Increasing Numbers Of High-Flying Students Are Shunning Going To University

[interestrateripoff]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/the-age-of-apprenticeships-increasing-numbers-of-highflying-students-are-shunning-going-to-university-8762342.html

Increasing numbers of high-flying A-level students are shunning going to university and opting to learn on the job instead. Thousands of teenagers expecting their A-level results today are planning to snap up the growing number of apprenticeships on offer so they can earn while they train for a career.

According to the National Apprenticeship Service, there are about 20,000 apprenticeships on offer today in a range of occupations from law and accountancy to IT and journalism.

Many of those seeking to be accepted for them will have top-grade passes – with firms insisting on at least 300 UCAS A-level points (the equivalent of three B-grade passes or two A*s and an E) before accepting candidates.

People realising £30k-£40k of debt isn't going to be a good thing?

[@contradevian]

David Willetts tells @bbc5live"I think what we're going to see today is more students getting first choice of university than ever before"

kerching!

Got a place to read Politics at Leeds. Dylan - 1, exam boards - 0.

Can't think of anything more pointless, other than media studies perhaps.

Edited August 15, 2013 by aSecureTenant

[fluffy666]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/the-age-of-apprenticeships-increasing-numbers-of-highflying-students-are-shunning-going-to-university-8762342.html

People realising £30k-£40k of debt isn't going to be a good thing?

I suspect that there are fewer apprenticeships at top-class engineering firms available than Oxbridge places..

Still, I'm sure that the ConDems will address this 'problem' by allowing firms offering apprenticeships to charge tuition fees under the wonderful new 'Indentured Servitude Without The Benefits' loans system.

[Guest eight]

I suspect that there are fewer apprenticeships at top-class engineering firms available than Oxbridge places..

Still, I'm sure that the ConDems will address this 'problem' by allowing firms offering apprenticeships to charge tuition fees under the wonderful new 'Indentured Servitude Without The Benefits' loans system.

I do wish you hadn't said that out loud.

I earned about £10K/year as an engineering apprentice......

.....in 1990!

[Tonkers]

Funny really, we might end up with only the very stupid going to University... (excepting the professions, medical, law atc...)

[Snafu]

kerching!

Can't think of anything more pointless, other than media studies perhaps.

From someone who studied politics, I can't disagree.

[spongeh]

I do wish you hadn't said that out loud.

I earned about £10K/year as an engineering apprentice......

.....in 1990!

and I thought I was minted on my £5k a year in 1990 on my apprenticeship ... it was about 3.5x the YTS rate at the time.

[frozen_out]

Funny really, we might end up with only the very stupid going to University... (excepting the professions, medical, law atc...)

Go and read a book called the bell curve. The distribution of IQ of students used to be pretty close to that you would find anywhere else. Open access to higher education changed this, but going back to a situation where communities have shop workers, bus drivers and tradesmen with good intelligence might actually be a good thing long term.

[Wurzel Of Highbridge]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/the-age-of-apprenticeships-increasing-numbers-of-highflying-students-are-shunning-going-to-university-8762342.html

People realising £30k-£40k of debt isn't going to be a good thing?

Yeah - and the rest.

Lets do some sums.

Tuition Fee Loan for 2013 entry

The Tuition Fee Loan is available to all Full-time Undergraduate Home/EU students. You can apply through Student Finance England on their website.The Tuition Fee Loan is paid directly to the University on the students behalf and is repaid by the student after Graduation.

For new students starting University in 2013, the fee is £7950.

Loan Amount

The maximum amount of loan full-time students may receive in 2013/14 is: £4,950 for continuing students and £5,500 for new entrants living away from home.

Tuition fees £7,950 x 3 years = 23,850

Living expenses £5,500 x 3 years = 16,500

Total Loan = £40,350 minimum without the loans, credit cards and overdrafts which are pushed onto you by the bankers.

Compound Interest

New System Income Contingent Repayment Loans 2012 (For customers in England and Wales)

From 1 September 2012 until 31 August 2013, the interest rate for ICR loans taken out in 2012 will be 6.6% (RPI, plus 3%).

