Comments on: News 22 Feb – Smart Drugs, Cadets and Academics with Guns

By: Darel

Darel — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 02:57:38 +0000

I do hope Dean’s work comes off such that prospective students have good information about what they are signing up for and likely returns when enroling. This looks like an interesting exercise: http://exmss.org/rate-it/

By: Dave Guerin

Dave Guerin — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 00:55:16 +0000

I can’t see National making any major changes this term – probably just some changes for access by “poor performers” and the universities will come out in support of that. Any interest would have to be a second term issue because National doesn’t want to buy a fight on going back on a big election promise. But real interest is pretty likely to be an election policy next time around.

And if you don’t get a well-paying job, your debt will get smaller in real terms over the years. I had a poorly paying job out of university and my debt got bigger in real terms!

By: Darel

Darel — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 22:49:38 +0000

It wasn’t that long ago (1999) that five and a half thousand UC students presented a petition to parliament asking that student loans attract CPI only. I believe petitioners believed that retaining the real value of the debt was fair, charging interest while studying was not.

Many of the posts on Red Alert are a variation on the theme that their qualification didn’t get then a well-paid job. That supports Joyce’s thinking, which from memory Labour Ministers also expressed, that more, not all, qualifications ought to be directly linked to the labour market.

By: Dean Carroll

Dean Carroll — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 20:37:04 +0000

For those of you interested in a more in-depth article on performance enhancing drugs for academic activities the New Yorker did an excellent piece last April on what is now becoming quite an issue for the American system.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/04/27/090427fa_fact_talbot