“Amounted to mis-selling”: comparing loans to phone contracts
MPs have concluded that comparing student loan repayments to phone contracts or similar consumer debt amounted to mis-selling, in the strongest finding yet from the parliamentary examination of the system. It matters because the comparison was used in official information for years, and because mis-selling is a term with legal weight attached. Student finance explained covers how repayment really works.
87 per cent of applicants expect to work through their degree
The Unite Students Applicant Index finds more than 87 per cent of incoming students plan to work alongside their studies for financial reasons. Paid work is now the norm rather than the exception, which makes timetabling, attendance monitoring and the assumption of full-time study increasingly detached from how students actually live. Budgeting covers making it work.
Are people going to university because nothing else is available?
A parent describes watching her son apply for degree apprenticeships and finding the alternatives to university effectively closed — few places, early deadlines, and competition now four times what it was. The conclusion is uncomfortable: some of the rise in applications may be the absence of options rather than enthusiasm for a degree.
Travelling as a student, and paying for it
A practical piece on travelling during a degree — when the cheap windows are, how to use a year abroad or a summer, and what it actually costs. Worth reading in July rather than in final year, which is the point it makes. The year abroad covers the structured version.