Intelligent conversation

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 01:34

Since Mr James mentioned it, I was just wondering what you all thought about the Government's proposals for funding higher education. Since it was all free in my day and Junior isn't academically minded, it doesn't really affect me. But I'd rather my taxes were spent helping the majority of 14-16 year olds for whom school is a major bore than subsidising the social lives of the next generation of smart-arsed cynics like myself.

Whadayathink?

Black Planet · 08 Feb 2004, 01:38

Thea · 08 Feb 2004, 01:51

I'd love the chance to go back to college properly. If i chose to go back in September it could cost anything up to Â£600 just to get on a few courses.
Because i live in the middle of nowhere, there was no way i could do GCSE's in school (they kicked you out at year ten - gawd knows why so i left at 14) and i was lucky to get a job - then i got too ill to work and now i'm pretty much qualificationless, ill and broke. So Free Education would be appreciated.

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 01:53

d00mw0lf wrote:I'd love the chance to go back to college properly. If i chose to go back in September it could cost anything up to Â£600 just to get on a few courses.
Because i live in the middle of nowhere, there was no way i could do GCSE's in school (they kicked you out at year ten - gawd knows why so i left at 14) and i was lucky to get a job - then i got too ill to work and now i'm pretty much qualificationless, ill and broke. So Free Education would be appreciated.

I don't think so.

Black Planet · 08 Feb 2004, 01:55

I am sorry I do not understand your education system.

Gary · 08 Feb 2004, 01:58

As a student.. i think the proposals are awfull...

Not just because if have had to pay more, but because i think its not going to work anyway..

The goverment will have to loan the students the money, so they have to find it from somewhere anyway, and whilst the good universtities will get more money, because they will be able to get away with higher fees, the other universtities will loose out.

erm.. anywya.. im tired night

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 02:00

Perhaps I was a bit rash. This was the bit I found hard to believe:

d00mw0lf wrote:Because i live in the middle of nowhere, there was no way i could do GCSE's in school (they kicked you out at year ten - gawd knows why so i left at 14)

Would you care to explain?

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 02:20

Black Planet wrote:I am sorry I do not understand you education systenm.

Doomie.hello ....here you just take the courses. that is it. what is wrong there? /a lot by my american comparison.

Your brit caste system.... has not gone away.

shame. shame shame.

BP

BP, how does your education system work? The impression I get (mainly from the US TV shows we have over here) is that you have to pay for your University (i.e post 18) education - tuition fees, living expenses etc. Over here, upto 16 is free and mandatory, post 16 is optional and free, assuming you make the grade, and post 18 used to be tuition free and a means tested grant for living expenses, at least upto about ten years ago. Then they started reducing the living allowance and expecting under-graduates to top it up with a loan. Then they introduced an element of up-front payment of tuition fees. Now they're talking about charging variable (i.e. each University can set their own fee level, initially upto a maximum of 3K per year) tuition fees, but payable on graduation and assuming earnings of over 15K per year. Basically, for some reason best known to themselves, the Government have decided that 50% of our kids should enter higher education but since most of the tax payers don't see why they should fund it, they feel the students who are going to benefit from it should pay for it. Makes sense to me. Certainly would have made me think twice about whether spending 4 years in Leeds getting drunk and avoiding lectures was worth getting into debt @ a rate of 7K per year.

But like I said earlier, I might be a bit more pissed off if I or my kids were
in this situation.

Thea · 08 Feb 2004, 02:30

Thrash Harry wrote:Perhaps I was a bit rash. This was the bit I found hard to believe:

d00mw0lf wrote:Because i live in the middle of nowhere, there was no way i could do GCSE's in school (they kicked you out at year ten - gawd knows why so i left at 14)
Would you care to explain?

the only school i could get to was a catholic school that would only take students untill year ten - after that they had to transfer to another school - but i was just too far from the schools they were expected to go to (one was in stockport and the other in buxton). I never found out why they didn't keep any students on longer.
the best i could hope for was a place at a school in sheffield (which from where i was living at the time would have been nearly 2 hours travel there and back a day) so i got a job instead. if someone offered you the choice of Â£100+ a week to run round a warehouse shouting at people or 4 hours travel a day - what would you take?

probably not the best choice, but i was 14 and being offered (what seemed like) a LOT of money to do work i enjoyed.

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 02:35

So how did you get away with leaving school @ 14? My (step)son decided he wasn't going back to school after the Christmas holidays before he was 16 in the May, and we nearly got taken to court over it.

