Is A Degree Without Student Debt Really Possible?

Click here to see Software4Students contact details

We accept mastercard and visa credit cards

Newsletter

Is A Degree Without Student Debt Really Possible?

Think Differently. by SoftwareGuru Student debt is not a new issue but the global recession brings new dimensions to be considered. Secondary school students studying for their A-levels are becoming a lot more concerned about student debt and websites such as notgoingtouni.co.uk provide useful information. So what sort of figures are students facing these days? Studying for a degree at most universities is likely to leave you with a debt of at least £25,000. Pretty scary stuff when you consider how long it will take to pay back. The good news is that most of The Open University’s degrees will set you back just £4,000, and better still, if you’re living with your parents and earning less than £16,510 a year you won’t have to pay a penny towards the cost of your study. Staying in the black is certainly a massive challenge in today's economic climate. On the one hand, student loans you take out while at university are extremely cheap compared to regular loans. However, the idea that it's "the cheapest money you'll ever borrow" depends on whether the government decide to move the goalposts or not. If the previous Labour Government can sell off pre-1998 student loans to a debt collection firm like Thesis, who knows what the LibCon or any Government could do in the future? The more that students fail to repay SLC, the more pressure Government will be under to do something about it.
	Yorkshire Evening Post While The Guardian newspaper may have written about student debt recently and again mentioned Software4Students, the Yorkshire Evening Post also caught our eye. Debbie Leigh's article "Students paying price of success" is well worth a read whether you're a parent, existing student or studying A-levels. She writes: "The annual student survey from Push says students who started university last year will graduate with debts of £23,200 – a 5.4 per cent increase on the previous year." The figures speak for themselves. A culture of greed within financial institutions globally caused the economic recession. Students who graduated this year face a tough task ahead of them with companies reducing salaries and wages as much as possible as well as handing out redundancies. How will parents and families cope if public sector jobs are cut in 2011? Earlier this year in March, Channel 4 newsreader and journalist Jon Snow provided a report from Hull which highlighted how utterly dependent some parts of the UK are on public sector jobs. "Nowhere is Hull's economic malaise more apparent than on its housing estates. The boom years under Labour bypassed many of them where successive generations of family members have never worked."
Taking Financial Control If there's a general theme running through all of these student debt and economic reminders it is the need to take responsibility for our finances and to shop wisely. It doesn't matter whether students go to university or not if they cannot come to terms with their own spending habits. The arrival of social media and other forms of online distractions only enable us to procrastinate and avoid the inevitable. Students should certainly consider all of their available options before making career and course decisions. Leigh's article reflects the belief held by parents that financial education should play a bigger role. "Recent research by online credit information provider Equifax found 35 per cent of parents don't think their children have a good understanding of the value of money and 94 per cent believe financial education should be in the national curriculum." Would financial education help students take more responsibility? Are parents expecting too much from teachers? Ultimately, any student who wishes to be successful in life must know that teachers and parents can only do so much. Every day we make choices from endless possibilities. It is up to students to choose which path they wish to take. Buy Microsoft Office 2010 today for only £38.95 - offer lasts until Oct 31.

Is A Degree Without Student Debt Really Possible?

Software4Students - Educational and Desktop Software Solutions. Copyright (C) 2003-2012 All Rights Reserved.
Address: Dept 150, 21 Botanic Avenue, Belfast, BT7 1JJ Phone: + 44 (0) 20 7870 7983 Email: support@software4students.co.uk