Tuition fees

[stoatsrevenge]

So we are to expect a massive increase in university tuition fees, as well as increasing interest ib student loans...

Here is the 6 year plan from the LibDem manifesto:

1
Scrap fees for final year full-time students

2
Begin regulating part-time fees

3
Part time fees become regulated and fee loans become available to part time students

4
Expand free tuition to all full-time students apart from first year undergraduates

5
Expand free tuition to all part-time students apart from first year undergraduates

6
Scrap tuition fees for all first degree students

How are they going to square this one?

"I believe it is a fundamental right for a bright child to have the opportunity for a good education no matter what their family circumstances."

I rather believe that all children have a right to a good education. But that's my crazy socialism again. Would you children who don't qualify as "bright" a bad education or no education?

"And yet university take up has risen as grants have been replaced with loans, and university take up from those from poorer backgrounds was far lower when there was full funding available (in, say, the 1970s) than it is today" - partly because you now need a degree to be a teacher (not in the 70s when my mum trained - as a mature single parent); social work (not in the 90s when my DH trained as a mature student from a very poor background); nursing (not in the 80s when my sister trained as a nurse); there are fewer real training options now in terms of apprenticeships and work-based training, and I believe a lot of children go to university because they think they should/they have to because the job they want to do now demands a degree.

It all changed from the 70's. I was a school leaver back then and the % of my fellow pupils who took up uni places was very low. Usually pupils from academic families. Anyone else had low expectations ingrained into them.

All my neices and nephews went onto higher ed in the early 90's on full grants, it was now within their grasp and that culture didn't change with the introduction of relatively small tuition fees.

It remains to be seen how this will impact on the number of people wanting to go. I think such a drastic doubling of fees will make potential students think of alternatives. It won't stop my DD, she has a vocation and provided she gets the grades etc.

"partly because you now need a degree to be a teacher (not in the 70s when my mum trained"

Cert Eds were career limiting for teachers, as compared to those with degrees. Cert Eds were And a Cert Ed was a two year, and later three year, usually residential, course, so the difference between that and a degree is hard to discern (and, indeed, the BEd is little different to the Cert Ed). And for a long time, teachers with Cert Eds were second class citizens in education, especially in secondary.

Tokyo I should have said a good 'higher' education. Not everyone is bright enough to go into HE.

Xenia the £3750 is a non means-tested loan for living expenses - the maintenance loan. A grant wd also be available under Browne's proposals (£300 more pa than the current max, and on a sliding scale for household incomes up to £60K). The tuition fee loan is different. Student Loans Company hasn't yet said whether it will fund loans for degrees over a certain amount.

"It all changed from the 70's. I was a school leaver back then and the % of my fellow pupils who took up uni places was very low. Usually pupils from academic families. Anyone else had low expectations ingrained into them."

That's the golden age that people appear to want to return to: a small number of funded university places for their own children deserving "bright" children, with a large range of low-status, career limiting qualification for those not deemed worthy.

My point is, Tokyonambu, that you can't do a Cert.Ed to be a teacher (second class or otherwise)any more. It's a BEd or a PGCE. My mum's career was "limited" by having meningitis at the end of her second year.

". Not everyone is bright enough to go into HE."

That argument has been advanced every time takeup has been increased. It was claimed that there were no more bright people to be admitted when takeup was 5%.

And the distinction between FE and HE has always been vague, and the FE sector has largely been merged into HE (a lot of FE colleges became universities in the 90s, cf. Crewe and Alsager). FE included courses for plumbers and electricians.

Note that the new scheme involves no students paying fees. Instead even for part time students an agent of the government will pay the fees and borrow the money and then charge a tax to graduates on the basis of their income. Some graduates will pay nothing, some will pay less than the fees, some will pay the same amount as the fees and some more.

What is wrong with that?

