personable with excellent interpersonal skills so will hopefully find her place in the world

Why are you critical of corporate lawyers? Negotiating and documenting large deals between companies is a useful and well paid job. Did it myself for 8 years - pretty gruelling but good way to make a house deposit in your twenties

I have STEM Alevel, degree and PhD. I trained to be a teacher aged 40 and still love it. My dream job (most of the time).

Teaching can take you around the world, Stem teachers are in demand, options like a boarding school can give you accommodation (allowing you to save). It shouldn’t be automatically dismissed.

She’s picking Alevel so in year 11. It sounds like she is going for STEM subjects. To keep breadth pick Physics, Maths and Chem.

If in 2 years she is still interested in teaching then encourage her to get a standard degree followed by a pgce rather than a teaching degree. Again more flexibility.

So it would be 5 years from now before she would be training as a teacher. A lot can change in 5 years!

I think you are over thinking this.

I’m a qualified careers adviser and now work at a university. My advice is that if you don’t have a clear career plan then choosing something you are good at and enjoy is a good start.
Re-frame indecision to open mindedness. Be willing to look at options and careers you’ve not even heard of or don’t know much about.
These UK labour market is skills based so a significant number of graduate employers look at skills and experience and are open to employing graduates from a range of subjects. Spend time understanding what skills employers value and work on developing those and thinking about how you will demonstrate them as part of a recruitment process. This is where the university careers service can really help. I advise students to engage with them as soon as they arrive. Don’t wait until your final year! Never again will you have access to a team of people whose entire job is to support you to develop your employability skills.

@TheaBrandt1

?? Where was I critical? I said:

So don't study business law or banking thinking you will get the most meaningful, creative, impactful jobs making the world a better place

and I stand by that. I didn't mean no one should do it. I said that it pays well, requires very long hours, but is unlikely to require the kind of creativity or give the kind of purpose that working in the arts might.

Again, my point was not to steer anyone towards or away from anything. My point was to ensure that decisions are informed.

It’s pretty impossible for our generation to pontificate and advise our young people anyway with the huge spectre of AI coming round the corner.

That is true, but up to a point.
I still think it would be irresponsible to say "study gender studies if that's what you like, and don't worry about job prospects because who knows what the future will hold". Which doesn't mean she should not study gender studies, it means she should do it only if she has her eyes open on realistic job prospects.

Again, my concern is that a teenager who has never lived alone may have a sense that she won't spend ££££ in clothes and clubbing, but doesn't appreciate how expensive housing childcare and "adulting" in general are.

A teacher in London will be on £50k+ within a few years if they are averagely ambitious and happy to take on extra responsibilities. 2 teachers, £100k+ income, why do you think they can't buy a flat in London?

There's slso a strong career path into Headship, if they want that with the possibility for far mor money. Plus tutoring, exam marking etc.

Whatever career path they choose, stay at the bottom and they won't make great money. Climb the ladder, and there's endless possibilities.

I would say do lots of research on what career path a certain degree could lead to. This what I feel I wish i had support with. I studied modern languages but didn’t realise i needed 2 different languages to get a wider career option. I have never used my degree and ended up working my way up through businesses instead.

Another thing I had no idea about was the need to keep up maths skills. The maths tests for graduate schemes are hard, and i hadn’t studied maths for 7 years when i was applying to these schemes.

That’s right, OP.

My (now 30-ish) kids also made lofty statements about money not being important, when they were teenagers. They both wanted to help people and make a difference.

They both went into worthy but thankless and low-paid public sector roles. After a few years they switched to much better paid corporate jobs - but they were only able to do this because they had good degrees in rigorously academic subjects from Russell Group universities.

@CForCake I take your points about adult expenses but a 21 year old doesn’t face them. The degrees that are most competitive have the best salary outcomes. Generally. I would say my DD as a barrister directly helps people. I don’t agree law doesn’t because it has to many facets.

Agsin, two teachers by age 30 can afford a property around London. Many commute like everyone else. The career structure for teachers is far better than many careers.

The ifs looked at best paying degrees a few years ago. They looked at the best universities too in terms of where to get the degree from. The results were what you might expect.

I don’t have any comment because you seem to have a pretty good grasp of the issues yourself. I suspect she has chosen you because she knows she will get some thoughtful advice.

I thought teachers got paid less, so thanks for the clarifications, very useful. Do you happen to have pay scales or other data one can look at? How much does pay vary from school to school, realistically?

The reality is that the majority of those studying law will actually find the profession is saturated and AI has already changed the landscape massively. It isn't a career you should go into thinking that if you're clever thats enough and you will get a job. You won't.

