{"id":454965,"date":"2026-03-03T07:56:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T07:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/454965\/"},"modified":"2026-03-03T07:56:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T07:56:08","slug":"misleading-school-talks-compared-student-loans-to-30-phone-contracts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/454965\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Misleading’ school talks compared student loans to \u00a330 phone contracts"},"content":{"rendered":"

One script from 2016-17, seen by the BBC, stresses that applicants should do their research and tells them where to find further information. Where possible, graduates took questions after the presentation and the script refers to an accompanying leaflet, which the BBC has not seen.<\/p>\n

However, the BBC has spoken to former presenters and interviewed two who say they feel the implications of taking out a loan were downplayed.<\/p>\n

The revelations come as the government faces mounting pressure to change the repayment terms of Plan 2 student loans, which were issued in England between September 2012 and July 2023 and are still issued in Wales.<\/p>\n

Last week, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said he would “look at ways” to make them “fairer”<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Ed, who was among the 2016 presenters, said he felt he was helping those who were thinking about going to university at the time, but now feels one part of the script in particular seemed like a “sales tactic”.<\/p>\n

In a section explaining that graduates would repay 9% of anything they earned above the repayment threshold, which was \u00a321,000 at the time, it gives an example of someone earning \u00a325,000.<\/p>\n

“You’ll pay 9% of \u00a34,000. In case you’re wondering, that works out at just under \u00a37 a week \u2013 or just under \u00a330 a month,” it reads.<\/p>\n

“I don’t know about you but my phone contract costs about that which might help to put things into a context and point out that the monthly repayments are entirely affordable.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"One script from 2016-17, seen by the BBC, stresses that applicants should do their research and tells them…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":454966,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-454965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-kingdom","tag-gb","tag-great-britain","tag-greatbritain","tag-news","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=454965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/454965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/454966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=454965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=454965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=454965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}