Your view?

[Deathwish]

Please do not tell me she did Social Work. Although I have a sneaky suspicion she may have done psychology or such in order to try manipulating the parents.

[EEVblog]

This says it all:

“Maybe they should have taught me how to budget a little better, a little more carefully,” she told the show the other day. “They never sat me down and had a real serious talk about it. They said, ‘Here’s your college fund, it’s for classes only.’”

and then

"“I just wasn’t very good with my budget,” she said. “I also used it to budget for school clothes, stuff like that. My college break money…Maybe I should have not done that.”

No shit Sherlock! 

[EEVblog]

Being female I find myself embarrassed for her, and for the rest of us females that she reflects badly upon.

What's gender got to do with it?

[AF6LJ]

Being female I find myself embarrassed for her, and for the rest of us females that she reflects badly upon.

What's gender got to do with it?

Well I just hate it when members of my own sex embarrass the rest of us.

[Lightages]

"Being a human, I find myself embarrassed for her, and for the rest of of us humans that she reflects badly upon."

I like that better. We are all human and should be given the same opportunities, independent of race or gender. We deserve the same ridicule on the same basis.

[Mechanical Menace]

Being female I find myself embarrassed for her, and for the rest of us females that she reflects badly upon.

What's gender got to do with it?

Well I just hate it when members of my own sex embarrass the rest of us.

You have no need to feel guilt for anything you didn't do. She's the idiot not you. Sharing a taste in what you like to read probably makes you have more in common with any person than sharing gonads...



I totally blew my first chance at uni partying like an idiot, that's not a mark against cisgender straight blokes but against me. Personally I actually paid for my stupidity and never blamed anyone else for it but different strokes for different folks, walk a mile in my shoes sort of thinking, I also never had tens of grands handed to me like it's nothing  to deal with.

"Being a human, I find myself embarrassed for her, and for the rest of of us humans that she reflects badly upon."

I like that better. We are all human and should be given the same opportunities, independent of race or gender. We are deserve the same ridicule on the same basis.

+1

[EEVblog]

Well I just hate it when members of my own sex embarrass the rest of us.

Again, what's it got to do with reflection upon gender?
This stupid over-privileged kid could have been male or female.

[EEVblog]

"Being a human, I find myself embarrassed for her, and for the rest of of us humans that she reflects badly upon."
I like that better. We are all human and should be given the same opportunities, independent of race or gender. We are deserve the same ridicule on the same basis.

+1

[AF6LJ]

Well I just hate it when members of my own sex embarrass the rest of us.

Again, what's it got to do with reflection upon gender?
This stupid over-privileged kid could have been male or female.

Actually Dave her sex is stated in the first paragraph of the post.
Being female I am afforded a certain level of privilege when commenting on members of my sex.
From the post....

* * * *
In a nutshell:
[Kim] blew through a $90,000 college fund on expensive clothes and a trip to Europe and now has no way to pay for her senior year, a predicament  she blames on her parents.

[Lightages]

I have heard similar stories for years. Female or male, children being little privileged brats expecting their parents to pay everything, including their errors and idiocy and at total loss to the parents. It has nothing to do with being a female.

[Rick Law]

You mention that you have a child about to go to university.  It is far more important that you have this conversation with her/him than with those of us on the forum.  If there is any disconnect between you, it might then be appropriate to go outside your family for discussion about who might be more correct. 

In my opinion the ideal situation is for you to be close enough to your kids you would have had this conversation (multiple times) and would have had few surprises because you have been influencing them for their entire lives.  Not everyone achieves this ideal.  I didn't.  But I got close enough that we survived the bumps and they have turned out pretty well in the end.

You bet!  I am close to her and we have conversations on this topic since she was in elementary school.  I prefer to first form a view, validate my views, then state my position to her.  She can challenge my view if she can justify it.  I prefer "adult views" in my formation and validation stage (sanity check).  Yesterdays right answer may not be right today.

She is a good kid for the most part.  I am just very demanding.

I am also very close to her education and education in general.  I know she will have a very hard time with post high school education given the decline of our systems.

[Rick Law]

I have heard similar stories for years. Female or male, children being little privileged brats expecting their parents to pay everything, including their errors and idiocy and at total loss to the parents. It has nothing to do with being a female.

Entitlement attitude is common, but it has nothing to do with privilege or brat, male or female.  In my view, "Privilege brat" is home made.  It is what the parent shaped their kid to be by either their action or inaction. 