Interest is charged on the loan at £2,663.10 for the first year, if you cannot afford to make repayments then it will be added to your loan and further interest is charged on the interest.

£40,350 - Graduation

£43,013 - 1 Year after Graduation

£45,852 - 2 Year after Graduation

£48,878 - 3 Year after Graduation

£52,104 - 4 Year after Graduation

£55,543 - 5 Year after Graduation

£59,208 - 6 Year after Graduation

£63,116 - 7 Year after Graduation

£67,282 - 8 Year after Graduation

£71,722 - 9 Year after Graduation

£76,456 - 10 Year after Graduation

.....

Nothing PONIZ about this then......

Calculations based on the assumption that the BOE remain incompetent and keep interest rates too low thus causing the CPI based loan interest rates to remain constant.

Also based on the assumption that the graduate does not earn over £27,813 in the first 10 years so no repayments are made.

[SirGaz]

and I thought I was minted on my £5k a year in 1990 on my apprenticeship ... it was about 3.5x the YTS rate at the time.

I was about the same as a second year design office apprentice.

If memory serves I was getting about £75 a week take home.

[SarahBell]

People realising £30k-£40k of debt isn't going to be a good thing?

Yup.

Son has been thinking about not going if he can't get in on the exact course he wants. Which is fair enough. No point wasting all that debt.

[interestrateripoff]

£40,350 - Graduation

£43,013 - 1 Year after Graduation

£45,852 - 2 Year after Graduation

£48,878 - 3 Year after Graduation

£52,104 - 4 Year after Graduation

£55,543 - 5 Year after Graduation

£59,208 - 6 Year after Graduation

£63,116 - 7 Year after Graduation

£67,282 - 8 Year after Graduation

£71,722 - 9 Year after Graduation

£76,456 - 10 Year after Graduation

Jesus, you clearly need to land a job immediately where you can afford to pay it back, or after a number of years of not paying it back you can't afford to have a career! Does it all get wiped after 25 years? Clearly a few years of low paid work the debt drag on graduates is going to be huge!

[SleepyHead]

Apprenticeships are a con too.

Companies only do them to get the subsidies/tax breaks/goodies that government are giving out.

Politicians still think, "if we have loads of apprentices, we'll have productive wealth creating jobs."

No, we wont. That's putting the cart before the horse.

House price inflation is snuffing out all productive work, and encouraging only FIRE (finance, insurance, real estate) jobs. I.e. ponzi jobs.

Edited August 15, 2013 by DogTired

[swissy_fit]

In Switzerland you don't pay much, but not many get in.

Seems correct to me.

I've been advising my nephews/nieces in the UK to load up on debt studying something globally marketable, and to b*gger off without paying to a country where the young have better prospects (though selecting a country is getting harder). Only 2 have done it, however.

[winkie]

There are lots of training courses out there financed by the government.......all well and good, but they are training people for the jobs that don't exist.......the thing with training is if you don't use it you lose it.....another waste of money if money spent on training can't be put into paid practice.....I suppose some jobs are created, more training jobs, so not all bad.

[blackgoose]

That is a shame as it is the high flying students that should be going to university. There are plenty of people who were not clever enough for A levels (doing GNVQ instead) who have no problems getting into uni. Those are the ones who should be doing vocational training instead.

[crashmonitor]

Not what I am seeing. Most youngsters still don't see it as real debt, and it isn't going to stop them from their Blairite right of passage. They have the default position of not having to pay it back should their degree prove useless and they don't earn much money during their working lives.

If it was an ordinary loan without safeguards, then we would see the numbers tank for sure.

Edited August 15, 2013 by crashmonitor

[Dorkins]

Not what I am seeing. Most youngsters still don't see it as real debt, and it isn't going to stop them from their Blairite right of passage. They have the default position of not having to pay it back should their degree prove useless and they don't earn much money during their working lives.

If it was an ordinary loan without safeguards, then we would see the numbers tank for sure.

