students - debts soar
WORKERS, SEPT 2005 ISSUE
AS A-LEVEL STUDENTS around the country celebrate record results, the future for them looks increasingly debt-ridden. Student debts for the year 2003/04 were seven times as high as they were nine years before. According to the Student Loans Company, students' publicly owned debts have risen from £1.89 billion to more than £13 billion. The average student debt was £8,430 for 2003-04, up from £3,530 in 1999-2000.
A survey by the Association of Investment Trust Companies found that students expected to leave university with an average debt of £7,208.
The research found that parents estimated the likely debt at £9,741. However, both were well short of the actual average debt a student now has on graduating, which is £13,501.