Students living at home - maybe an expected but saddening trend

[mids2019]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4g09p93m29o

Anecdotally this is really becoming a thing and due to costs students are eschewing the whole student experience of living away from home. As well as cost savings I think there is a perhaps savvy realisation that being thrown into a house or hall with strangers is maybe a step too far from an exploratory point of view. No one wants to be quiet one in a party flat or corridor for instance. In addition I think parents of girls fully realise some of the dangers of being away from home for an extended period perhaps for the first time combined with plenty of access to drugs and alcohol is not perhaps the safest.

However could the prospect of university just being an extension of school from a living point of view limit social mobility with students preferring a home town university to one some distance away with a better reputation?.Does work need to be done (and ideally in some fantasy world funded)_to ensure working class kids are not being put off well regarded unis because of distance?

I thought it meant three hours each way. 90 mins is nothing. I would expect that to be a zone where people stayed home instead of going into halls.

That is still quite a zone though. I do know relatives of mine who have university aged children are quite happy their children are not going to into halls. Partly because of cost but mainly though a sense of protectiveness. Strangely it is partly due to parents looking back at their student days with retrospective alarm and maybe not wanting their children to have a similar experience (but hypocritical in my opinion).

My dd is at home. She didn’t want the expense and isn’t a party girl.

I on the other hand left home and had a ball.

As pp, I left home for uni and had a ball, going to clubs 3/4 nights a week. Luckily I was never offered drugs and I was never into multiple boyfriends/one night stands.
My DD has stayed at home out of choice as she doesn’t drink, hasn’t had/doesn’t want a relationship, and goes to bed at 10pm. I’d actually be concerned for her MH if she went away and lived in.

I think living away from home for university is valuable. DD1 is two hours away and her horizons have widened due to this. We started saving for the possibility when she was a baby though, and I'm glad we did because it's very expensive. We had to discourage her from a London course due to the costs but that was the same decades ago when I was looking at degree courses. Both DH and I lived in halls then shared houses and view it as a protected way to develop independence. We've both benefitted from lifelong friendships with housemates. If parents are worried about a quiet DC in a 'party' flat then many universities now offer quiet accommodation and try to group people who need this together.

I deliberately chose a university where I couldn't live at home (I turned down Imperial in favour of Sheffield, who were number 1 &2 for my course). My home life wasn't bad, just claustrophobic.

With the cost of accommodation etc these days, its a logical choice for many.

Out of my daughter’s friendship group of 12. 6 of the girls regret moving away to go to university. They haven’t found it to be the amazing experience they hoped for. They already had a big friendship group, they live in a big vibrant city already and all they are really getting is more expense. 4 of them are choosing to commute from home next year as a consequence. They get about 4-5 hours of lectures a week so their view is what is the point is spending all that money when they can stay at home and catch up the work from the recordings and materials online. My daughter is choosing to stay but she is studying a professional programme with placements so needs to be closer.

I’m a single parent of 3 including twins - I mention the twins part to demonstrate the financial impact of supporting 2 children through uni at exactly the same age.

i just can’t and won’t ever be able to afford it - great for those that can afford to save money each month but that’s out of the reach of a lot of families

wr do however live within commutable distance of upwards of a dozen very good unis and so I’ll be offering my children to stay home

i don’t think the halls experience is worth it

I teach at a uni and see lots of students staying at home nowadays. Partly because accommodation is scarce and expensive, partly due to family dynamics/speficic religious backgrounds and partly because some students are not very outgoing and prefer the safety of the family home.

There is a ‘commuter student’ society that organises get togethers and things like board games evenings (which might speak to the perceived personalities of students who live in the family home).

Equally, I have met local students who choose to live in halls for the experience and students who technically live at home but seem to spend most of their time partying in friends’ halls. As long as they have opportunities to meet their tribe, they should have a good experience.

There’s quite a bit of group work in first year on one of the modules I teach on and I try to group students mindfully after a few weeks of noticing their personalities as there are always a few students who stand out as being a bit unsure of themselves and maybe a bit lonely (often students living at home). I love it when I see them bonding with the group mates and turning up to class together, in conversation, rather than shuffling in alone looking nervous.

