Studies show that the average student currently in college spends at least £700 a month and gets only around £400. This means that they are ending up with a £300 shortfall every single month. This is a very concerning situation and a lot of students are relying on their parents instead of getting jobs. In some cases this makes sense because the kids are studying all day long and they spend the little free time they have left doing extracurricular college activities.
This situation is really costing a lot of students extra stress that is lowering their grades and hindering their performance. That is something that is not beneficial at all because it doesn’t allow the student to be fully submerged in the learning experience. A lot of people are asking higher learning institutions to start giving students a much better financial support that is going to allow them to go to class without that extra worry.
The situation is not something new, but the cost of higher education is increasing and this is forcing more students to get into high debt or ask their parents to help them. The problem is that I many cases the parents can’t afford to help their kids with all of their payments and this is one of the reasons why their stress levels get higher and higher. Some of them do have the option of taking a part time job, but they would rather focus on learning. Still, there are usually local options for those who are willing to get a job to help finance their studies. The biggest problem is that what they make is usually still not enough to cover their expenses.
A good way to help with his issues is to initiate a crowd funding campaign that will be assigned to send money to colleges to be distributed amongst students who are having trouble making payments. This would be a great way for an entire community to solve these problems for a lot of college students and they would be contributing to helping more professionals get incorporated into society. This would be a great help and thanks to the internet and social media this kind of campaigns can easily be created and brought to light. One of the best things about crowd funding campaigns is that when people see a cause that is truly beneficial they are most likely going to support it. This has been proven by many successful campaigns for good causes.
Students could also organize protests and ask the higher ups at their institutions to come up with better financing. The problem is that this could easily escalate into disorderly conduct and that is why a better solution would always be to get them to look for funding options if their parents cannot afford to continue to send money to them. Sadly the economy is not good for a lot of people lately and even though people want their children to succeed, they can’t afford to provide them with all their financing needs.
Hopefully more people will start to see how useful the internet can be in order to get some funding for important issues such as this one. There is no excuse not to do some research and learn a little more about what you can do as a student, as a parent or simply as a citizen who is concerned for the future of the students in your area. Anyone can get involved and help out with any amount of cash that they can send in. This is why encouraging crowd funding is so important.
Sharon Callix
Award Winning Social Media Consultant, UK
