Working class? Don't think that Oxbridge is for you.

I was brought up in a family, where money was very tight, due my father's chronic ill health and my mother caring for him. No-one worked. When I put forward my desire to go to university. My mother told me to forget that stupid idea, people like us don't go to university. She wanted me out working, to bring in money to our home.

For the first time in my life, I defied her (she was a permanently angry woman), got two part time jobs and went.

Years later, after being a stay at home mum, I decided to go back to teaching, but retrain as a primary teacher. She told me to forget that idea too, my place was at home with my children. With the support of my beloved FIL, I went against her advice and retrained, finding a career I loved.

I didn't say working class people talk working class people down, they don't. They are as aspirational for their children as anybody else. It is all the middle class bien-pensants who say they want to help them that talk them down by constantly telling them how hard it is for them to make progress,

What they shoul really be doing is encouraging them to aim for the sky. The more of them that do that the better te chances of them succeeding.

JaneJudge

I don't recognise working class people talking working class children down at all. Lots of working class families value education. The issue is whether they can afford it in a lot of cases. The loan system doesn't help a family whose mindset is that their child will be left with such a huge amount of debt either. It is unthinkable as most working class or poorer families to be in such amount of debt.

That’s a really good point JaneJudge. Many people have a horror of debt, and the amount students can rack up now just by attending university must be terrifying.

M0nica I sometimes think that the left wing do-gooders

Are you posting this as a representative of right wing do-badders, or do you just not recognise the hollowness of these lazy tropes?

You will get your best results at a university you are comfortable at, there is no point going to an Oxbridge college if you are not happy there. There are plenty of good universities in other areas, the vast majority of students would have no disadvantage.

I don't recognise working class people talking working class children down at all. Lots of working class families value education. The issue is whether they can afford it in a lot of cases. The loan system doesn't help a family whose mindset is that their child will be left with such a huge amount of debt either. It is unthinkable as most working class or poorer families to be in such amount of debt.

Maybe one day, a researcher could analyse and reach conclusions about random posts here.
They'll have their work cut out for them!
Enjoyed your post M0nica. Takes me back to how I felt in my first term.

MOnica- I do understand personal anecdotes make research. My point was that the anecdotes here are just that, we share information because it’s interesting. Maybe one day, a researcher could analyse and reach conclusions about random posts here ?

I don’t think anyone is suggesting the personal anecdotes make research, only that it’s interesting to share experience

Of course personal anecdotes make research. What is research in a subject like this, if not the accumulation of personal anecdotes.

What no one takes into account is that going away to university is a daunting experience for any school leaver. Most will have spent their first 18 years living at home with parents and siblings, never having been away from home alone for more than the occasional school trip or visit to friends and relations. All of a sudden they are far from home, surrounded with people, none of whom they know and having to fend for themselves and it comes as a real shock, quite regardless, of their background.

The formality present in somewhere like an Oxford College is as alien to the student whose father is a doctor or engineer as it is to one whose father is a fisherman or factory worker.

My best friend at university had impeccable middle class antecedents, her father was a senior manager in an international company, but she spent most of her first term, travelling home and missing lectures because she couldn't cope with being away from home, her course and looking after herself. Her parents, with commendable good sense, would sit her down, give her a good meal, and then get the car out and her father would drive her back to her hall of residence. After a term and a change of course, she settled down and thoroughly enjoyed her time at university.

She was not alone, I knew, less well, a number of students from all kinds of backgrounds who found that first term at university very difficult and acted as she did. In fact I would say that the majority of students find the first term at University very difficult. It is lazy thinking that decides that if a child is the first in their family to go to university and has problems then the problem is their background, rather than to look at the problem overall and say that actually the majority of students have difficulties. Going to university is an enormous shock and change for every student, think of those from abroad, who have a far bigger culture shock to deal with.

As I have said before the biggest obstacle facing students from working class backgrounds are all the adults around tem, who should know better telling them that they are doomed, that it will be much more difficult for them to get to university, that when they get there they will be unhappy, surrounded by all these middle class children, most of whom, will also be state educated and some even been at school with them, but who will somehow speak a different language and live a different way to them, once they get to university.

I sometimes think that the left wing do-gooders who are always talking down the chances of working class people instead of talking them up, are actually doing it, not consciously, because if working class people were not struggling, they would have nothing to feel virtuous about.

I know you have all said not to post about our own experiences but we are working class and are educated and I wouldn't have known how to go to these dinners etc at Oxbridge

All my sons that have gone to university wouldn't have known or liked to have gone to al those sit down dinners in full attire either

Do they do all that at other universities? (as I have been to one that didn't do any of that #pintsatthebar)

NittWitt

Germany has a very good system of vocational training which the UK would do well to look at, in my view.

