… in Britain, that is. Per the Financial Times, there’s been a double-digit jump in American undergrads applying to UK universities: (Archive.is link to avoid paywall here.)
Data published by the UK’s university admissions service on Thursday showed 7,930 US students applied for undergraduate courses starting this autumn, an annual rise of 13.9 per cent and the highest number since records began in 2006. Student recruiters said the data reflected the Trump administration’s assault on the higher education sector, with elite institutions including Harvard and Columbia at the centre of a battle over federal funding and academic freedom.
Mark Bennett, vice-president of research and insight at Keystone Education Group, an international student recruitment company, said Americans had been deterred from domestic study by Trump’s threats to cut funding and revoke student visas.
From slashing financial aid to meddling in enrollment standards to trying to break institutional accreditation, you don’t need me to remind you that Trump is befuckifying one of America’s crown jewels. Trouble is, will UK universities be able to handle the influx? The higher ed sector over here is in pretty deep shit, too, with a financial polycrisis threatening a shocking number of institutions. Here’s an excerpt from a June explainer by The Week:
London is getting ready for Trump’s visit
— WuTangIsForTheChildren (@wutangforchildren.bsky.social) July 17, 2025 at 6:29 PM
You could say that’s not nice to do to a guest, but, you know: honi soit qui mal y pense. Open thread.
Baud
Tailgate parties for soccer matches. Wild.
Rose Judson
@Baud: I almost want to befriend some US undergrads just to take them to Twenty20 cricket at Edgbaston. It’s like the minor league baseball/monster truck rally version of cricket.
Baud
@Rose Judson:
Take me out to the cricket pitch…
Barney
Nine Elms Station- where the US Embassy happens to be …
Subcommandante Yakbreath
Since this is an open thread I’m going to take a minute to vent. I just left LinkedIn permanently after seeing an image of a group of aborigines with a caption (paraphrase here) ‘These cannibals have just agreed to take five refugees a week’. To make it worse, all the comments were in agreement. I have to say I haven’t been this pissed off in a long time, and it’s going to take a while to simmer down. Sorry to have harshed anybody’s mellow, but thanks for listening.
brendancalling
I always laugh bitterly about college in the United States. I took out loans totaling about $35,000 when I went to an out-of-state school—UMass—with no help from my parents, even though they probably should’ve known better (TBH I should have quit when I learned the humanities department had been slashed months before, but I was young and dumb). When Joe Biden forgave my loan, which I have been paying on ever since I graduated, it had ballooned to $88,000 and probably a little bit more than that.
I told you that, so I can tell you this: my dad saved up about $20,000 over the course of my progeny’s childhood. As most of y’all know, my child is a dual citizen of the United States and Canada: she went to school at Concordia U in Montreal, and my father‘s savings paid for every last dime. In fact, I think there was even some money left over, because Canada doesn’t believe in bankrupting their young people before they even get a chance to launch their careers.
As for me, I still regret going to college. It was a waste of my time, and a waste of my money. I should’ve gone to trade school. I tell my students that unless they’ve got someone to pay their way or they know EXACTLY what they want to do, in most cases college is a fucking scam and they would do much better as a plumber or an electrician. No offense to any of you who work for universities, you get fucked over just as badly in many cases (like my PhD girlfriend who works FT as a professor at Penn State and gets paid $45K for her work).
Speaking of plumbers, my old plumber—who never even WENT to college—was able to send his daughter to Hampshire College, with no loans, because of how much money he made fixing pipes and installing heating systems.
Rose Judson
@Subcommandante Yakbreath: Jesus Christ, on LinkedIn?! That’s usually where people claim to be passionate about improving customer marketing KPIs through identification of synergies, at least in my experience.
Masks off, hoods on. I’d be furious, too.
Subcommandante Yakbreath
@Rose Judson: Thanks. Yes, I thought it was a space for professionals, of which I am nominally one. I had seen a few pro-Trump posts, but this thing was unbelievable.
JoyceH
The White House is admitting “chronic venous insufficiency” about the swollen ankles but claim the frequent back of hand bruises are due to too much hand shaking. I’d buy that if they admitted that Trump was on a blood thinner. Orrrrr…
Remember back during the first term of when Trump would shake the hand of other world leaders and turn it into a contest? He’d do this strangulation thing as some sort of dominance display. Later in the term, leaders started strangling right back. Do you suppose they’ve all covertly agreed to try to break the bleeper’s hand?
prostratedragon
Pile it on, Britannia!
hells littlest angel
So Oxford, Mississippi isn’t good enough for kids today?
martha
My husband’s cousin just posted that image on Facebook…gosh I hope it’s legit! Just a gentle reminder that the “friendship” went way back.
Baud
@martha:
Picture needs Prince Andrew.
martha
@Baud: Hah! Yes it does.
prostratedragon
@Rose Judson: Ooo, the Chicago Dogs!
Central Planning
My daughter went to England to get her degree. It was about the same cost as a SUNY degree here, and, it only was 3 years. The year the pound was weak it was even more cost effective.
And, it was a great way for me to get 4 trips to England to do sightseeing.
mrmoshpotato
Has Chuck III ever nodded off during a meeting?
