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

The point is that if you don't even consider the highest goal possible should be available to all, regardless of their background or origins, and offer the opportunities which make that goal achievable, you must downgrade all levels of opportunity because you have changed the target.
It's a bit like saying "don't aim for the stars there's a very nice cloud up there and that's high enough for you".

FarNorth

How about another bombshell?
In my opinion, making nursing an all-degree profession was a huge mistake.

It excludes a lot of people who could be excellent nurses but who are not capable of degree level study.

But people who want to do that side of the work can become health care assistants and fulfil their potential in that role. The point abut a nursing degree is that it recognises the huge developments in treatment and enables those with the ability to provide those treatments.

Quite.

Dickens
The message is that social mobility works at all levels. We shouldn't focus on just one goal.

I agree FarNorth.

Iam64

Blimy. Another long thread where polarised ‘debate’ continues. I find myself with volver on this. Some of us get it, others never will

I think the message from the tsar is a bit subliminal.

'Social mobility' isn't really working well, so persuade people to aim lower. And be satisfied with that.

How about another bombshell?
In my opinion, making nursing an all-degree profession was a huge mistake.

It excludes a lot of people who could be excellent nurses but who are not capable of degree level study.

Blimy. Another long thread where polarised ‘debate’ continues. I find myself with volver on this. Some of us get it, others never will

SporeRB

DD has a friend from a working class background. All her family work as cleaners, she is the first one who managed to get an office job. She did not go to university but is now working as a senior buyer earning almost twice the UK average salary.
So you can achieve social mobility without going to university.

Indeed you can. I didn’t go to university but became a partner in a City law firm.

Tweet that makes sense.

“it may just be me but if the Social Mobility Tsar is saying working class kids shouldn’t bother trying to be socially mobile then maybe they shouldn’t be the Social Mobility Tsar”

Did anyone watch Beth Rigby's interview with her.

news.sky.com/story/i-wish-he-could-be-but-he-isnt-britains-strictest-headteacher-says-boris-johnson-is-no-role-model-for-children-12630957

I've just been over on Ms Birbalsingh's Twitter feed. Somebody has posted a comment including the standard definition of social mobility that the government has used up until now. You won't be surprised to learn that it's easier to say social mobility is improving if you use her new definition, which is completely made up and has little or no support from anyone with any experience in this, as far as I can see. So as is the way of things in 2022, if you don't like the rules because they are too hard, just change them.

She is also engaged in a tweetfest saying how she has been misrepresented and that she knows best. And some strawman argument about lawyers. She's predictable, I'll give her that.

DD has a friend from a working class background. All her family work as cleaners, she is the first one who managed to get an office job. She did not go to university but is now working as a senior buyer earning almost twice the UK average salary.
So you can achieve social mobility without going to university.

For many, many people, it is genuinely impossible to achieve a uni education, however much they may aspire to it.

The point is that they are capable of some achievements and those things should be celebrated just as much as uni degrees for those who can do them.

I take your point Casdon.

volver

It's not about aspiration.

It's about being told not to expect too much, know your place.

That’s what I meant - knowing your place means knowing it’s not possible for you to achieve something, so you don’t aspire to get there.

That is not what I am saying.

I know. But that is what Birbalsingh is saying, and is the theme of this thread.

volver

I give up.

You're being told that if your parents are unemployed, and you get a job, you should be happy with that and not expect anything else.

That is not what I am saying.

If a student has the ability (both educational and emotional) to go to University, then it is down to them to choose what Uni they feel will suit them.

If they want to get a job and get their degree through the OU, that should not be dismissed.

GrannyGravy13

volver

No GG13. I'm not explaining myself clearly. I've got it. I started the thread, remember.

*The person responsible for improving social mobility says people shouldn't expect to have social mobility.*

Social mobility is earned either through academia or financial success.

Nobody should expect it.

The whole point about social mobility is it has to be possible. It is only possible if it is expected. If you are told that you are a great success because you have a job cleaning toilets (and your parents were unemployed), when what you really wanted to do was astrophysics at Oxbridge, should your job be celebrated or the loss of your ability mourned?
Of course everyone won't do it, but the possibility has to be there.

I give up.

You're being told that if your parents are unemployed, and you get a job, you should be happy with that and not expect anything else.

volver

No GG13. I'm not explaining myself clearly. I've got it. I started the thread, remember.

*The person responsible for improving social mobility says people shouldn't expect to have social mobility.*

Social mobility is earned either through academia or financial success.

Nobody should expect it.

It's not about aspiration.

It's about being told not to expect too much, know your place.

GrannyGravy13

Casdon I agree, but I also know that it is possible to achieve both academically and financially without a degree from Oxbridge/red brick Uni.

This is about aspiration though GrannyGravy13. Ability should be the deciding factor for getting into Oxbridge not social background.

RichmondPark

"the person who cleans the toilets in an Oxford Dons house could go on to have their own cleaning company."

Which is nice unless they had the capability and desire to be an Oxford Don but couldn't do that as the Social Mobility Czar thought it too big a step.

There is access to any University at any age.

It is not beyond the realm of possibility that once that person has their own company that they can then apply to Oxbridge.

No GG13. I'm not explaining myself clearly. I've got it. I started the thread, remember.

The person responsible for improving social mobility says people shouldn't expect to have social mobility.