Prince Charles Car Attacked: UK Students VERY Angry over tuition fees, etc / General Chatting / Forums

Forums

4hv.org :: Forums :: General Chatting

« Previous topic | Next topic »

Prince Charles Car Attacked: UK Students VERY Angry over tuition fees, etc

1 2 next

Move Thread

LAN_403

quicksilver

Fri Dec 10 2010, 12:08AM

Registered Member #1408 Joined: Fri Mar 21 2008, 03:49PM
Location: Oracle, AZ
Posts: 679

UK students & others made their feelings noted when they attacked the Prince's automobile and screamed vigorously at his group due to economic condition within the UK.

There was a time when it would take more than poverty and economic hardship to even consider insulting the Royal Family in Britain itself. I am surprised that this would make the News in the USA to the extent it did. Perhaps the activities were seriously beyond what has previously occurred......(?)

Ash Small

Fri Dec 10 2010, 12:46AM

Registered Member #3414 Joined: Sun Nov 14 2010, 05:05PM
Location: UK
Posts: 4245

Apparently most of the 'direct action' was from sixth formers (schoolkids).

Patrick

Fri Dec 10 2010, 04:54AM

Registered Member #2431 Joined: Tue Oct 13 2009, 09:47PM
Location: Chico, CA. USA
Posts: 5639

those misfits have had it to good for to long .... raise tuition.

Muttyfutty!

Fri Dec 10 2010, 09:15AM

Registered Member #2915 Joined: Fri Jun 11 2010, 10:41AM
Location: Malaysia!
Posts: 101

Its not just the rise in tuition fees thats angering most students, but the fact that the Lib Dems signed a contract agreeing that they wouldn't raise fees...

uzzors2k

Fri Dec 10 2010, 10:33AM

Registered Member #95 Joined: Thu Feb 09 2006, 04:57PM
Location: Norway
Posts: 1308

If there's anything a government should be spending money on, it's schooling. I understand why they're angry.

big5824

Fri Dec 10 2010, 11:01AM

Registered Member #1687 Joined: Tue Sept 09 2008, 08:47PM
Location: UK, Darlington
Posts: 240

As a student im actually for the fee rises, I see far too many people recieving money from the government just to go and study things like film studies or literary criticism, I cant really see them helping the countries economy in the long run.... My hoping is that with the fee raise even more companies will offer scholarships for important degrees such as engineering etc, and none will offer the same for the other rubbish degrees. Hopefully then supply will meet demand at last.

Nicko

Fri Dec 10 2010, 11:12AM

Registered Member #1334 Joined: Tue Feb 19 2008, 04:37PM
Location: Nr. London, UK
Posts: 615

Uzzors wrote ...

If there's anything a government should be spending money on, it's schooling. I understand why they're angry.

Angry? I'll give you angry...

There are many factors in this one - I come from a strongly academic family (father & stepmother profs at Cambridge, brother & sisters lecturers etc.) but we never had much money.

I had to work my way through uni - wrote dozens of letters, eventually got sponsorship and a job, paid my way...

We like to do what we can for our kids, and the though of them coming out of uni with huge debts is something we'd like to be able to help them with... I have a daughter at uni at the moment, studying management & languages - she has 8 hours of lectures a week. It costs me about GBP 10,000 pa at the moment for her to be there - tuition & living. I have two other kids on the verge of going to uni.

For so-called middle class people like us, how the h**l are we supposed to cover tuition fees of GBP 9,000 each on their own, i.e. probably GBP 15,000 overall annual expenses per child (after tax) - we'd have to find GBP 45,000 p/a after tax to do that... Over 3 years, that's a bunch of money to find after tax. Before tax that's about GBP 75,000 PER YEAR or USD 120,000.

Those on really low salaries will have their fees paid, and those who reek of money won't even notice the rise. Those in the middle are completely stuffed - If your child wants to do an "arts" degree, how are they ever going to be able to pay these sorts of sums back - if they are doing maths/sciences etc., fine, but the world needs the arts just as much.

Now I believe that my kids should do as much as they reasonable can, but why prolong the agony? With only 8 hours a week, my daughter's course could easily be done in 2 years, not 3 - result? HUGE saving. Its only old prejudices that say all degrees should be at least 3 years long.

The future lies in our children and their education. Its complete lunacy to stuff that up - its a NATIONAL requirement that these kids have a decent chance - how many 10s of 1000s of bright kids who would gain from university will now just not go? What will happen to the feeders for research & development?

I do not condone for a minute using violence in demonstrations, but as a hardened marcher myself (many times) this one would get me out on the streets.... its just so short-sighted...

BTW. The UK government have just axed a replacement for an AWACs-style aircraft that we have here at a cost, now lost, of over GBP 3 BILLION. Gone. Lost. For nothing. How many kids would that support? How many hospitals?

Cheers

Steve Conner

Fri Dec 10 2010, 12:06PM

Registered Member #30 Joined: Fri Feb 03 2006, 10:52AM
Location: Glasgow, Scotland
Posts: 6706

Well, I think New Labour stuffed it up by creating too many new universities and encouraging too many students to go to them. Result, a higher education system too big to subsidise.

This is complete hypocrisy of course as I work for one of the above mentioned new universities

But when I went to university in 1990-something, I got one of the last grants before the system was phased out. There's no way I could have afforded to go otherwise.

Proud Mary

Fri Dec 10 2010, 12:11PM

Registered Member #543 Joined: Tue Feb 20 2007, 04:26PM
Location: UK
Posts: 4992

Nicko wrote ...

Now I believe that my kids should do as much as they reasonable can, but why prolong the agony? With only 8 hours a week, my daughter's course could easily be done in 2 years, not 3 - result? HUGE saving. Its only old prejudices that say all degrees should be at least 3 years long.

Surely, the point of having a three year undergraduate degree is as much to socialise the students into the life of the mind, and the spirit of enquiry, as it is to communicate structured learning. It's often said that students learn more from other students outside the lecture theatre and seminar room than they do in formal instruction.

A two year undergraduate degree will produce yet more students who know little beyond their own narrow specialism, and who have been encouraged to view education as a stepping stone to vocational employment, rather than as a strand in the greater fabric of our national culture.

Nicko

Fri Dec 10 2010, 12:23PM

Registered Member #1334 Joined: Tue Feb 19 2008, 04:37PM
Location: Nr. London, UK
Posts: 615

Proud Mary wrote ...

Lets get real here - there is a world of difference between a social science/arts degree & an engineering one (as most of us here have already experienced).

Believe me, I understand fully the social side of university life, but it doesn't take 3 years (or 4 in my own case) to complete every aspect of many degrees. Its a 3 year party for many, at parent's expense (to a large extent). Its great fun & all that, but is ripe for restructuring.

Cheers

1 2 next

Moderator(s): Chris Russell, Noelle, Alex, Tesladownunder, Dave Marshall, Dave Billington, Bjørn, Steve Conner, Wolfram, Kizmo, Mads Barnkob