"My point is, Tokyonambu, that you can't do a Cert.Ed to be a teacher (second class or otherwise)any more. It's a BEd or a PGCE. "

So what? A Cert Ed was, by the end, a three year, usually residential qualification. A BEd is a three year, usually residential qualification. And in most cases the places that offer BEds are the same buildings that used to offer Cert Eds: the teacher training colleges mostly merged into the polys, but remained as separate departments in what are now post-94 universities. If we brought back Cert Eds they would be three year, mostly residential qualifications taught within post-94 universities. How are those different from degrees?

Xenia, I have been able to provide for my family very well working for the charity. It's not a bad job for the area we live in. We have never gone hungary or cold and haven't had to wear rags. There is only DD and myself.

I couldn't afford private education, of course, but hey she has done very well so far, at the state school. So, therefore, I cannot pay uni fees upfront.

She isn't even fazed by the debt that she will gather but I would like to know what help is still going to be available. As I have said down thread we had a lovely day last Saturday at an open day and they were giving information about bursaries and now that has been blown out of the window. She will be one of the first intake that it affects and has to make application by this time next year hence me taking an interest now.

Your argument was that the take-up of university places has increased despite the introduction of tuition fees, Tokyonambu. My argument was that one of the jobs that now requires study at a university but didn't in the 1970s is teaching, which has contributed to the increase in people studying at universities. Despite your constant picking and rather arrogant comebacks, I'm still right on this one love. 'Night.

'Hungry'

Cert Eds were stopped nearly twenty years before tuition fees were introduced. I fail to see the relevance. You would have to be nearly fifty now to have taken one. Rates of takeup rose steadily throughout the eighties and nineties, during which time the Cert Ed was already dead.

tokyonambu - what are these post-94 universities you keep referring to? As far as I'm aware you have post-92 universities (ex-polys and sometimes ex-FE colleges) and the 1994 group (an elitist group having some overlap with the Russell Group, but not entirely).

I think you are talking about post-92 universities, not post-94 universities.

Sorry, my mistake. Conflating the two, I suspect!

tokyo - but also in those days nurses could train whilst earning
now they will leave with 30k debt - you still thing that degree is worth it?
Not EVERYONE IS hugely academic....maybe a move to recognise that academic ability is really NOT the only worthy trait might help here...

sorry 30k debt from fees alone

It's not an all-degree profession until 2013. And the drive to make nursing all degree didn't come from the government, although anything which helps weaken the position of power that doctors have within the NHS is always going to be attractive to centralising ministers. But nursing bodies were also obsessed with "respect" and "professionalism". The phrase "be careful what you wish for" springs to mind. This is an interesting read.

other professions are not necessarily glass ceilinged - through lack of a degree though are they ?

this article caught my eye a couple of months ago

'I state I believe in free education, I do but I believe you should only take this if you intend to contribute back to society.'

One could argue Catherine that by paying tax one is contributing to society; by creating companies and jobs in the private sector one is creating employment; contributing to society does NOT always mean working in the public sector.

Those of us who do not use the 'free' (paid for by the tax payer, there ain't no such thing as a free lunch) education available, should therefore not be expected to contribute to society? Neither should our children who do not use it?

It remains to be seen. I've only ever met one certified accountant, and he always complaining that his chartered colleagues were the only people who would be offered partnerships. The situation may be different now. Cert Eds were less well regarded in teaching. There were all sorts of routes into the law that didn't involve degrees, but led to an officers and NCOs structures. Ditto, I think, architecture. I think claims of non-degree routes that don't have glass ceilings are a long-term punt on the reversal of a long-term trend.

The Browne review though has not said what will happen to professional training on govt contracts (such as undergraduate nurses, doctors, social workers) - I suspect the funding arrangements will be different, as they are now...?

The quickest and best route to chartered accountancy is to go into it at level 2 (GCSE's) to do AAT then do ACCA, some training firms want you to join after A levels but it's possible to do AAT after GCSE's. A degree is a wasted few years as far as accountancy is concerned.

I wonder about nursing requiring a degree. If one is capable and required to study for 3 yrs for a degree then why not do a further 2 years and go into doctor training? I think a lot of future nurses are thinking this way atm.