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Qualifications and their equivalents


Jan McNulty

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To be honest Interested Parent I don't know. Funding also relates to the qualification and if it is classed as further or higher education. Level 3 is further education, levels 5&6 are higher but I don't know which level 4 is classed at. Student loan guidelines for eligibility say they are available for the first higher education qualification only, regardless of whether that qualification has been self funded. I think you can get student loans to top up the HND to a full degree as I have seen several such courses offered but whether you could get a full student loan for a new 3 year degree course is a different matter. Regulations suggest not but I think the cracks in the system are so wide and with so many people not understanding the system, it might well be possible to fall through the cracks and get a student loan regardless. I say this because I do know of people who have self funded the Trinity diploma and then gone onto university - apparently with full student loans, ("no problem, it was very straightforward") but I cannot of course know what they declared on application forms or what they actually got. The whole system is a minefield!

2dancers, Level 4 is an undergraduate level, and is Higher Education.

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The qualification my son is doing, the two year BTEC Higher National Diploma in Health and Social Care is supposed to be equivalent to the first two years of an Honours degree. However ,whatever way it was set up, there are not enough modules for it to be awarded it. So whereas normally the HNC after year 1 is the first year and the HND after year 2 would allow you to enter the final year of a degree, with my son's course he will [hopefully] complete both years,get an HND and it will still only be worth the first year of an Honours degree. Many people have left the course for this reason as ,quite rightly both students and parents have felt it was a bit of a ripoff. For starting this September the course is changing from BTEC HNC/D to a Foundation Degree,which IS worth the first two years. Naturally, the ones ,like my son, who will not be able to change over to the Foundation Degree now they have done the first year of the HND, feel a little bit cheated. So the thing to consider is to make sure any HNC/D is actually worth what you think it is. A good job Higher Education fees here ,whether at college or university,are only £3,750 a year. But still, it grates with both students and their parents.

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It seems ridiculous to me that if you fund your first qualification yourself you can't get support for a second,whatever the subject matter. Surely it makes no difference to the nation's coffers if someone self funds course A and then gets funding for course B, than if they were funded on course A and self funded for course B? It's hard enough for parents struggling to find a dance qualification themselves as it is - I really don't see why that should then potentially prejudiced their children's opportunity to do something else later.

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It seems ridiculous to me that if you fund your first qualification yourself you can't get support for a second,whatever the subject matter. Surely it makes no difference to the nation's coffers if someone self funds course A and then gets funding for course B, than if they were funded on course A and self funded for course B? It's hard enough for parents struggling to find a dance qualification themselves as it is - I really don't see why that should then potentially prejudiced their children's opportunity to do something else later.

Completely agree - not logical to me!

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