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

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 ?

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.

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.

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.

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?

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.

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.

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.

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 Like Birbalsingh.

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

What no one takes into account is that going away to university is a daunting experience for any school leaver

Is it? Can't say I found it so. I was more than ready to spread my wings and assumed most 18 year olds were too.

So... well... gosh!

But perhaps having parents who went to uni helped as it was spoken of as a great experience, and one which, on my father's part, made him "socially mobile". He didn't forget his Yorkshire mining roots but he and his parents were jolly glad he was able to break out of that background. Mum went to a girls' grammar school and, also with parental encouragement, was the first girl at that school to get a state scholarship to university (early fifties). Their view was that if you were academically bright enough to go to uni then of course you would if you got the chance.

Things have changed somewhat since the mid-seventies and I do wonder now if some young folk who go to uni would be happier and no less well off (financially and psychologically) not going but doing some vocational training while in a job. I'm glad to see there is some movement towards this type of education. I might even have used it myself had it been available.

BTW, the army paid my dad's uni fees. He had to do post-war National Service when he left school at 18. When his two years were up, it was assumed he was uni material as he had 3 A-levels.

He and Mum both lived at home with their parents until they married.

Living at home was still common in Scotland in the seventies.

Living at home while a student, that is.

Actually, come to think of it, a good proportion of Minibaggs's school cohort have lived at home too while at uni.

I was a student in Scotland in the Seventies.

Of all the students I knew, only one stayed at home. Moving into accommodation that wasn't your parental home was a huge part of being a student in Scotland. The different economic landscape that has meant that people have to stay at home now, and that's a pity.

Obviously from the grammar in that post you can see that I wasn't a student of English. ?

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'm absolutely struggling to make sense of this, MOnica. We're talking about Birbalsingh, who is right wing, apparently suggesting that working class children shouldn't aspire to Oxbridge. No left-wing do gooders involved...

What is a left wing do gooder?
I suspect I’d be dismissed as one by some posters. The ones who insist they’re talking up the opportunities for working class children by bringing back secondary moderns for example

I've just read the transcript of Birbalsingh's speech and I can't find anything that justifies your interpretation, volver. I can't even find the words 'Oxford' and 'Cambridge' in it.

That's me done, though...

Oxbridge is a reference to hte headline in the LBC article. In the very first post of this thread I said To be fair, we haven't heard the whole speech yet so it might not come out this way when she actually says it..

Since then we have had a barrage of posts about how anyone can get to Oxbridge if they really want to. Somewhere upthread I said that this has nothing to do with getting to Oxbridge.

Birbalsingh is meant to be in charge of promoting social mobility and she is telling people to be happier with less social mobility. That's it.

Not long ago whilst visiting Oxford as a tourist I sat on a park bench by one of the colleges and a two young ladies sat beside me having their lunch.
Being a naturally chatty (nosy) person we started chatting, both were students at Oxford,one from a state school one privately educated but both new friends ,both clever and both considered themselves to be lucky to have gained places at such prestige places.Both said their classes seemed to be 50/50 mix of state and public schooled and beyond initially getting to know each other conversations it wasn’t now even an issue. I wished them both good luck in their lives and left them to chat and I came away thinking what thoroughly nice well balanced youngsters they were.

MaizieD

^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'm absolutely struggling to make sense of this, MOnica. We're talking about Birbalsingh, who is right wing, apparently suggesting that working class children shouldn't aspire to Oxbridge. No left-wing do gooders involved...

MaizieD the whole 9 pages on this thread have been based on something that Balbirsingh did not say. I've read the speech, listened to the Q and A session which followed her speech and she did not say that working class students should aim lower than Oxbridge. If she had I would violently disagree with her. In her speech she doesn't even mention Oxbridge.

foxie48

MaizieD

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'm absolutely struggling to make sense of this, MOnica. We're talking about Birbalsingh, who is right wing, apparently suggesting that working class children shouldn't aspire to Oxbridge. No left-wing do gooders involved...

MaizieD the whole 9 pages on this thread have been based on something that Balbirsingh did not say. I've read the speech, listened to the Q and A session which followed her speech and she did not say that working class students should aim lower than Oxbridge. If she had I would violently disagree with her. In her speech she doesn't even mention Oxbridge.

I know, foxie48, I've read the speech too, now.

It seemed quite reasonable to me. Perhaps volver could point out the actual phrase/sentence/ paragraph which has informed her interpretation, because I'll be blowed if I can see what it is that I seem to be missing.

foxie48

MaizieD

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'm absolutely struggling to make sense of this, MOnica. We're talking about Birbalsingh, who is right wing, apparently suggesting that working class children shouldn't aspire to Oxbridge. No left-wing do gooders involved...

MaizieD the whole 9 pages on this thread have been based on something that Balbirsingh did not say. I've read the speech, listened to the Q and A session which followed her speech and she did not say that working class students should aim lower than Oxbridge. If she had I would violently disagree with her. In her speech she doesn't even mention Oxbridge.

Please read my post, 13:30. Please. ??

I've read it, volver. I appreciate that your earliest posts were based on headlines rather than the actual speech, but what exactly did she say that informed your conclusion that she's telling people to make do with less?

I'm finding it really disappointing that posters with whom I often agree are looking for a sentence where KB says "Poor people shouldn't go to Oxbridge."

Its clear to me, and to many people here and many commentators outside of the GN bubble, that the intent of her speech was to reduce the expectations of "those at the bottom" (her words) so that they should be content if they can just get themselves a job. Don't aim high, just be happy with what you can get. Her premise about success being all about money is just showing her lack of understanding of how people really think, and she is using that made up idea to base her entire plan on.

She says people should be encouraged to get jobs that make them happy (That may be a paraphrase). Well that's lovely and we should all have jobs that make us happy. But its not social mobility and her responsibility is social mobility.