I know OP is not saying this, but I do find the view of some (very often white, middle class) parents and teachers that if a young person does not leave home for university, often thrown into a flat with total strangers in a city they have barely visited before, their social, emotional and metal development is somehow incomplete.

Living at home while in university is a much more usual choice in Europe and Australia (probably elsewhere too) and I certainly do not find that my French nieces or Australian goddaughter have any smaller a world view than my English DD who has moved two hours from home. It has worked well for them financially, academically. They travel in the holidays, keep their local relationships and work jobs locally.

DD2 is looking to study in London and she will absolutely commute in, because it’s almost becoming the norm in London universities and because much of the accommodation is grim, extortionate and not near the university anyway. With the money she has saved, take a year abroad, probably studying in Germany or Scandinavia, which I think will expand her horizons just as much as three years in a flat in, say, Aberdeen.

For some young people, and for some courses, of course moving away is the right thing to do. But for many young people, especially those with neurodivergence, medical or mental health needs, I think living at home can be a really positive choice.

Mine are hours away and I’ve always thought the main point of university is learning how to be independent and that it’s important.

However University has really changed. It’s horrendously expensive, far too many kids go and so there’s no longer any real competitive advantage to going, online lectures mean they don’t bother to show up and social media means a very large number of them don’t interact properly when they get there and so the whole “find your tribe” ridiculousness is misleading and leads to high expectations which are then crushed and lead to much higher levels of drop outs.

The system is failing. Staying at home and going to whichever university is closest (most people in the country will have a university within an hours commute) is the norm in Europe and in Australia. It will I suspect become the norm here eventually since why would you spend £8k a year when your course only runs for 22 weeks and the lectures and even the exams are all online?

I think there are pros and cons to living at home/ away.

But the idea that living away is the norm is very UK centric. Many, probably a majority, of European students stay in the family home. And many US students
tattend local colleges for bachelors degrees.

My DC attended an expensive private school so their school friends don’t have an issue with budget. Even so a surprisingly high number of them have gone to the local university and are living in halls in year one and then at home for the later years. It’s a really good compromise.

My ds is staying in our home city for uni and will be staying with me. His choice. It is a very popular uni city. It would be different if we lived in a small town and he had to commute.
His whole life is here, he has a lot of friends and hobbies, and a decent paid part time job 5 minutes from home that will hopefully see him through uni. Plus he doesn't want to get a ton of student loans and end up in debt. He'll pay me some keep from his part time job. I am a single parent and couldn't afford to fully support 2 adults.

It doesn't surprise me, given costs of going to Uni, low contact hours in many courses, and online resources making a physical library redundant in many cases. As pp have pointed out, halls are an absolute lottery in terms of who you end up with and there are horror stories both ways (people stuck with someone who is on their decks until 3am every night when they are on a 9-5 timetable and people looking for a social life stuck with people who emerge only to shower or cook with their headphones on). Plus, smartphones have completely transformed how YP socialise (probably not for the best but cant uninvent them so it is what it is) and have massively cut down how much time they are likely to spend just talking to their course/hall mates IRL vs maintaining their snap streaks with friends from home.

There's also the fact that current 18 year olds are probably 2-3 years behind 90's 18 year olds in terms of personal development and many havent really transitioned their relationship with their parents from parent-child to adult-adult, so far fewer are actually ready to successfully navigate peer to peer relationships in communal living. That's not their fault, although it is problematic for the whole Uni model which is designed to educate adults but is now spending huge amounts of resources providing support that they wouldn't have had to 30 years ago.

The main problem with the trend as I see it is that the UK has a pretty clear hierarchy of Unis, unlike somewhere like Australia where they are regarded more equally. It could be that the trend to commuting will even out the UK Unis somewhat but in the meantime it's likely that some YP will end up at a Uni that somewhat underplays their abilities and that could have a knock on effect on social mobility. It also makes a YP less likely to be prepared to move for a grad job (although this could be correlation rather than C&E) which is likely to become more necessary, especially in high paying sectors.

