Talk it through with us
For parents weighing the decision

University, honestly.
The real cost of the next three years.

No spin, no sales gimmick. Change any number below to match your child’s actual situation, and check the source on every figure we use. This tool shows you the real shape of the decision, tuition, rent, living costs, and the student loan that follows for decades, against a one-year route that ends in a job. If university is right for your child, this will show you that too.

University vs a trained route into the industry
Every figure is editable. Every source is shown. Nothing is hidden.
Live
Course fees as published by Event Academy. Monthly payment plans available, which change the affordability picture again.
£24,000
Set this where you think it really lands. The Event Academy reports 90% of students in work in the events industry within six months of graduating.
30 months
The trained route is one year plus a placement. A degree is three. This is the head start, set it conservatively if you prefer.
Not your numbers? Edit the core assumptions: Tuition/yr £ Rent/wk £ Living/mo £
The university route
£0
Total cost over three years
Tuition · 3 years£0
Rent · 3 × 40-week years£0
Living costs · 3 years£0
Earning before year 3 endsUsually nothing
The Event Academy route
Trained, qualified and in work while the degree is still running.
£0
Course cost · no maintenance debt needed
Course fee£0
Earned by the time a degree ends£0
Includes3-month work placement
In work within 6 months90% of graduates
The same three years, month by month UniversityEvent Academy
Your cumulative financial position from this September, on the numbers you’ve set above.
The part the sticker price hides: the loan

A degree is rarely paid for upfront. It is borrowed, and repaid as a graduate tax: 9% of everything earned above £27,750 a year, for up to forty years before any remaining balance is written off. On the salary you’ve set, here is what that actually means.

£0
Typical borrowed for a 3-year degree
£0
Graduate repays per month at this salary
40 yrs
Before any balance is written off

£0 of difference over three years.
The gap between borrowing to study and training to earn, before counting the experience or the head start.
Our promise: this is not rigged

What’s real, and sourced: tuition £9,535/yr (2025/26 cap, UK Government, rising to £9,790 for 2026/27). City rents from the Accommodation For Students database, January 2026. Living costs default to £250/month above rent. Rent is calculated over a 40-week academic year. Loan terms are the actual Plan 5 rules. Course fees and the 90%-in-work-within-6-months figure are as published by The Event Academy, whose courses are the only ones accredited by the Chartered Institute of Marketing.

What you control: salary, head start, and all three core costs are yours to change. The tool does the arithmetic on your numbers. It does not guess your child’s outcome.

Where university genuinely wins: if your child wants to be a doctor, lawyer, engineer, scientist or anything that requires a specific degree, university is the right and necessary route, and no calculator should tell you otherwise. This tool is for the large group of young people heading to a general degree mainly because it felt like the only option. For them, it is worth seeing the alternative clearly.

Beyond the money

You’re not buying a course. You’re buying their odds of a good start.

The money matters, but it isn’t the real question. The real question is whether your child comes out the other side employable, confident and wanted by employers. That is what this route is built for, and it is why employers ask The Event Academy for its graduates by name.

Work-ready, not just qualified
Employers say Event Academy graduates arrive more ready for work than many university leavers. The placement is real experience, not a lecture about it.
The skills every sector wants
Running a budget, working under pressure, managing people, showing up and delivering. Learned by doing, transferable anywhere.
A growing, AI-resistant field
The UK events and experience sector is large and growing, and it runs on people and live moments, which is exactly what automation cannot replace.
She got a first-class degree in architecture, then spent two years unable to find work, in a pub. She did our two-week course, passed with a distinction, and we helped place her. She is now an events executive at a brewery. Her parents said she’d wasted three and a half years at university.
A real Event Academy graduate story, shared by our Principal.

Still weighing it up?
Talk it through with someone who knows.

Book a relaxed, no-pressure conversation about your child, what they’re good at, what employers are actually hiring for, and whether this route fits. Bring your questions. We’ll give you straight answers.

Book a conversation about your child
A real person, not a sales pipeline. No automated emails, no pressure.
The Event Academy · figures are live and recalculate on your inputs · eventacademy.com