It sounds like Dump doesn’t have the stamina to stay in office.
mrmoshpotato
@JoyceH:
That’s probably from Melania slapping his hand away so often. Or Dump gets way too into his jerking-off-two-penises “dance.”
Harrison Wesley
So Chuck is going to host Diaper Don at the Brit equivalent of Four Seasons Total Landscaping?
Chetan Murthy
@Subcommandante Yakbreath: @Rose Judson: I started using LI back in the day, b/c it was better than keeping a rolodex. I’ve always been mystified by people who use it as a social network, or a recruiting tool, or whatever. I mean … “InMail”? Why? I can just copy out the contact email into my regular mail-user-agent!
So I don’t notice any of the social media aspects. But for sure, if I used it and got something so offensive, I’d be wantin’ to leave too.
Suzanne
So to anyone who still has student loans through the DoE, make sure to check your email. There’s some information this week about 0% interest ending soon and some people (me included) needing to choose a new plan, since SAVE is going away. I made sure to choose my new plan because I want to get this shit over with ASAP!!! I’m so sick of the goddamn drama with it.
Harrison Wesley
@mrmoshpotato: Not a Bill Maher fan, but his description of Trump jerking off two imaginary giraffes seems appropriate.
JBWoodford
@JoyceH: I thought I saw something in the story about the bruising being partially due to taking aspirin.
JoyceH
@JBWoodford:Pfffft! Aspirin is an NSAID, so it does have a slight effect on bruisability, but Trump is taking the “heart healthy” dose, so essentially a baby aspirin. So I can’t see that making one more prone to bruising. Personally, I think frequent IV lines that they aren’t explaining is more plausible.
VeniceRiley
Remember when Hillary tied student loan relief to academic institutional reform? I do.
There is a bunch of bloat there.
ColoradoGuy
@JBWoodford: More likely untreated diabetes, considering his significant obesity, lack of physical activity, and appalling diet. The lack of sleep and nonstop rage will result in very high levels of cortisol, which is a stress hormone that depresses the immune system.
You can “get by” with all these problems until something inside has a major failure. He is already showing signs of frontal-lobe dementia, sounding much less coherent than he did twenty years ago.
Harrison Wesley
@JoyceH: Or if he’s taking warfarin or Eliquis.
JoyceH
@ColoradoGuy: Why on earth would the WH doctors allow a president’s diabetes go untreated? Just give the guy metformin.
Unknown known
@Harrison Wesley: it’s not exactly a dump, no.
images.app.goo.gl/ySnSy25EvULomj2K6
More like taking him to the country club to avoid being seen by all the people in town
brendancalling
@Suzanne: My girlfriend—the underpaid PHD—has two payments left. She’s all done by September, fingers crossed. I’ll believe it when I see it.
brendancalling
@JBWoodford: more like Warfarin or something like that. My dad is on that stuff, and the man bruises really easily (and they are big-ass bruises too).
Subcommandante Yakbreath
@Chetan Murthy: To be honest, I probably joined so I could feel like a Real Business Person, but it was always a poor fit. I should have bailed long ago.
suzanne
@brendancalling: Congrats to her! I am approximately 60% of the way done. I WANT TO BE DONE.
I am sure you have fantastic plans to celebrate.
prostratedragon
@brendancalling: And of course if he’s on warfarin (as I am), he should not be taking aspirin or any other NSAID. Tylenol works pretty well on osteoarthritic knees.
Rose Judson
@brendancalling: I badly broke a leg years ago and unfortunately wound up with a post-operative DVT, which required a couple of months on warfarin. I was routinely covered in livid green bruises.
Harrison Wesley
@prostratedragon: Yeah, I’m on warfarin; would love to switch to Eliquis but I can’t afford it. Price may come down next year. I could order generic from Canada, but King Swino’s Big Beautiful Trade War makes that a bit uncertain.
JoyceH
@Harrison Wesley: I’m on Plavix. Got my stents years ago and asked my cardio why I was still on Plavix after all this time – she said “because you smoke “. I bruise easily and the smallest cut takes forever to stop bleeding, but I’ll stay on the med because it’s supposed to protect from stroke etc. Just turned 72 so I’ll take all the help I can get.
JoyceH
BTW, Twitter and Bluesky are both awash in a story that the WSJ has a Big Story about the Trump-Epstein friendship in the works and Trump is frantically trying to quash it.
brendancalling
@suzanne
We’ll do that if and when the loans are forgiven. DOE, as we all should know, has a really shitty history surrounding student loans. Heck, after forgiveness I got two checks from the government for about $3500 apiece for my overpayments. I was one of those caught up in the Income Based Repayment scam (as I said, university is mostly a scam to relieve unsuspecting young people of their future income, and boy did I fall for it).
I don’t trust DOE to honor their promises. If not for Biden, I’d still be overpaying on a bill that never went away. So I’ll believe it when I see it.
Yes, I AM quite bitter and disillusioned about higher ed.
Nettoyeur
@JBWoodford: Chromic veinous insufficiency is an early sign of what used to be called dropsy and is now called edema. It can progress to congestive heart failure. It does not augur well for Trump if he doesn’t improve his diet, exercise, and lose some of that embonpoint, aka belly.
Nettoyeur
@JBWoodford: He is taking Eliquis, a blood thinner , I bet. Like the Turtle.
raven
@hells littlest angel: There is also Emory at Oxford!