Ripped off: Students charged £150 to attend their own graduation ceremony
It can cost £60 even if you can’t make it
Amy McElwaineIt’s supposed to be one of the proudest moments of your life.
But students across the country are having to fork out almost £150 to attend their own graduation ceremony.
And some grads are being forced to pay £60 just for their certificate – even when they can’t make it to the event.
Not that fun
As if tuition fees weren’t steep enough, some students across the country are being charged just to graduate.
The extortionate price is based on cap and gown hire and the cost of bringing two guests.
The average cost of a graduation ceremony this year was £68 – and that’s excluding optional extras such as photographs.
The mortarboard and gown alone are also likely to set you back around £44 for a day’s hire.
And if you’re looking to graduate from any of the following universities in Scotland or Northern Ireland, you’re out of luck, as you’ll be charged a fee to graduate even if you can’t attend the ceremony:
“I think it’s a bit of a joke. A guy from my class actually chose not to go to our graduation ceremony because it was so expensive,” said Roisin Lanigan, who graduated from Queen’s University Belfast this summer.
Incensed Queen’s graduate Roisin Lanigan who doesn’t like paying for things
The cost of the day wasn’t the only thing that deterred students from turning up to their ceremony. A recent Kent graduate also boycotted his ceremony, due to the unavailability of tickets. “I was concerned at only being allocated two tickets with no guarantee of extra tickets,” he told The Tab.
“I have three people I would want there, and did not want to pay for my two tickets and potentially not get that valuable third.”
Sports ties are apparently compulsory for graduations at Exeter
Even before splashing out on a cap and gown, guest tickets, travel or accommodation for the day, these students are already set back by these compulsory fees.
Rachel Donald, who had to pay 45 Scottish pounds for the pleasure of attending her Aberdeen graduation
It costs even more to graduate in person, including cap and gown hire and the cost of bringing two guests.
*We’ve left Oxbridge out of the figures, as a range of robes have to be bought, and the requirements vary between colleges.
UCL came on top, with this year’s graduating students having to fork out a whopping £147.
And with the cost of extras such as photograph packages costing up to £100 at many universities, they’re likely to have been set back over £200.
At the other end of the scale, if you’re a student at one of the unis below, you’ll be lucky enough to graduate in similar style, and still get change from a £50 note:
Kathryn Marsh, who graduated from Newcastle this year, said: “I feel blessed to have paid so little. I could have got 24 trebles for the price of my gown.”
Kathryn Marsh, whose robe hire was relatively inexpensive
How much did they squeeze out of you? Let us know in the comments.