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I saw a debate on Newsnight earlier this evening about whether it was worth even becoming a student nowdays, when you consider the huge debts you are saddled with for years afterwards and also how some degrees aren't really worth anything. One thing that stuck in my mind that was said in this discussion was how the aveage student will only earn about ?100,000 more, during their entire working lives, that those without a degree. This equates to getting about ?2,500 - ?3,000 a year extra, between when you graduate and when you retire, than if you hadn't gone to University. Hardly seems worth going to Uni does it?

I just treated Uni as one big piss-up. I had gone straight from education to work and at 23 fancied going to Uni. Got a 2.1 Business Studies Degree...means sod all these days as I am paid less than I was getting back in 1993. Should have stuck to being a Manager.

Oh well at least I got some good years worth of beers !grin!

I'd say it depends on what you want to do with your life - and that doesn't always mean 'going to uni' automatically says you're passionate about what you do. There are tertiary qualified people with mind-numbingly boring jobs that are every bit as dead-end as the worst factory jobs and probably pay as bad to boot!

I have to laugh when I hear universities preaching that tertiary qualifications are the only ones worth a look. Of course they're going to say that - they make money out of bums on seats these days. I work in a place filled with PhD qualified scientists, medical practitioners and Professors. They have interesting well paid jobs, but their initial university education was only the start of a very long path to where they are now. They achieved most of their position status through being self-driven and actually now put far more back into the university system through lectures and leading research projects than they ever got out of it in the first place.

Anyway, these days there are so many degree holders walking the streets it has almost become the equivalent of having a school leaving certificate. I've noticed a lot of employers now ask for experience and a willing attitude to learn on the job rather than simply a piece of paper.

I'm having major brain surgery next week and I'm entrusting the job to my local panel beater because he is willing to learn on the job and turns up on time.

Although it has become rediculously expensive I believe that Univercity is a very important life curve for many people that go. My generation and those that followed on dont really do responsibility (sweeping statment) and compared to older people a 18 I think are quite immature. The difference in me from the start of uni to the end was huge, I grew up and I cant imagin me doing that if id stayed at home and gone to work. Sure its an expensive way of doing it but where else do you have the freedom and time to explore the fun things in life and find your self. We will have to work well into our 60s I recon having 4 years bumbing about with a tiny bit of learning thrown in to give life a bit of structure, even if its going to cost alot of money is worth it for the experience.

Its very nice Masie that you had 4 years to find your place in life but its at the expense of the tax payer (why is it people who are on benefits arent able to use the same reason?) and those who an university education was intended for originally i.e the brightest and best.

In the past they were able to have a grant which meant they could go through university but by allowing everyone get in theres now no chance to give a grant to anyone.

University education is now based on nothing more than having the cash to be able to do it hence back to no social mobility.

Firstly I only did the first year (thats the most important) and secondly I cost the Tax payer nothing. Please dont shout at me for being middle class but I sold my Pony to fund my year of fun.

When I was at Uni I was surrounded by people from all backgrounds and they paid their way by having the usual bar jobs. Nothing is unatainable in this world you just have to prioritise. After I left uni I had a second year of doing nothing much and I never signed on once, didnt spounge off my faimly and always paid my rent on time. I just lived off value asda own products, I think me and my boyfriend managed to live off ?1 day or something equally clever. It was our choice we could have worked more and eaten better but we wanted to enjoy being young.

If someone wants to become a doctor say, they wil find a way if they want it enough. I know thats a very easy thing to say when you are lucky enough to come from a nice home like I did but equally I have been cut off since I left home and know what its like to decide wether to eat or buy a jumper but it was always my choice.

My dad is my hero because he came from a very poor background his mum drank to much they had no time fo him he muffed up his 11 pluss but he is now managing director of a massive company and he didnt get any grants he did it on his own with effort. I dont like this running theme with my generation and bellow taht the world owes them something and all their failures are because they didnt get a government hand out or the generation before used too much carbon or mucked up the economy. What ever happened to responsibility for ones on life. Some people start further back than others bu we all have the potential to reach the same finish line, its just some want it more than others. Its like the game of life, some people head all the way to the mansion others are happy tohave two sets of twins and stop at the little cottage.

Depends on the field your trying to become qualified for

The really smart cookies pick a business,show that their seriously career driven and get the business to fork out for the study

It may be that having a degree in years gone by would stick ?100K onto your life long earning potential, but that was before the world and their dog went to "Uni" for a three year booze up before taking home a 2:2 in Comparative Pizza Studies and a picture of them in a gown to put on the mantelpiece.

Now that employers have sussed out that the Government's ritual annual proclamation about the quality of the output from the tractor factories continually rising for the last twenty-odd years is nothing more than a blatant lies and that many so-called "graduates" can't think for themselves, use their initiative or even punctuate a simple business letter then their earning potential is going to drop like a stone.

I simply don't have time to double check every single letter that leaves the building - on my letterhead - for schoolboy howler malapropisms, wandering apostrophes and basic mis-spelling.

and, embarrassingly, I have just noticed the inappropriate plural ( 'lies' ) in the penultimate paragraph of the foregoing...