University fees – should we still have to pay them?

I have this belief that a lot of students who go straight into university tend not to know themselves completely and the concept of freedom just drives them off the rails during their first year of being out of their parent’s sheltered cave.

There is also the fact that a lot of teenagers go straight to university after college in order to delay the 9-5 job and to spend more time considering their options and figuring out what it is exactly that they want to do. Furthermore, the stage of still being a teenager and almost being an adult isn’t exactly the easiest, especially when everyone expects you to already know what you want to do. Obviously your up-bringing has an effect on this as well but more to my point. The concept of university.

As we all know the university institution is an education that we pay for as it is now an educational market.

When the Labour Party entered government in 1997, it came with an inheritance from the previous Conservative government concerning higher education funding. Students had to contribute to the economy aswell. The whole idea that students would benefit from these degrees so they should contribute towards the funding of them. Just in time for the new academic year in 1998 students fees were pushed through by David Blunkett, with a starting cost of £1000 a year. I would have been 2 years of age at the time, oh how we’ve come a long way since then. Imagine now in 2016, some universities are at the £9000 benchmark and others pushed that £250 further for £9250 per year. This brings me to my next point.

Now as university students since we are paying for our education, I strongly believe that those who were entitled to a free education should have no input on what we choose to study and what is considered a ‘academic rigour’ subject and what is not. These pompous, ‘well-educated’, non-sensical buffoons should have no right to tell a university student that the subject(‘s) that they have chosen to study and are paying for, lack substance.

Especially anyone who went to university for free and whom studied subjects such as, ‘The Life of Madonna’ or ‘The Art of Jam Making’ and can now freely turn around and say, “Yes, I have a degree under my belt”. There are however such things as, ‘Dead Subjects’ according to my flatmates, for example the study of ‘Dance with Movement’ a degree where you need physical evidence that shows you are good at dance and movement rather than just a degree which says you have studied it. So are people really leaving university with degrees in 2016 and not being able to find jobs because the job market is getting smaller? Or are there other factors, such as what has been studied which come into play?

The marketisation of education has allowed universities to offer almost anything which leads to a degree as the end product and they pocket £9000 a year whether that degree gets you into a job or not. Does Blunkett’s concept of students benefiting from degrees, so should therefore contribute towards them still apply? Or are universities so marketed now that they are taking advantage of student’s naivety?