If your 17 year old wanted to take a day off school to attend the student funding march on Wed would you condone it

[mrswoodentop]

What it says really,ds1 ,17 ,very politically aware wants to attend.Its a school day,independent school so I need to write to say we are authorising him to have a day off.

Dh violently against ,very angry with me for even thinking about it ,treats ds like a naughty little boy.I am more ambivelent,I am proud of him for feeling strongly (dh thinks that because he wouldn't go on his own that he just wants a day off school with his friends),I think that this issue is going to have a profound effect on his life and in a way I am quite proud of him for wanting to have a voice, also proud because he has thought carefully about the issues and wants to hear both sides and yes he wants to experience something big ,something new,to be there if you like.But and and its a big but he has to have day off school,he's not a definate oxbridge candidate ,his grades aren't perfect he can ill afford to miss a lot of school,but one day? I don't know,dh has said no and he's agreed so I suppose its over but perhaps we are doing him a diservice (sorry not sure of spelling)

If we lived any further south I would be actively encouraging my DD to go and join in. I would be going too.

I agree it is a good move that youngsters and taking notice in politics again, they don't have a choice atm.

Well he could 'toe the line' and go to school as normal - or; he could be an independent young man who is voicing something which directly impacts on his future.It will give him the opportunity to join with other young people his age in comradeship- and possibly act as a source of extra info. It's only one day - which if the protests are successful could result in years of debt reduction. I would call that 'time well spent'.

My 17 year old DD has gone - the school actually encouraged students to go and make their voices heard.I am very proud that she and her classmates feel strongly enough about this to do something about it,hope you're listening Nick Clegg.

My DD is 15 so is too young to attend (and travel to London), if she was older I would let her go with my blessing.

It all seems to have kicked off

Hope any of your DC are there are safe and on the way out of there/away from the trouble

When I was 17 I attended poltical events and marches. My parents did not always know, sometimes just saw me on the front cover of the local newspaper

It's not really a good idea to have kids that young thinking that the government/public owes them something.

My dad in america came from a very poor family (his parents were illiterate unskilled southern italian immigrants). He worked 3 jobs to put himself through a top university. And after that he worked one part time job and one full time job to pay for his Masters (MBA). No social life for him back then! Now he is a former bank president who has retired very very well. And the undergrad and postgrad schools he attended back then were a heck of a lot more expensive than the universities in the UK.

My dad's sister's husband came from the same background. It took him 8 years to pay his way through a top school but he did it and lived like a pauper for nearly a decade. Now in his 60's he is rich as all hell. Has been since he was about 35.

My stepfather worked 2 or 3 jobs while he was at university and paid his way through undergrad and grad school. Also from a very poor background in the States.

These guys wanted their kids to have the same kind of work ethic. My cousins, step siblings and myself all were expected to go to university and pay for it ourselves without whining for help from either our parents or the government.

We would have looked like losers if we had done anything else. I would go to class for 8 hours and then work for 8 hours every day and I paid my tuition that way. On school holidays I worked 12 or 16 hour days. My two step sisters put themselves through school doing the same thing. It is GOOD for kids to do this. I may not have had decent clothes or nights out but I wasn't a debt ridden whinger thinking that the government owed me something either.

I am glad I left the UK because getting taxed to pay for someone elses education after doing all that simply sucks. Seriously, who wants to pay for these kids to sit on a playstation when they are not in class rather than working?

Someone needs to tell these college age kids to get off the wii, the ipods, stop going out binge drinking and buying expensive label clothes. Focus on nothing but work and study for 5 years or so. If they do that they will make it. Glad I got my DC's out of the UK. Hopefully they will grow up with more of a "can do" attitude.

Yeah I know I am going to get flamed.

Lovesthechoas, your second last sentence sums it up, we are getting taxed to pay for a decent education, hello!

You are glad you left England. You did the right thing.

If the people I described in my post had been taxed all their working lives to pay for their own education as well as everyone else's they never would have done as well. I would rather work like a dog paying my own way through school and then being free afterward rather than paying taxes all my working life for it. Screw that.

"Someone needs to tell these college age kids to get off the wii, the ipods, stop going out binge drinking and buying expensive label clothes. " You could tell my dd that but as she has never done any of those thigs she might be a bit confused.

"Someone needs to tell these college age kids to get off the wii, the ipods, stop going out binge drinking and buying expensive label clothes."

unfortunately some of themn have got off their Wiis, and are now outside Millbank Towers. There may even be some lecturers there with them. On thing's for sure, there are an awful lot of progressives out there.

I am in favour of education being totally free. I'm not a fan of the US system, which seems to be the type of thing that Labour and the Coalition having been trying to bring in here. But LovestheChaos does make a good point about responsibility. In the US the students are more responsible, not like the progressives outside Millbank Towers.

Yeah you all make good points. The prospects for a new grad in the UK right now ain't good. When I was leaving uni the world was my oyster because I sacrificed to go there. I think that the new grads now can look forward to asking people if they want fries with that.

My stepson is telling me just now on facebook that it isn't the student rioters who are getting out of control but anti government protesters who have joined in.

My definition of a progressive is a left-wing socialist. The sort of "students" and "lecturers" chanting "Tories out". The Labour party's slogan at their party conference was "building a progressive future." If it looks like what is happening outside Millbank Towers, then I'm out.

Your stepson is right. It's the "anti government protestors" (the progressives). They interviewed one of the protestors on the roof of Millbank Towers. She is not a student and said that she is a fulltime protestor against the cuts, and apparently that is her paid job for her. Which progressive organisation is paying for her to campaign fulltime and to climb on the roofs of buildings?

'so right wingers would be 'regressive' then'

No, they would be sensible, law abiding, upright citizens

I hope the DCs of everyone here get home safely tonight.
So sad it has gone this way.