The main safeguards on student loans are protection for the government, not the student. They are the only form of personal debt in the UK that cannot be discharged by bankruptcy. An Act of Parliament was passed in order to give them this property. The government is getting the youngest and most naive adults to sign up to non-dischargeable debts worth 2+ years of average full time take home pay on an interest rate of RPI+3%. It's the financial equivalent of "grooming" teenagers.

[Dorkins]

In Switzerland you don't pay much, but not many get in.

Seems correct to me.

+1

This was the correct solution to the funding gap in UK higher education, but the debt-pushers got their way.

[@contradevian]

Apprenticeships are a con too.

Companies only do them to get the subsidies/tax breaks/goodies that government are giving out.

Politicians still think, "if we have loads of apprentices, we'll have productive wealth creating jobs."

No, we wont. That's putting the cart before the horse.

House price inflation is snuffing out all productive work, and encouraging only FIRE (finance, insurance, real estate) jobs. I.e. ponzi jobs.

Yet employers complain they have to import workers because UK kids "don't have the required skills."

I posted something on the order-order blog during the Next/Tesco furore and the response I got back was that the inability of being unable to import workers was "damaging business."

[SleepyHead]

Yet employers complain they have to import workers because UK kids "don't have the required skills."

I posted something on the order-order blog during the Next/Tesco furore and the response I got back was that the inability of being unable to import workers was "damaging business."

This is their convenient excuse. Of course the real reason is that UK workers wish to buy a home, raise a family, save etc. Migrants are much cheaper (for the 1st year or 2) because they will live 8 people to a bedsit, and not expect to buy a home.

The companies are interpreting this as,

• Brits = snobs, lazy, won't work for peanuts.
• Migrants = hard working, good attitude etc

The reality is,

• Brits = aware that minimum wage jobs will not put a roof over your head in the UK, so must have better career plan.
• Migrants = Naive, they still believe a low paid job will get a basic living standard, as it would in Poland etc. It takes a year or two for them to figure out there is no hope of them housing themselves in anything but a tent, caravan, shed with bed, or smelly shared bedsit.

Edited August 15, 2013 by DogTired

[crashmonitor]

Yet employers complain they have to import workers because UK kids "don't have the required skills."

I posted something on the order-order blog during the Next/Tesco furore and the response I got back was that the inability of being unable to import workers was "damaging business."

I think they have the skills, but they are not available. On balance when you get a native worker in the service sector they have superior social skills and appear more able than their foreign colleagues. Sending nearly half of school leavers to University makes them unavailable.

[@contradevian]

I think they have the skills, but they are not available. On balance when you get a native worker in the service sector they have superior social skills and appear more able than their foreign colleagues. Sending nearly half of school leavers to University makes them unavailable.

I think the risk is if you are not quite good enough for `the professions` if you don't go to University you end up in a kind of non job, temporary, insecure "call centre" type hell, so you might as well go into higher education as another spin on the roulette wheel or at worse, delaying the inevitable.

Then again I know a lad, who I would have said was a complete no hoper, is now making a fortune in "energy sales."

[fluffy666]

Jesus, you clearly need to land a job immediately where you can afford to pay it back, or after a number of years of not paying it back you can't afford to have a career! Does it all get wiped after 25 years? Clearly a few years of low paid work the debt drag on graduates is going to be huge!

It's a graduate tax, effectively - anyone who goes to Uni this way will pay 9% on anything over the threshold. Very few will earn enough to actually clear the balance before age 55.

Except, of course, those with rich parents who pay the fees up front, they will just pay the headline rate of tax. And the dossers of the world, who basically get 3 year's financial support. So it's a tax that specifically targets the 'hard working / aspirational middle'.

[FreeFall]

The government is getting the youngest and most naive adults to sign up to non-dischargeable debts worth 2+ years of average full time take home pay on an interest rate of RPI+3%. It's the financial equivalent of "grooming" teenagers.

...it's a tax that specifically targets the 'hard working / aspirational middle'.

These seem to sum it up without further discussion....