Want your children to be able to go to uni?

[GreatAuntLoretta]

I am really feeling the urge to join the NUS protest against tuition fees on Thursday 9th December. Although my children are both under five, I am really really upset and annoyed to think that if they want to go to university in the future we will be very unlikely to be able to afford to send them. Who knows what the fees will be by then?! Also when my children are a little older I would really like to have the opportunity to retrain and do a degree. That would be completely off the cards. (angry)

Is anyone else with young children thinking of attending? It would be good to stick together with some other parents. A large group of parents will probably be a lot safer than a random woman with a buggy and a toddler in a mass crowd.

Who is with me?

Is there already a family protest group out there?

Sorry to repeat myself - but not even Labour are proposing to raise taxes to cover the cost of student tuition.

It looks like a choice between graduate loans or graduate taxes. Either way - the graduates pay.

Dreaming - I guess there is nothing to stop a university staggering the fees increase if it can afford it.(they are being given the authority to set the fees level).

As to Wales - they are diverting other HE funds to subsidise tuition fees. And, as far as I can see their Universities will be less well funded as a result. Especially if there is a drop in English students attending them.

I've got a horrible feeling it's going to to get voted in .

There seem to be two views current:

1 that we are putting too high a proportion of our young people through university (graduates come out and can't get graduate jobs; few people do apprenticeships these days)

2 that the cost of giving all of these people a university education is too high for the taxpayer.

The latter suggests that we should cut the costs of university funding and the former suggests that we should cut the numbers of people going to university.

Why don't we cut the numbers of people going to university, and thereby cut the cost of university funding by restricting it to the more academically able?

The route we are going down just now is being sold to us as a way of making the user pay, which it may well do, but its effect will be to greatly reduce the numbers of people going to university by cutting out those who come from a background where taking on £60k to £80k of debt before you have a job is regarded as bonkers, rather than cutting out the less academically able. The less well off and those lower down the social scale where they don't have the confidence that they will get a good enough job to be able to pay off that debt and buy a house will be the ones who are cut out of university from now on. What happened to meritocracy?

RRocks

I think the Government will win the vote on Thursday which as a Liberal supporter makes me feel a little uncomfortable.

granted - in a (much earlier) reply to me you posted.

• "I personally would prefer education fees to be 100% funded by the state (maintenance costs only for the v poorest)"

Well wouldn't we all - in an ideal world? But it's only an option if you can fund it from tax.

jackstarlightstarbright - I think you're extrapolating from that higher taxes - I'm not really recommending higher taxes (except for the v v rich, possibly); I'd prefer a greater focus on cracking down on corporate tax avoidance, for example. 6 bn from Vodaphone, say, would plug a pretty big hole in the education budget.

The protests by UKUncut - not reported or discussd on Mumsnet, I suppose because it doesn't particularly involve kids/families directly, in the way that tuition fees do - mirror my views.

RRocks - and...?

Of course that's what the Tories want to do.

They want to ensure that only the rich can get to university, however stupid they may be, by removing all competition from bright but poor students.

Isn't that obvious?

I suspect we will end up with a two or three tier system with:

Cheap universities for the poor (used to be called Technical colleges)

A middle tier for most of the others.

And a top tier (Russell Group) for the well off and well connected so the sons & daughters of the "superior classes" dont have to mix with their supposed social inferiors.

As David Lammy MP (Labour) has shown today Oxford had fifteen "road shows" at Eton and Marlborough and none at all in Tottenham.

Brasenose college (Oxford)"call me Daves" university has not had a black pupil for five years and all the Oxford Uni's did not take one black student this year.
Add

I say pupils from Public Schools should take second place to state school pupils if they have the same A grades.

This will help balance the "old school tie" and the advantages a public school education gives including the training to smarm in at uni interviews

Don't the top universities look at more than simply the a level grades though newwave.

huddspur, yes they do and that is partly the problem.

Toffeenosedgit from Eton is trained to pass the interview and has all the advantages and confidence money can buy.

Johny with the same grades from Bog Standard comp probably has none of the above so if they have equal grades Johny should get in before Toffeenosedgit because if Johny has to overcome hurdles (bigger clsses) etc

I don't think it is a problem to be honest, the russell group universities also tend to look at ways that a potential student has shown an interest outside of school and oxbridge make a lot of decisions based on interview performance.

I think simply equating a level grades is too simplistic, also would you put someone who'd been to a comprehensive over someone who had been to a state grammar etc.

I think simply equating a level grades is too simplistic, also would you put someone who'd been to a comprehensive over someone who had been to a state grammar etc.

To a degree yes I would, I would give a "points" advantage to those getting equal grades who overcome the disadvantages of larger classes, poor home life, low waged parents etc.

oxbridge make a lot of decisions based on interview performance. Yes and Public School pupils are trained to do well in them this does not tend to happen in comps.

I am not saying that Toffeenosedgit should not get into the top unis only that if it is a tie the state school pupil should get in first

didn't Labour try to enforce this to favour state school pupils over private. Not sure if it went through in the end

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1030415/Universities-ordered-favour-state-school-pupils.html

claig, yes Brown did his nut over a Girl from a state school who had brilliant grades who did not get into Oxford but got into Yale or Harvard (not sure which) and also about the percentage of students from Public schools.

He accused the Uni of bias against state schools which David Lammy MP seemed to confirm today with Oxbridges entrance stats.

She wanted to do Chemistry I think.

Yes I remember her. Brown jumped in.

Some people do have an advantage because they are prepped for the interviews.

Some people do have an advantage because they are prepped for the interviews.

If you take that view then Public School pupils do have an unfair advantage and should be offset by giving the place to a state pupil with equal grades.

Why should preparing for an interview be frowned on, surely its the sensible thing to do and preparation for university interviews was done at my school and I went to a state school.

Hudd, then you were lucky not many state schools do that, certainly my Son's school did not.

As for frowned upon not sure I said it should be only that the advantages of wealth and a public school education should be taken into account.

I see my position as entirely reasonable, equal results state goes first or do you think bought advantage is ok

I believe that we should trust universities and admission tutors to choose who they think is best suited to study at their university.
I don't believe in central Governments dictating university admissions from Whitehall

Yes, something needs to be done to make the system as fair as possible. I don't know the answer. But I don't like the interview system, because it is too subjective. All sorts of prejudices can sway the result. I think entrance should be on academic ability only.

hudd, it's not their fucking university and they have shown by their actions that they are class ridden FGS. The best suited seems to be those from Public schools.

Fifteen road shows at Eton and Marlborough, none in Tottenham, Barnsley, Bradford, more students from Richmond on Thames than from the whole of manchester can you see a pattern here.

92% of pupils at Barenose college Oxford from the top three richest sections of society

Left to their own devices they would pick from the upper echelons with a few token working class and as we see today at Oxford no black students.

If you cannot see a class bias you are blind.

I'm from a workless household in the North and I went to a Russell Group University and I don't recognise this picture of top universities being full of upper middle class kids who have been to private school.

The majority of students at university in this country are from state schools, even in Oxbridge so this view that they will only choose upper middle class public school kids doesn't bear true in reality. The reason there are more private school kids at top universities than their proportion suggests there should be is that they have a far higher educational attainment than the majority of state school kids.

The reason there are more private school kids at top universities than their proportion suggests there should be is that they have a far higher educational attainment than the majority of state school kids.

So if Toffeenosedgit and State school Johny have equal A levels you dont mind Johny going in first then as he has had to overcome disadvantages that TNG has not