Black Planet · 08 Feb 2004, 02:36

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 02:42

So upto what age is education free in the States? And is it he same in every state? And is the High School Prom really that big a deal? And what's a sophmore?

Black Planet · 08 Feb 2004, 02:47

Sophmopre... 14 year old.

In my country 18 is a a graduate, from high school.

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 02:53

Oh, right. Over here, a graduate is 21+, having obtained a degree from University. I always thought a sophmore was a second year at University i.e. c 19/20 years old, since a Fresher is what we call a first year at University - 18 years old. So what age do kids start school in the States? Between 4 and 5 over here.

Thea · 08 Feb 2004, 02:54

Thrash Harry wrote:So how did you get away with leaving school @ 14? My (step)son decided he wasn't going back to school after the Christmas holidays before he was 16 in the May, and we nearly got taken to court over it.

more by luck than judgement i think. it happens a lot round here - leaving early to work. but usually it's because their parents have farms and they help out there. we had chickens and a goat so i guess that sort of counts

Black Planet · 08 Feb 2004, 02:55

Black Planet · 08 Feb 2004, 02:56

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 03:03

d00mw0lf wrote:
Thrash Harry wrote:So how did you get away with leaving school @ 14? My (step)son decided he wasn't going back to school after the Christmas holidays before he was 16 in the May, and we nearly got taken to court over it.
more by luck than judgement i think. it happens a lot round here - leaving early to work. but usually it's because their parents have farms and they help out there. we had chickens and a goat so i guess that sort of counts

Buxton, Stockport, Sheffield. That's a hell of a catchment area. Was it just a Catholic sixth form college you were looking for? My Catholic school education ended when my parents moved from Bournemoth to Marlborough in Wiltshire. We were a very small minority there. I didn't realise I was Catholic until then.

Edit: Forgot to say I was about seven then.

Black Planet · 08 Feb 2004, 03:12

Thea · 08 Feb 2004, 03:15

Thrash Harry wrote:
d00mw0lf wrote:
Thrash Harry wrote:So how did you get away with leaving school @ 14? My (step)son decided he wasn't going back to school after the Christmas holidays before he was 16 in the May, and we nearly got taken to court over it.
more by luck than judgement i think. it happens a lot round here - leaving early to work. but usually it's because their parents have farms and they help out there. we had chickens and a goat so i guess that sort of counts
Buxton, Stockport, Sheffield. That's a hell of a catchment area. Was it just a Catholic sixth form college you were looking for? My Catholic school education ended when my parents moved from Bournemoth to Marlborough in Wiltshire. We were a very small minority there. I didn't realise I was Catholic until then.

Edit: Forgot to say I was about seven then.

i was looking for anything at all. sheffield was just the closest.

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 03:16

Black Planet wrote:ha... oh **** you do not care

Oh ... err... why do you think I'm talking to you then?

Black Planet · 08 Feb 2004, 03:18

Black Planet · 08 Feb 2004, 03:20

Thrash Harry · 08 Feb 2004, 03:25

d00mw0lf wrote:
Thrash Harry wrote:
d00mw0lf wrote:more by luck than judgement i think. it happens a lot round here - leaving early to work. but usually it's because their parents have farms and they help out there. we had chickens and a goat so i guess that sort of counts
Buxton, Stockport, Sheffield. That's a hell of a catchment area. Was it just a Catholic sixth form college you were looking for? My Catholic school education ended when my parents moved from Bournemoth to Marlborough in Wiltshire. We were a very small minority there. I didn't realise I was Catholic until then.

Edit: Forgot to say I was about seven then.
i was looking for anything at all. sheffield was just the closest.

Where the hell were you then? Sheffield and Stockport are miles away. I'm too confused to continue...

08 Feb 2004, 03:55

Black Planet wrote:Sophmopre... 14 year old.

In my country,18 is a a graduate,

from high school.

VAL

Sophomore = 14 years old? If you skipped a grade, maybe. Generally 15 (or 16 by the end of the school year), yes? In any case, 10th grade out of 12. The following is a generalization and applies to grade school or to university status.

Senior = final year
junior = next to last year
sophomore = second year or at least the grade / class before being a junior
freshman = first year (some high schools may not have this one - then again, some prep schools may have a thirteenth class)

I also would not expect someone to refer to himself/herself as a graduate out of high school. A "high school graduate" maybe, but not just a "graduate." If someone is a graduate, to me that sounds as though he/she is doing post graduate work.

Graduate/post-graduate? Grade/class/form? Public/private? High school? Sutdent/pupil? Because of our mixed experiences and systems, this topic may become quite confusing.