and presumably when he returns at christmas there will be a pile of washing, a bored student with no money who will eat you out of house and home!

Did he thank you for ferrying him to Liverpool btw ? If not - get to come back by train at his own expense!

We are rubbing his nose in it by evicting him from the largest to the smallest bed room in the house. He'll not want to linger!

were doing fucking cartwheels.

I have 3 teenage step children. The eldest is about to start year 2 of uni, and the middle one is just starting a gap year, having just bought a round the world ticket that will take her away from January to April.

We are fourtunate enough to have a house big enough for 5, but I don't think the palace has been built yet that can stand the fall out, in terms of mess and noise that 3 teenagers make. I know it's not deliberate, or directed at me - they live like pigs in shit in their bedrooms - but the relentless spread to every other free space in the house wears you down after a while. That and a seemingly congenital inability to empty a bin,turn off a light, or not start clattering around the house about half an hour after I've gone to bed means that term time offers badly needed respite care.

There may be some grounds for optimism. The age of 18 seemed to be a particular zenith of selfishness for ours - and frankly they were building on a pretty high base. There seem to be phases of "growing away" from parents and turning 18 maked a new high (or maybe more accurately, a low) in the "it's all about me" stakes - they are adults now don't you know!!. But after being away at Uni the eldest seems to have become a degree more socially adept and considerate of others. Lets hope it continues. And spreads to her sister sometime soon, as god knows, she needs a dose of it, and quickly.

Of course, they still come back expecting to have their cooking and cleaning done for them - they only do that for themselves in term time. But it's still nice to see them come back.

if only the summer holidays weren't so long .....

I do not want to think about the summer break. Live for the moment I say. I believe working holidays on camps are avaliable.
We are not wealthy by any means but I can not see how the offsprings of the disadvantaged finance college. The basic accomodation is costing £4K a year plus plus. There will be no requiremnt to cut college places, the finacial situation will do that.

I was the first person in my family to ever get to university, some 30 years back, and the Bathmats have made no further demands on the state vis-a-vis higher education until recently, when my niece and nephew started Business Studies and Marketing degrees, respectively. But, though I love em both very much, their both as thick as pigshit, as far as I can tell. They come to visit and say things like 'So,do you read those books?' Or is it just me?

Stimpy you have beaten me to the key board as I was considering I sounded like Daily Mail man. There is a philosophical discussion to be had on what is a degree, they should be relatively rare because they are difficult.People need higher education after 18 but not a degree, the word and the qualification should have a value. There is no point in creating a massive group of dissafected graduates.

What worries me is the two little darlings mentioned above have ridiculously heightened expectations of what their going to achieve. Me and the missus (48 and 35 res;ectively) are doing alright. but the aforesaid come rounnd the gaff and say things like 'I'd like a house like ths but i'm aimig to have paid off my mortgage when I'm 28' Who's telling them this shite?

to talk to my 17 year old lad tonight who's just started year 2 of his A levels. He is very bright (brighter than me that's for sure) & very, very lazy. He got ABD in his AS's in difficult subjects despite very little work. But he is saying he hates college & doesn't see the point of carrying on to uni & debt for jobs that don't exist. I do not know what to say to him because I think he might be right & what other options are there? He has no practical skills so manual jobs are a no go. My eldest lad did an HND in computer science & walked straight into a 20k job although he did less well at school & is not as bright.

when the youngest goes off to Uni.

Suspect the real impact will come when I get the first electricity bill... the absence of one person who has a laptop on all the time + TV, leaves lights and fans on when going out to work, has a power-shower every day and lots of hair to dry is likely to make a big difference.

Maybe I will be able to treat myself to a Kindle after all.

I work in management in a highly respected international school, , and the fact is the kids can't fail. The GCSE's, especially Science and Maths, are now so simple that almost anyone of our generation could come in off the street and get an A. Kids who do fail are put onto one year remedial courses that are the'equivaent' of 5 GCSEs. Then we encourage them to study 'soft A levels like media studies, and they eventually come out aged 20 ready to study Trael And Tourism
in Devon. THey come out of that at 23 essentially having wasted 7 years of their lives. and imagining they're worth 50k ayear.

Stick your lad in the RAF.

and I'm not all that bad. Honest!

more of an old softy than I thought. I miss the boy around the place, we just get on really well and I can't wait for him to come back he'll always be welcome here. His course is more vocational, following something he's always wanted to do and has worked towards. University is just a step he has to follow to reach where he wants to be. I wouldn't have recommended him doing Business Studies or American History I would have sent him out to work as his older brother did.