So I'm firmly on the fence on this.

The impact of living with people from across the UK, and across the world, living in halls - and being on campus with even more from every type of social and economic class from many countries was worth far more than she is saving in my opinion. And then having that early development living away from home with many others doing the same, and with unique support, is also a great experience to have. As an important part of the development of the entire university experience as the qualification you end with. And a one off chance to ever experience those aspects!

But it is up to them, and in some cases they might genuinely struggle either with the environment, or financially as things have really become expensive - although eating cheap, and the rent and all costs included in halls, tends to make it almost always possible with student loans for at least for one year.

Uni as three years of partying is a relatively recent phenomenon. I went before student loans existed. I got a grant but it paid for my room and about half a bus ticket. (London). My parents refused to contribute a penny so I worked all the way through. It was a balance of clinging to an existence while finding time to study. Those three years were the most grueling of my life. There was no time or money for partying, drink or drugs. No real opportunity to get myself in to trouble, but I managed to graduate.
My ds will go this summer and I am determined will have a better.time than I did. He's carefully researched the best mix of rated degree/cost of living/cycle-based University to minimise his costs. He has a Saturday job with a large leisure company and has already arranged a transfer so he can continue to work when he moves in September.
So he will go, have fun, gain independence. He doesn't drink, smoke and is sensible so I'm fairly relaxed about it.

17 years ago, I stayed home and commuted to uni. Tbf, I wanted to live in halls but they didn't have enough room for everyone. I didn't know that when I applied! I spent weeks trying to find a house share before I started, but that was difficult because I didn't know anyone to share with.
I don't feel I missed out on anything though. I saved money and spent my evenings and weekends with friends from school who also hadn't moved away.

Really interesting post. I forgot to mention that the internet has revolutionised society and learning with online resources becoming more prevlalent.

I guess we have modelled the concept of university on Oxbridge where students for centuries have come together in academic communities and so there is lot of historical affinity for the student living in halls model but maybe technology and changing society has disrupted this?

I have two daughters and always imagined them living away from home but I am slowly changing my perpective.

It's not just that there are no grants. The cost of the accommodation itself has skyrocketed. When I went in 1996 there was a good range of accommodation for £40 per week for a single room. Now you'll struggle to get something for less than £160 weekly, and incomes certainly haven't quadrupled over the same period.

My DC was massively fortunate to get into a university which still has plentiful cheap accommodation, for which I thank my lucky stars most days.

Since you mention Aberdeen, just to point out, living at home remains more common in Scotland as well as Europe. Also in NI and at the Welsh universities there are more commuting students.

This is also true of London universities and those in big cities.

I do agree that the partying student trope is fading (don't know about the US). I think this about cost but also I think modern students are a little more conservative with alcohol and thinking back to my student days for girls/young women I do think there is a safety aspect to this with women being very much focused on potential assault etc.

Maybe the loan system needs an overhaul so those who don't live near at appropriate university can access more funds.

Oh come on. I went in 92 and spent three solid years partying then cramming for exams the night before.

the problem is social media and child development. They do not socialise in the same way and expect everything to be done for them. DS2 is super friendly. He has always had a gift for being able to make friends very quickly. He is in a flat of 10. In the first week they all made an effort and got on well and he thought it would be great. By week 3 the flat was tense and fractured with one person demanding absolute silence in the evening and having screaming meltdowns if someone left stuff out in the kitchen. Another tried to dictate what the whole group did all the time and got angry if she couldn’t control the group so made herself very unpopular very quickly. Four others barely leaving their rooms and on their phones and games consoles all the time. Two are international and interact mainly with others international students. Two have just started hanging out with friends elsewhere or from home who attend the same uni (including DS) since it’s not enjoyable being there. They are all polite to one another but it’s not a nice environment to live in. It’s misleading to tell kids they will find their tribe and it will be the best time of their lives. It leads to massive expectations which then unfortunately can lead to massive disappointment.