As a new project for my blog I am going to pose a question every month which I will encourage friends and visitors to comment on.
This question will be on a number of issues from politics, philosophy, society to food or traveling.
This months questions is something for my immediate age group.
'Is university financially worth it?'
Financially, as in you might of had a great time sipping your £5 Blossom Hill wine or £1 pint for 4 yeas, but has it help your career; or left you crippled with debit in a job you could have worked up to or attained with any BA never mind your specialization.
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I think your question might depend on where someone is from in the UK.
ReplyDeleteThe low level of Scottish student funding (loans/grants total about half what you'd get in England, Wales or N.Ireland) means a lot of students north of the border run up considerable commercial debts. It's one thing to owe the government tens of thousands that you only repay as an extra tax when you earn enough, it's quite another to have to immediately repay money to banks and credit cards regardless of your income. So for a lot of Scottish students there may not be much point going to uni.
Distance learning with the Open University is basically free so if you wanted a job requiring a degree it might make sense to use them. Especially when you think that the teaching at the modern uni's isn't always that great (I got 6 hours a week in Belfast). But then again going to uni is an experience in itself.
I dunno, maybe worth it maybe not. I'd encourage people to only go if they were certain, maybe take a year out after school to consider if it's worth it.
Thanks for the first comment.
ReplyDeleteHere's a quick ball-park figure.
Leaving school at 17/18 going into an office or service job.
Starting at 12,000 a year and increasing by 500 a year for 4 years, which is the time it takes to get a degree. A pretty low starting point
So 12 + 12.5 + 13 + 13.5=
Well we come out on a pretty solid career path plus 4 years work experience and a gross income of 51,000 pound.
The avrage cost at uni (Scotland) is lets say 4k student fees, and 9k loan ( 4 years x 2.2k), 2k overdraft and 0.5 credit card. That's 15,500 pounds. For money earned from a part time job over the year lets disregard your interest and make it a square 14k or 13k.
So there is now a 65,000 difference between you and a low paying job starter job. Nevermind all those who did an apprenticeship or landed a plum 15k job at the job centre. You know who you are ;)
Average starting salary for a first time BA graduate (www.prospects.ac.uk) is £19,300. Assuming that you pay increase grows at the same pace as our high school hero, then you will make back that difference in pay in .....11 years.
That's a minimum if we bump our high school leaver up to 15,000 and growing to 17,000 it will take...30 years.
This is big time estimate and for certain degrees you'll be paying and taking intermships, Doctors or Lawyers for example.
This is also purely financial. You could be in a much more pleasing job (maybe) or have a greater chance of moving up the ladder,
Hey Kev
ReplyDeleteI've only started reading through your blog these past few weeks, which I find very interesting btw. But on the subject of uni vs school leaver, i would say that I found the latter to be of huge benefit to myself.
I started Caley after 5th year and attended for approximately 8 weeks before realising that I didn't need to complete a degree to become an accountant, I could do a professional qualification whilst training as a junior accountant. So it took me around 4 years to complete the professional qual, but the huge benefit was that I was now qualified and also had 4 years experience of working and was now working as an investment accountant. My uni friends with whom I started with were just about to finish and leave uni looking for junior roles and would then still have to embark on their professional qualification albeit with exemptions for 2 years of the exams, meaning they would qualify in two years time. The other benefit was I had been on brilliant holidays, had bought my own flat and was able to have a comfortable lifestyle even though I was only 21. So I found for myself, it was definitely the correct choice.
I think uni is an amazing experience for sure, and to be quite honest I sometimes look back and wonder if I should have stayed to live out the rest of my teen years. Perhaps I was looking at things in too much haste back then, but it's now seven years on, no student debt which is a bonus, but I suppose the question for me is; for a person who didn’t attend university would 13/14k for a four year experience and a mission of self discovery be worth it in the long run? I’m not sure.
Mark – hope you are well mate? I am actually applying at the moment to OU to study their long distance psychology degree, I don’t want to do anything with it, I just think it’s great that there is the opportunity to learn a new subject purely for self improvement.
Cheers
James