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" In another blow for further education, new rules come into effect today which see\u00A0the scrapping of student grants (free money) for those from low-income families who are heading for university. Not only is this a complete blow for those who need\u00A0all the financial support they can\u00A0get from the government, but it&amp;#039;s also a depressing broadening of the gap between rich and poor. Up until now, the families of those hoping to\u00A0study at university or any other higher education institution have been assessed by a means test. Those from a household with a combined\u00A0income of\u00A0less than \u00A325,000 per year\u00A0received\u00A0a full grant of \u00A33,387 every\u00A0year; a hugely necessary help. From there upwards it works proportionately. But all that&amp;#039;s gone as of today, after changes came into effect which mean the former grants are now\u00A0just another loan. But, er, don&amp;#039;t today&amp;#039;s students have enough of that?  It&amp;#039;s not as if this move has come as any great surprise to us; former Chancellor George Osborne announced that grants would be swapped for loans back in his October 2015 budget, but it&amp;#039;s not until today that people are really considering the\u00A0hugely detrimental impact this decision will likely\u00A0have. Because ultimately, what this means is that thousands more people simply won&amp;#039;t be able to afford to go to university. It was bad enough when student tuition fees were hiked up in 2012, tripling the cap to \u00A39,000 a year. That&amp;#039;s \u00A327k of debt before anyone&amp;#039;s even paid for a roof over their head, or purchased enough Supernoodles to get\u00A0through the three-year stint that&amp;#039;s ahead. Next year, that \u00A39,000 cap will rise even further (inflation, in case you were wondering),\u00A0proving that soon,\u00A0the sky really could\u00A0be the limit for the amount our universities choose to charge\u00A0for their valuable education. Thanks for that, guys. The maintenance loan students are offered - which currently stand\u00A0at a maximum of \u00A35,878 for those studying outside London and\u00A0\u00A38,202 for those at a\u00A0university in the capital - certainly help, but realistically\u00A0even a student would struggle to live on five grand a year. Think about it; financial support is necessary. But what if your parents simply can&amp;#039;t afford to step in where the government has kindly bowed out? What do you do then? You don&amp;#039;t go to university\u00A0at all. Because with a bill that already stands at well over \u00A343,000 (tuition fees + maintenance loan for a three year course) before you&amp;#039;ve even sat down in a lecture theatre, your future bank balance is\u00A0not looking pretty. Never mind all the Sainsbury&amp;#039;s Basics vodka\u00A0you&amp;#039;re going to have to buy on top of that.\u00A0  And where does that leave us? It means thousands will now have to forego\u00A0the education they deserve; the education that\u00A0could have helped them\u00A0to\u00A0achieve a career that would support them financially throughout life (not to mention the fact\u00A0that that career\u00A0would\u00A0help them pay a wedge of taxes back into our society).\u00A0 This isn&amp;#039;t to say university is everything - academia isn&amp;#039;t right for everyone and there are some brilliant other routes for them to pursue, such as apprenticeships. But for everyone else, time at university\u00A0often gives them a sense of direction; a few years to think about what they want to spend the rest of their working life doing, and some growing-up time while they&amp;#039;re at it. There is another option, of course; you could always study at a university close to your home. But what\u00A0that would save you on rent,\u00A0it could cost you in full experience. I spent my secondary education years in an all-girls school in the middle of Surrey; I was crawling up the walls to get out and experience something new by the time I was 18. So off I went to Leeds, and\u00A0I can honestly say\u00A0I believe\u00A0the independence I gained at university is\u00A0more valuable than the law degree I came away with. And that&amp;#039;s not only because I decided to become a journalist instead. At Leeds, I made\u00A0new friends who came from all corners of the country, who had\u00A0a variety of diverse backgrounds and\u00A0who helped me develop interests I&amp;#039;d never explored before. If I&amp;#039;d enrolled at Kingston University and hopped on the bus every morning from my parents&amp;#039; house, would I have had quite such a fulfilling experience? I doubt it, tbh.  In his\u00A0announcement revealing student grants would be scrapped, George Osborne justified the decision as being based on a\u00A0&amp;quot;basic unfairness in asking taxpayers to fund grants for people who are likely to earn a lot more than them&amp;quot;. But from where I&amp;#039;m standing, that&amp;#039;s short-sighted. Tax payers are investing in the\u00A0development of people who are the future; and when that generation becomes &amp;#039;the present&amp;#039;, they&amp;#039;ll be\u00A0making their own\u00A0healthy sums of money which,\u00A0in turn, will be ploughed\u00A0back into\u00A0society in the taxes they&amp;#039;ll pay. Those people will then pave the way for the generations after them to see the same success. You don&amp;#039;t need a degree to see that it makes sense. But what&amp;#039;s perhaps\u00A0most worrying about this decision is that it&amp;#039;s elitist. It feels as though the choice to pursue a higher education is being taken away from some. Not some, in actual\u00A0fact: many. More people than we think live hand-to-mouth\u00A0in this country, and if you just happen to be born into one of those families, it&amp;#039;s likely you&amp;#039;ll head straight into work at the age of 16 instead of continuing with an education you could have been wildly successful with. It&amp;#039;s unfair; it\u00A0only considers the wealthy, and I think\u00A0it could be a decision we live to regret. Follow Cat on Twitter. Like this? Come and check us out on Snapchat Discover.\u00A0  "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.cosmopolitan.co.uk/reports/news/a45041/student-grants-cut-replaced-with-loans/>