Student finance. Mention those two words to most students and you’ll either get people moaning about the amount of forms they have to fill in, or excited about how rich they are at the beginning of the month.
However, at the end of the day, you have to pay it back. Unless you vote SNP. That was the message they gave graduates in 2007. Strangely enough, I still seem to have a student loan and quite a substantial amount of money to pay back. They knew they couldn’t afford it and scrapped the pledge in their first budget. It was a …
Prof Les Ebdon will take up the key role as director of the Office for Fair Access later this year, charged with ensuring that working-class students are not deterred by tuition fees of up to £9,000, the Business Secretary announced.
Leading Tories, including Michael Gove, the Education Secretary, were said to be unhappy at Prof Ebdon’s appointment after he threatened universities with “nuclear” penalties if they missed targets for widening their student intake.
He has also criticised the “patchy” record of leading Russell Group institutions at increasing the number of students they take from state schools and
There is a real danger that many prospective students will be put off from going to university due to the confusion, half-truths and lies, often left unchallenged, relating to the new system of university funding and graduate contributions.
A bright light which breaks through the fog can be found over at MoneySavingExpert.com, where Martin Lewis pares things back to the bare facts. His Student Loans Guide 2012 makes the following key points:
Existing students stay on the old system of loans
Students don’t pay anything up front
Graduates will pay back £540 per year less than they do under the current system – graduates will have more money in their pocket each month
Graduates who earn less than £21,000 don’t pay back anything
Graduates will owe more and be in debt longer but this debt will not affect credit ratings
People shouldn’t think of the new system as a loan but as a graduate tax
The rules may be different for students in Scotland and Wales
Most people will never pay back all of this debt as the debt is wiped out after 30 years
A graduate tax: the very thing that the NUS has been calling for. It is a crying shame that the NUS has decided to be political over the new changes rather than do the right thing by the people it professes to represent.
I would be extremely disappointed if there is a single person put off going to university due to the spin put on the changes by the NUS. Let’s hope that as many prospective students as possible find their way to MoneySavingExpert.com where they can actually get some honest expert advice on what to expect when they take up their courses in 2012.
Editor’s note: You can also watch a video of Martin Lewis explaining student funding from 2012 on YouTube:
Simon Hughes MP, the Government’s advocate for access to Higher Education, has a piece over at Left Foot Forward today, on the confusion surrounding student finance.
He cites the Sutton Trust’s findings that more than a fifth of 11-16 year olds believe their families will have to pay for the cost of university tuition, while a further 10 per cent believe students paid for university with money they earned before and during their studies:
This situation is clearly unacceptable. And now as we start a month where higher education is again back on the agenda, with today’s publication of the
Well here we are, in the cockpit of history. The Today programme yesterday reported that David Willetts had been yanked back from the Conservative Party conference to negotiate with Vince Cable over student fees, looking for a deal before the Browne Review delivers its report.
What kind of deal is possible? This is a crucial question not just for Liberal Democrats but for the whole country because Nick Clegg holds a powerful hand and the way he plays his cards may shape the future our universities and the role they play in this country for a generation.
Officialdom seems to have opened a new front in its battle against those who commit the terrible sin of studying while black.
One of my students has been sent a summons to appear in court for not paying full Council Tax. The problem arises because non-EU students come in on a visa that specifies they must be recorded as being actively taught in college for at least 15 hours per week in college premises.
However, to be exempt from Council Tax a “full-time” student must study for 21 hours per week. Hands up anyone who got a degree …
Back when Cix was the main way of talking to other Lib Dems online, a tradition emerged of posting Lib Dem MPs’ maiden speeches so that people could read them and respond – a tradition LDV would like to continue. Earlier today, we read Simon Wright’s speech, and tomorrow we will bring you David Ward.
Duncan’s speech is also available to view here at the Parliament website until 1 June 2011.
Thank you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, for giving me the opportunity to make my maiden speech so early in this Parliament. I congratulate the hon. Members for Harlow (Robert Halfon) …
Graham Jeffs Good article - thank you!
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