Should I stay or should I go?

I answered the telephone earlier this morning to my sister who was taking her daughter to view one of the Universities where she is considering studying next year. My sister asked me if I had any advice for my niece. I have seldom felt more perplexed when presented with such a seemingly straightforward question. To her immense credit, my niece has had the innate good sense to take this year out of education. Based on my own convoluted experiences, I would insist that everybody considering a University education did likewise as a bare minimum. The advice I wanted to give to my niece was "don't go!". That might seem a little extreme but it is based on what I consider to be a unique perspective. I find myself in the unusual position of pursuing a University education fully 26 years after first doing so in 1987. Things were very different then on a variety of levels. The obvious difference was that aside from your tuition fees being paid by your Local Education Authority, you were also paid a decent student grant which was not repayable. How the times have changed. Not only do students now have to take out a student loan to pay their tuition fees, they also have to take out a loan to support themselves in terms of accomodation and general living - hardly an inducement you might think. In 1987, my 2Ds and solitary E meant that I was left with the consolation prize of a Polytechnic. The country was festooned with them at that time as the country still maintained a manufacturing base in need of apprentices. This demand was ably supplied by the Polytechnics. All those institutions have now renamed (rebranded) themselves as Universities. They can frankly call themselves what they like but they are still Polytechnics seeking to equip their students with the necessary attributes to take their place in industry. Our industrial base is rather different now to that which prevailed in the late '80s. That said, it is with no small irony that the lad with 2Ds and an E now embarks on his final year as a medical student at the frankly absurd age of 44. Since those early days in my academic odyssey, the biggest difference is that all these institutions are now businesses - warts and all. What I respect is that they make no attempt to conceal the fact. The name of the game is "bums on seats" as the accountants demand ever larger numbers as year succeeds to year. If people get lost on the way so be it provided the institution involved can recoup the vital tuition fees along the way. When I made the brave (stupid) decision to return to education in 2004, I sought a relevant degree course at the former Liverpool Polytechnic. Now sporting the splendid moniker of John Moores University, it was still very much the Liverpool Polytechnic I had known in 1987. The staff were worryingly familiar as indeed were the 1960s laboratories. Granted, the main building had benefited from a lick of paint but little else had changed. The biggest change was me. I was now there of my own volition as compared to the bewildered 18 year old doing what was expected of him. Much life had been seen in the interim and, with it, valuable lessons learned. For what its worth, I had the most amazing time at Polytechnic in 1987 and did what I thought students were supposed and expected to do. As I look around me today, I don't know that I could feel jealous of my peer group at Medical School. Certainly I admire their unremitting focus on the job in hand but question whether the experience has been an enjoyable one. That is not for me to answer but I feel that the students of 1987 had a great deal more fun. Course work and assignments were a thing of the future and written examinations still predominated. Thus it was "brown trousers and bicycle clips" for one week of the year while the rest was spent in various states of enjoyment. As the concept of a job for life is about as secure as a "bag for life", I would urge caution to any young person considering an academic degree. I would first point them in the way of private enterprise which now seems to offer a lot more opportunity and reward. For a start, we didn't have the internet in 1987. For that matter, we didn't have mobile phones either so would do all sorts of odd things such as talk to each other and have fun. The Universities of today are rather sombre places obsessed with their perceived reputations as they seek to cram ever higher numbers of bums on already strained seats. So my advice to my niece would be to go and have a look. Have a really, really good look and then have a look in the mirror and ask yourself if that is what you want. There will be those who are happy to undertake such a huge financial risk but I would put it to them that a High Street shop would represent a much safer bet - even in a recession!