h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Charge people what the courses are worth! I didn't have the benefit of a uni education, couldn't even take 6th form due to being a bit mental at the time, so why should my (non-existant at the moment but that's unusual and will change at some point but that's not the point) taxes pay for people to learn more stuff so they can go off and earn more money than I can probably dream off, get better jobs, grow up and pay more taxes than I ever will and keep me in and when I'm old?


Oh...

take govt out of higher education all together

let the universities bet into bed with the bank in a sub prime education system

you aply for the course, are advanced the money in a long term busssines loan at a moderate interest rate by the uni-s bank partner

you get a living expence benefit from the state similar to job seeker allowance

you graduate or not, you still owe the bank!!!!

your benefit stops and you get a job and pay back the loan

getting degree for the sake of it becomes a thing of the past

getting a degree that has practical applications becomes the norm

the govt. sets the rules, business takes the risk

the taxpayer reaps the rewards

(now aiting to be hot down)

My only objection to that would be benefits. If you choose not to work for however many extra years, then why should everyone else support you? The bank would be the one making money out of it, so they should support living expenses too.

I have no problems with education not being free at the point of consumption. What I *do* have a problem with is whether the proposed changes will deter less-well-off students from going to Uni. If anything, it will deter prospective doctors and scientists as their courses will cost a hell of a lot more than an arts or humanities degree. And we're producing precious little of those even as I speak.

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basic support is only fair, enough to feed themelves while they live in student accomodation, provided by the uni-bank and paid for as part of the loan,

force the uni to have enough accomodation to house it entire student body, in dormitories on campus, freeing up low cost rented accomodation for those who need it in the real world

and when the graduate pays off their loan, they will have contributed more than enough in NI payments to off set this initial outlay by the state

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hopitals and health providers could be encouraged to help subsidise doctors degrees, maybe with a tie in clause, garanteeing them with a steady stream of doctors who have to come and work for them for a set period or untill £££ are repaid

And the scientists? Who's going to guarantee their degrees?

scientiffic research organisations, high tech industry, univerities that sort of thing, nasa etc.

The chair of the physics department goes to the provost for the annual budget review. "I've got some good news and some bad news. The good news is we have a lot of exciting things going on in the department - some potential Nobel-prize winning stuff. The bad news is we need a new particle accelerator which will cost £10M."

The Provost is shocked. "That is a lot of money. It is incredible to me how different departments need different things. Why can't you be more like the math department? They only want paper, pencils and wastebaskets. And the philosophy department doesn't even want the wastebaskets..."

Its such a step backwards, but mind, it was such a step backwards when they first moved over to fees back under Labour...

True if you look at the stats you can see the 'average' earneings of someone with a degree compaired to someone without, but that isn't necessarily very meaningful on its own; There are many many jobs which you really have to have someone with a degree to do, and they're not always highly paid, often very far from it; I still think its quite disgusting when you look at the pitiful wages, just as an example (cause I know it), in jobs associated* with the NHS, particularly lab technition jobs, for which you do* need a science/biology/medical orientated job, and for things that are pretty important to many of us out here, testing cerfical smeers, breast screening samples, all manner of medical samples which need to be tested often very repetitively its true, looking at X hundreds of cell samples each day to check for abnormal cells, and those jobs albeit you require a degree and you relaly want someone pretty competant doing it, yet the wages are so pitiful; I remember looking at what they were paying for these jobs at our local hospital here, and well, you couldn't afford to do the job and rent in this town... and now we're telling anyone who might go into that as a job, that they're going to run up however many extra tens of thousands of pounds....
True, the 'average' earnings of the graduate are skewed upwards, but for every baraster, solicitor, higher manager or whatever who comes out of university there are probably far more who'll end up in jobs alalagus in many ways to a lab tech...

We used to have the best higher education system in the world, and even until the 1990's it was improving in many ways, especially with equality of access to higher education, and yet since then successive descisions by governments have decided to try and break it as much as they can...
If it gets too broken then despite the higher 'home rate' fees, Universities may start seeing a decrease in their ability to draw in money, overseas students pay 'full fee's, which are far above even the new rised in 'home fees' but those students only come here because the higher education offered in this country is as good as it is. Turn it into a simple inaffective supply and demand, conveyer belt system turning out a uniform bland product at the end, and before long it'll be worthless to even home students as it won't offer an end-result worth the paper its written on.

Of course, some people may prefer their children to be taught by ill-educated people, or their doctor to have only the very basic of science knowledge, but I can't really see myself how that would be a step forward. We've always had a relatively fair system, by which anyone with the aptitude and determination could attend university and study, and the only thing introducing increased fees will do is reduce this oppertunity; not only the oppertunity to the individual herself studying at university, but the oppertunity to everyone to recieve a decent service in whatever sector they're accessing it in, weather health, biscuness or some aspect of social care. The system was fair as the access to the education was pretty-much availible to anyone with the aptidude and will to study, and consequent to study, those who earnt more as a result of this education paid higher contributions through earnings tax.

Its another step backwards, perhaps not quite as big a step as when tuition fees were first introduced, but, I can't see in anythign but the short term its going to pan out in entirely the oppoiste way to which they think.

Do you have any *idea* how little money there is in the scientific world? How much people have to compete for moderate research grants, let alone for subsidising degrees? And industry is only going to fund degrees in subjects that it deems 'relevant'. What about people who want to become academic researchers? Who is going to fund there? Universities (that by your reckoning already have to grub their funding from other sources)?!

This is going to be bad news for people who have scientific talent but who come from working class backgrounds. We already see socially exclusionary practice in the legal professions, where trainees are expected to work unpaid for ages: this is to keep the plebs out, although the chambers wouldn't admit to that. The idea of extending this regressive model to other professions, where the poorer graduate is beholden to an employer they might end up hating, whereas the graduate with 'private means' can hawk their skills to all and sundry, is only going to exacerbate social division.

We don't train enough scientists. This isn't going to do anything to change that situation, and is going to make arts degrees look an awful lot more attractive.

Couldn't agree more with FM and 2legs, who've both been more articulate on the subject than I could hope to be. Just for an extra though...

The OU, as part of its own cost-cutting measures, is ending practical science courses entirely in 2012, so it may become impossible for a mature part-time student such as me to get a science degree with no experience in practical work at all.

My sister-in-law is one of the top lecturers in her field in the country (one of the arts, since you ask). She will never pay off her debts accrued in nine years of study - she barely pays off her interest each month.

I agree that there are too many spurious courses. Let's stop funding for the homeopaths, ayurvedics and crystal therapists first, but let's not kid ourselves thinking that the people who graduate in engineering every year have done it 'for the sake of it', nor that companies who are currently laying off staff are likely to prop up the system in the near future..

I didn't know that about the OU. The practical week I did was compulsory for me course, where are people going to find that?!

It's a thorny subject. One I'm not going to comment on in much detail because I am still so very bitter about not being given even the basic grant (living overseas with a father in the military - local councils could "use their discretion" and mine decided 'nope')

But I have worked with some fairly recent graduates (over the last 10 years) and they have literacy skills that rank alongside my young teenage children. In fact, their grammar is appaling.

I really really really resent that taxpayers have funded them but people like me (I wasn't alone that year in being rejected and our families not being able to cover the costs) could go whistle.

I have also heard the following argument against those high university fees. Namely, sometimes as a professor you may become reluctant to fail the students, who otherwise end up with debts and without a degree. So the exams tend to become easier and the level generally drops.