Today I was reading The Age online and I discovered that in a recent poll, Melbourne was deemed to be the fourth most student friendly city in the world, just behind Paris, London and Boston. The ranking was based on 12 key criteria, including quality of living, number of internationally ranked universities, proportion of international students and affordability. Melbourne was awarded 95 out of a possible 100 for quality of living, however that quality comes at a high price because Melbourne was only scored 28 out of a possible 100 for affordability. This just didn't seem right to me and made me think that what they were basing affordability on were obviously not the things on which students would base affordability.
I remember my students days and I managed to get drunk at least once every week for only ten dollars. I know that was ten years ago, but even with Consumer Price Index (CPI) increases, that couldn't be more than around fifteen dollars today. How can anybody consider that to be unaffordable? I then realised that the low score was aimed at cost of living factors such as rent, food and other such things. You know the kind of thing parents might be looking for when they send their kids to university. It is obviously the cheap price for student drinks which managed to get us most of the 28 points out of 100. This made sense to me and as I read further it said that if Melbourne was more affordable it would surpass even Paris as the most student friendly city. I am assuming that is because the savings in rent would then enable students to get drunk at least twice a week!
To read the original article check out The Age website.
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