Quite agree. All jobs tend to be respected in Germany, not just the professions and that is how it should be.

His hair simply doesn't cooperate with his comb and I doubt there's much he can do about it.?
I can empathise with him there but I don't run my fingers through mine before I face the cameras

Casdon

Sorry, but these are anecdotes about people other people know, not an average experience. Students have differing experiences at all universities, and some would struggle with uni life wherever they go. It’s not related to class, it’s related to each individual. For every negative experience there’s a positive one - and with such a low dropout rate, even the unhappy are coming out with an Oxbridge degree.

Well said, Casdon.

Iam64

True enough Casdon, and as we all know, an Oxbridge degree opens doors other degrees can’t touch.
I don’t think anyone is suggesting the personal anecdotes make research, only that it’s interesting to share experience

It depends on your intended career path. My son turned down an offer from Oxford to take up one from the LSE, which opened more doors in his chosen subject than the equivalent degree from Oxford would have done. He hasn’t regretted that choice.

Or Larry.
She has a point.

I assumed she meant cut by a "professional", rather than Carrie or perhaps even Wilfred?

Professional looking hair!

Does it have it's own little briefcase?

CaravanSerai

When pressed, Birbalsingh's views about Johnson were this:

"I like Boris, I don’t think he’s a bad guy you know, but I don’t know enough about what he’s got up to, but I do not think that he is a good role model for children."

"When pushed on why she believed this, she said: “His personal life, for instance, that does make me raise an eyebrow. The other day I saw a picture of him in the Metro and I looked at his hair and I thought, oh my goodness, we expect our children to have professional-looking hair."

“Now, you might think that’s a bit pedantic and that’s a bit silly, but it isn’t actually. It’s important to look professional and sometimes Boris looks professional, but sometimes he’s not professional enough for me. Put it that way.”

So the thing she pinpoints as most distressing about Johnson is his hair!!! Nothing about his lack of honesty and integrity and law breaking.

What is professional-looking hair when it's at home?

Johnson's hair should be the least of our worries. And hers. His hair simply doesn't cooperate with his comb and I doubt there's much he can do about it.

... "but I don’t know enough about what he’s got up to"... well, considering the confidence vote and the loss of about 480 council seats recently, maybe it's time to find out?

True enough Casdon, and as we all know, an Oxbridge degree opens doors other degrees can’t touch.
I don’t think anyone is suggesting the personal anecdotes make research, only that it’s interesting to share experience

Sorry, but these are anecdotes about people other people know, not an average experience. Students have differing experiences at all universities, and some would struggle with uni life wherever they go. It’s not related to class, it’s related to each individual. For every negative experience there’s a positive one - and with such a low dropout rate, even the unhappy are coming out with an Oxbridge degree.

Some of the comments here are very much like the staff who hadn't quite 'got' the equality and diversity training in my job.
"Oh, he isn't allowed to help in the kitchen in case he burns himself".

"No Maureen, you've had 3 cigarettes already, and I think that's quite enough!"

We should be looking at ways around making sure poorer people don't feel like fish out of water, when they are with people they are equal to. I do understand the practicalities may be a problem, though.

A real problem for my son's friend, apart from being unable to relate to many other students, was the inability to pay for trips back home, and for his unemployed mother to visit him. It wasn't the happy experience it might otherwise have been.

0xbridge can cause problems, full stop. Look at our PM and many in his party.
The daughter of friends went to Oxford for interview. She was academic, expected to achieve A stars, and did. Both her parents are Professors. Her brother Oxbridge etc.
She hated the interview, the process and the place. Turned down her place, went to Manchester. She’s a prof now

She's not telling anyone they shouldn't aim for Oxford, simply pointing out that other, smaller successes in life are worth celebrating. I must say I'm not keen on her teaching methods though.

Oxbridge can cause problems for clever students, from working class homes.

My g.daughter's friend is just finishing her first year at Cambridge. Lovely girl, very bright and works hard - which is how she achieved her place. Her parents are from Eastern Europe, been here from before she was born. Live in a one bedroom flat above shops. She has always had the bedroom, parents sleep in living room on sofa bed. They both work hard.

Problem has arisen as students in the cheaper halls at Cambridge have to completely move out every holiday - as Uni lets those rooms during holidays for conferences, etc. Neither of her parents drive, nor have a car, so this is a real problem for her. She also has to pay more for those cheap halls, that in most other Uni's.

I am sure she will survive there, as she will not want to let her parents down - they are so proud of her achievement. However, it does appear that she is missing out on the fun and enjoyment which should also be part of University years.