Anyone who frequents “The Student Room” will know that London Metropolitan University is a taboo subject. It just isn’t spoken about – and the moment anyone dares to bring it up, the angry mob come out with their flaming torches, determined to tell everyone that a degree from London Met will kill your family and banish you to the deepest, darkest, fiery pits of hell for all eternity.
The sad thing? I wish I was overreacting.
The way I see it, a university is a university. You’ve got ones that are prestigious – Oxford, Cambridge and the like – and ones which don’t carry the same amount of international prestige. That’s fine by me. If your choice of uni is based on the fact that when you tell people where you study, they’ll say “Oooh, you must be brainy!”, you need to re-evaluate your reasons for going to university. Personally, I don’t care if I go to Oxford University or London Met, as long as I’m studying a subject that interests me and having the full university experience.
Yes, London Met has very low entry requirements – but why is that such a bad thing? It gives people the opportunity to go to a university where they will study at a level that is right for them, because a Maths applicant for example may love Maths and have a real interest in it, but for whatever reason, can only attain a C. Having a university like London Met gives people like this the opportunity to study the subject they enjoy at a level that is right for them.
“But if they can’t get better marks, they shouldn’t go to uni!”, I hear you cry. Alright then. Where do they go instead? What do they do? Get a job? Where exactly are these jobs? Alright then, they should go on benefits? But that will be nigh-on impossible with the current cuts being made in the benefit system, and they’d only be known as “dole scum” anyway. So, they should live with their parents and do nothing? So how do their parents afford to keep an adult at home who can’t pay anything towards their own upkeep. Simple, I hear you say. They stay working for longer and don’t retire until later. Ah, but this only perpetuates the fact that there will be even fewer jobs for young people who apparently “shouldn’t” be going to university, because there’ll be more elderly people working later into their lives to try and pay for the upkeep of their children! And the vicious circle continues to spin.
Universities like London Met have their place – and, contrary to popular belief, that place isn’t “being inferior to the likes of Oxbridge”. Universities like London Met are, I’m willing to say, helping to keep this country afloat. People are paying £9,000 a year to study there – a steep figure, but they’re willing to pay it. For that £9,000 (and other costs on top of that), they are living independently for most of the year. They are gaining vital life experience of shopping for themselves. And, they are gaining a degree that, however inferior the elitist snobs might like to say it is, will give them a much better chance of getting a job – admittedly, still not great, but not even an Oxbridge degree has “great” job prospects these days – than if they lie around in their house for three years, doing nothing and destined to go nowhere.
If you’re considering London Met or another university lower down the league table, don’t let elitism sway your decision. If you have a passion for a subject, but it isn’t offered at the higher-ranked universities, or you don’t feel you could keep up with the courses in higher-ranked unis, or meet their grade offers, don’t be put off from studying it by people who are determined that any degree coming from a university lower in the league table than their own is worthless, because they’re not going to be spending three years there. The most important person is you, and what you want to study, and what you feel capable of, and above all, where you want to go.
the life of a moomin 