We do not need anywhere close to the number of lawyers that are being churned out. It's not a sure fire route to money.

And of course there are very very few jobs that pay £160k as an NQ. It always grabs the MN headlines but that sort of money is at very few firms, all London based and doing a particular type of law which will not suit lots of would be lawyers.

If she does a stem degree she will be employable for a wide range of jobs - including in law and finance. The fact she might change her mind about being a teacher is irrelevant because a stem degree is not vocational teacher training. If she loves it, even better - she gets to do a subject she loves and has lots of great career options at the end.

I agree, I think in principle studying something because you enjoy it is entirely valid and I love the concept. However all graduates now take on crazy amounts of debt (I’ll be paying my student loan off in my 40s) and there is a discrepancy between graduate number and graduate job numbers. I know people with degrees working in non-graduate roles.

so while there are lots of comments here saying that X knows someone who studied something for the love of it, and now has a fulfilling career elsewhere and no regrets, I’m not sure that’s the norm and certainly I know many people who that has not happened to, and they wish they studied something else or never went to uni in the first place.

@CForCake why are you expecting this teen will want to work in London? Don't the majority of uni educated professionals move elsewhere for work? its a big country out there. We don't live in London but ours is an expensive city for housing and my kids know that they may not earn enough after uni to live here ,so their choice of career will determine where they may need to live. There are plenty of degrees i would get my teens to think carefully about doing on the basis of finances but teaching isnt one of them, you are likely to easily find work somewhere in the UK (whether or not teachers recommend it as a profession is another matter entirely!!)

Look at the London payscales, plus dont forget to add on TLRs (which most teachers will get after a few years if they take on some extra responsibilities). The salary scale is pretty decent, and if they want to move into headship it can be very lucrative(but a lot of work)

https://neu.org.uk/advice/your-rights-work/pay-advice/pay-scales/pay-scales-england

You can earn pretty well as a senior teacher. Also it’s flexible you can easily take a career break then go back also you can work abroad. I know there are challenges but it’s not all doom and gloom. Hopefully quite AI proof too.

@Bahbahthe i don't expect her to necessarily work in London. My point is not that she should work in London, but that she should be more aware of how much harder it is to live in London if you do certain jobs. We go back to the point of informed decisions.

Tbf @CForCake you don't go into teaching for the money! But I do think that the pay is not that bad, certainly compares well with a lot of other post-grad or grad jobs.

Yes if you are happy to take on a teaching and learning responsibility (TLR) then your salary will go up. Unless you want to be a head (a real tough shout) tho it is likely to reach a plateau. But agree with others, it's pretty good. If I had stayed in teaching (left about 7 years ago for a creative role), even without a TLR, I would be earning more than I do now.

But I would really really caution against focusing on the pay, The reason teachers are leaving is not IMHO to do with salary. It's about workload, pressure, behaviour, lack of SLT support and the hours you have to put in. As a basic classroom teacher I typically worked 60-hour weeks – which if you were working that much in another grad role would bring in a lot more money.

I really hope she does want to become a teacher. We need more bright sciencey mathsy women teaching.

What's a K stem subject?

@CForCake we are coming from the same position then in terms of making sure teens understand the reality of life, i think i just disagree with you about putting someone off teaching on the basis of income There are far more uncertain careers to go for and vocational professional jobs are always going to be needed - and certainly AI proof.

Doing something JUST for the money sounds great, but not if you dread every single day going to work , or have no interest in the subject matter. Thats no life. Do people have to do it? Of course. But if you have the choice, and going to college is a choice, then i would, and have, advised mine to do what interests them
I agree and I also think the same applies to A Levels and degrees. If some one is doing a subject they dont get on with just because they think they will get a better paid job at the end of it then are they going to do as well as they could? Is it better to go into the jobs market with a first in music, which demonstrates creativity, commitment etc or a 3rd in economics because you read you could earn more money? No one know what AI is going to do to the jobs market over the next few years? Its already affecting IT, architecture, law, accounting etc at the lower levels.

Best approach would be to encourage her to do a gap year- no, not the travelling or constant party type but working in an environment that she's considering. So, she wants to be a teacher, maybe she could become a teaching assistant for a year to see if it is for her.
I did this with my DD, she also wanted to study English lit & become a teacher. Teaching didn't happen for my DD - she choose something else, based on working in a school. She's happy with her choice. I do believe DC need to consider the amount of debt they will accumulate, how much it cost to live as a student and if they are able to have a pt job besides studying. (Not all courses will leave enough spare time....)

One extra word of warning, DC will be put under huge pressure from their school to go uni straight after A-Levels. This is because deferring for a year will not count towards the schools % of student going uni.