[Shock]

To make sure it doesn't happen, be the one who pays for it out of your account directly. Make it clear from the outset that this is education money and will only ever be education money, and if their track record with passing grades goes down hill they will need to turn to working to support themselves until they prove they are back on track.

[pickle9000]

Wouldn't it be amazing to have severely reduced rate or even free university level education for all students during the first 2 years? I wonder what that would do for the economy in 10 years?

[miguelvp]

Then High School teachers would be teaching those first 2 years at the same pay grade as they get now.
But if you are willing to double your property taxes for the good of the economy I guess they could take the extra cash to pay the professors a decent professor level salary for those 2 free years.

[pickle9000]

Then High School teachers would be teaching those first 2 years at the same pay grade as they get now.
But if you are willing to double your property taxes for the good of the economy I guess they could take the extra cash to pay the professors a decent professor level salary for those 2 free years.

Or cut down on military spending by 1%. Of course in Canada that mean no aircraft carrier (that's a rowboat with a piece of plywood on top. We could keep our battleships, two of them still float!

[Rick Law]

Wouldn't it be amazing to have severely reduced rate or even free university level education for all students during the first 2 years? I wonder what that would do for the economy in 10 years?

Most likely, free university will make the degree worthless to more students.  People will not put much value or effort to achieve something that costs nothing.  It will become a 4 year vacation while taking worthless easy courses.  End result will be plenty of kids with a degree but without employable skills.

You can see this happening in the USA today.  Kim that my original post was about, she didn't had to contribute to her first 3 years.  She was spending the college fund for "expensive clothing and European vacation".

It was knowledge of other cases like this leading me to conclude: to best ensure my daughter doesn't miss the value of the education, she has to bear more of the cost.

This particular case was just a good example I can use as a conversation starter so I can gauge "am I too much of a tiger" in the context of "tiger mom." (Well of course "tiger dad" in my case, the original newspaper story was "tiger mom" so if I say "tiger dad", it may leave too many of you scratching your head.)

[miguelvp]

My daughter works while being in college and even pays most of her own rent.

Funny enough, to teach her the value of money we did sent her to Europe but backpacking and doing workaway programs (work for a place to sleep and some places would actually fed her), cost us little and at 18 she learned pretty fast what it takes to be on your own and on top of that she got to see other cultures and had a blast.

We did send her some money for food every now and then but not much, but she would go to the markets and got the produce at a discount towards the end of the day, even the menu of the day in most places was in her mind too much to spend, so she usually cooked her own food and found the best bargains, specially on fruits and vegetables that have been sitting for half a day and discounted towards the end of the day.

Now she is very frugal and doesn't like to waste food. She was going to college to be on her own anyways and I did some traveling at her age myself (then again I was still in Spain so it was easy for me).

Some of our friends couldn't understand why on earth would we send her to foreign countries on her own, on how dangerous that is, etc etc etc. Being on your own is really not that dangerous, I find the US more dangerous than Europe, and at 18 is about the best age to see the world on your own (six months).

One funny thing is that one day she was on Italy called us to ask us for permission to go to Berlin with some friends (she made a lot of friends over her trip) me and my wife looked at each other a bit perplexed and replied to her, "Don't you get it? you are an adult now, but thanks for asking, just keep us informed on your whereabouts and phone numbers of your friends in case we don't hear from you".

Many here might not agree on what we did, but that's our version of kicking our kids out of the nest because it's time to learn to fly.

And I know what that trip meant to her because I did the same, my wife did the same at her age as well. You just can't do that on your mid 20s or older because no one is going to let you stay at their place. At the end of your teens you find open doors everywhere.

Of course when she came back she was a bit condescending towards everyone because she was a world traveler and she knew everything worth to know in this earth because of her six month adventure. But that was two years and a half ago when she came back to go to college, and she has been pretty independent ever since.

Another funny thing is that her grand parents from my wife side, have never been outside of the US. So we are taking them along to visit my parents in Spain in September, they've never met in person and I'm past half a century old so it's about time they meet before they can't, and it's been a long time since I saw my parents last. My daughter has seen them more than me on the last decade.

[pickle9000]

Wouldn't it be amazing to have severely reduced rate or even free university level education for all students during the first 2 years? I wonder what that would do for the economy in 10 years?

Most likely, free university will make the degree worthless to more students.  People will not put much value or effort to achieve something that costs nothing.  It will become a 4 year vacation while taking worthless easy courses.  End result will be plenty of kids with a degree but without employable skills.

