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people here are wondering how long it's going to take before school here gets too expensive.
cases of people not being able to afford higher education are pretty rare, since the fees are reasonable so most parents can easily afford it. there are scholarships for anyone who might struggle: you can apply for one, they look at your parents financial situation and the money you would spend on education and you get a large part of that money back.
my school costs around 600 euros a year, study material (mostly drawing stuff) not included. my mother is a single parent with three children, and we get a scholarship for a 'student living at home'. around 550 euros are paid back, so my education costs 50 euros a year, plus the materials.
this system has been proven to work pretty well. the idea behind it is that people who have a talent shouldn't have their level of education depend on wether their parents have money or not. everyone gets the same chances and starts at the same level. a student who has to work to pay for his studies ends up losing a lot of time (time that could be used to invest in the studies) and does not have the same chances as a richer student.
i do believe that it's the government's responsibility to provide education for who wants it or needs it. it will only make them better in the end. we would miss out on some very talented and highly qualified people later.
i read sways comment on how people don't necessarily need universities, how they can educate themselves... in some rare cases this is true, but i wouldn't say it works for everyone. if i apply it to my own school i'd definitely say it's untrue. i study at an art school and we are almost dipped into a giant pool of new impulses, stuff that would take years or cost a lot of money to acquire. in my first year i got the opportunity to visit conferences on graphic design for 1/4 of the price, practise different forms of printing (woodblock, etching,...) and learned how to develop photographs. i am in a large group of young people who are into the same stuff and will talk about their ideas or interests. we are surrounded by teachers with years of experience who know a lot and can look at our work in order to help us. i've seen people educate themselves in art (my boyfriend is one of them) but they all either wish they had some sort of education (he always says he would like to have some model classes, just to get a better view on anatomy) or they start it at a later age, investing a lot of time in it (a woman i know just started doing a part time job instead of a fulltime one so she could study again)
anyway, what i'm saying is that it doesn't hurt to give everyone the same chance in life. people's lives shouldn't depend on hox their parents did in life.
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