Next Gen News

"You're expected to write up lab reports at weekends, so it really didn't happen. My life was just too hectic. I stopped working those sort of hours at the end of my first year and would advise other students to work at most one day at the weekends."

In the longer term Isaakson wants an academic, which means that they \ have'll almost certainly become a means for promotion. "I 'd like to do a PhD, but they have cut funding for agencies. And there are very few jobs to go in science. We seem to degradation of higher education."

Angharad Mead, King 's College London. Debt: £ 42,000

After five years at the university, Angharad Mead, 23, £ 42,000 debt, the result is going to university in London and changes her studies after the first year.

Mead started her studies in French at King's in 2006, but after a year and a term she realised that it wasn't the subject for her. "I think 18 is a bit young to decide what course you want to do in some cases. There wasn't a lot of advice, I thought you could only study one of your A-level subjects at university." She does believe that the change in degree was worth it "as I did something which was a lot more relevant to what I wanted to do" and advises students who don't like their degree to change it, despite the debt.

After a temporary employment agency job for 8 months, she began a new level of the King 's, this time in English language and communication. "I didn 't do for A-level English language - it was just by looking at the prospectus, I realized that this course I can \ be" possibly interested d "

She financed her studies by a combination of £ 6,000 per year in the form of loans and large loans from the bank and a little help from their parents. It is however aware that the next generation to begin at the University of \ won 't be so lucky.

She does have an idea for how courses could be made cheaper. "Maybe you could squash some courses down to one or two years to alleviate debt. In my first year I had eight hours a week of lectures and didn't use the time wisely. Maybe loans could be given out for students to do internships and learn skills you wouldn't get from the classroom."

"And it definitely taught me the value of money."

"I would literally walk out of the office for a lecture and then make up the hours that day working through lunch and after work. It helped that my boss allowed flexible working and my lecturers would talk to me by email rather than meetings. I am quite driven, so when the children went to bed I would pick up the books. My mum continued to study as an adult so I went in believing it was completely manageable."