You can see this happening in the USA today.  Kim that my original post was about, she didn't had to contribute to her first 3 years.  She was spending the college fund for "expensive clothing and European vacation".

It was knowledge of other cases like this leading me to conclude: to best ensure my daughter doesn't miss the value of the education, she has to bear more of the cost.

This particular case was just a good example I can use as a conversation starter so I can gauge "am I too much of a tiger" in the context of "tiger mom." (Well of course "tiger dad" in my case, the original newspaper story was "tiger mom" so if I say "tiger dad", it may leave too many of you scratching your head.)

My argument would be that even the most basic jobs can benefit from higher education. 30 years ago it was possible to work and pay your way through uni. Today while that may be technically possible in reality a very difficult thing to do. It's easy to say to a high school graduate do this or that but if the family is low on cash it's out the door and to work.

Would it devalue the power of the degree, sure. Would it benefit the economy? I would say that education always benefits the economy, and certainly benefits the individual. Generally I would say that a massive section of the population (worldwide) do not have "real" access to higher education.

[McBryce]

Wouldn't it be amazing to have severely reduced rate or even free university level education for all students during the first 2 years? I wonder what that would do for the economy in 10 years?

You mean like it is in Germany?

McBryce.

[pickle9000]

Wouldn't it be amazing to have severely reduced rate or even free university level education for all students during the first 2 years? I wonder what that would do for the economy in 10 years?

You mean like it is in Germany?

McBryce.

That's a thing in Germany? How do they pay for it and how long has it been implemented? Is it working?

[nctnico]

Wouldn't it be amazing to have severely reduced rate or even free university level education for all students during the first 2 years? I wonder what that would do for the economy in 10 years?

Most likely, free university will make the degree worthless to more students.  People will not put much value or effort to achieve something that costs nothing.

Ofcourse not. A good education is important and even with the government paying for the education it doesn't mean the bar to pass exams should be set low. Having typed that: the system in the NL has been like that for a while but it didn't push all the students to make progress or really think about what they wanted to learn. The system got changed where students can take a loan (if they can't pay for university) which can be payed back over a long period and the payment plan is also based on the salary. I think it is a good tradeoff because it keeps a good education available to everybody. I always say: The road to prosperity of a society is paved with good education.
If good education isn't available to everybody then you'll write off a lot of good talent. I recently saw a documentary from China. Over there poor parents can have their children raised and well educated in fosterhomes so the children don't end up in poverty. It is extreme but at least it breaks the poverty cycle.

[McBryce]

Wouldn't it be amazing to have severely reduced rate or even free university level education for all students during the first 2 years? I wonder what that would do for the economy in 10 years?

You mean like it is in Germany?

McBryce.

That's a thing in Germany? How do they pay for it and how long has it been implemented? Is it working?

Some German states charge you €500 per Semester, but most don't. There's a €50 registration fee, but that's it. Not sure when that was implemented, but it was before I got here, so at least 25 years. Universities are funded through tax.

McBryce.

[Howardlong]

Wouldn't it be amazing to have severely reduced rate or even free university level education for all students during the first 2 years? I wonder what that would do for the economy in 10 years?

You mean like it is in Germany?

McBryce.

That's a thing in Germany? How do they pay for it and how long has it been implemented? Is it working?

Some German states charge you €500 per Semester, but most don't. There's a €50 registration fee, but that's it. Not sure when that was implemented, but it was before I got here, so at least 25 years. Universities are funded through tax.

McBryce.

30 years ago, the UK government (or local government) paid a grant to pay for living costs, and the tuition fees were met by the government too. That level of living cost grant was means tested, determined by your parents' wealth.

Over the intervening years, firstly the cost of living grant has been replaced by a government backed loan scheme, and more recently tuition fees are also met by the loan scheme. Coincidentally (well, not at all really), the percentage of school leavers going to university rather than into a job as mushroomed. The problem we now have is that a university education has become devalued, with about 50% of school leavers now attending tertiary education. It was much more the exception rather than the default position to go to university when I went. In contrast, Germany concentrates much more on an on the job vocational approach to training, with barely a quarter of their school leavers attending university.

While I applaud the promotion of education, I have never understood why you need a degree to do many of the jobs that younger graduates do these days, now that the bar has been risen.

[HighVoltage]

My nice is just starting University here in Germany and had to pay the Euro 50 registration fee for the semester and was complaining about it. When I told her that she should look to other countries and find out how much they are paying for a semester, she only said that she is in Germany and is expecting this to be free.