On Wednesday 03 July 2013 10:42 Dave Liquorice wrote in uk.d-i-y:

On Wed, 03 Jul 2013 09:35:53 +0100, Tim Watts wrote:

If I were 16 now, I would be giving serious second thoughts to going to
university with the extorninate costs involved.

er, I'm sure you realise that you don't go to University at 16, you
go to "Sixth Form" to get A levels to go to University at 18...

Well, yeah... But 16 is a good time to start thinking about it - it may
affect the choice of A-Levels taken ;-o

The costs, well the student loan is cheap money and you don't start
paying it back until you are on a reasonable income and even then
it's at a pretty low rate and it gets written off after 25/30 years
or so.

This is true - but what about the means tested maintenance/cost of living
side - that looks horrendous? It seems that a lot of working parents would
have to support their kids through uni for housing and food. Or am I wrong?

No.1 Daughter is currently "in limbo" between Secondary and Sixth
Form. I'm only half keeping an eye on the University Fees/Student
loan stuff as they are almost bound to change the rules again between
now and two years time...

Assuming I knew I was handy with computers, I would probaby consider
apprenticing with a company that did something with networking,
datacenters or similar.

Bits of paper are useful but I do agree that real experience in the
work place has a lot of value to employers. If it only shows that you
are willing to get out there and do something rather than sit around
waiting for something to happen.

--
Tim Watts Personal Blog: http://squiddy.blog.dionic.net/

http://www.sensorly.com/ Crowd mapping of 2G/3G/4G mobile signal coverage

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