255 euros. That’s how much basic grant money students living away from home will get as of September 2023. Hurray. That’s the same amount of grant money students got in 2008, before the collapse of the Lehman Brothers bank, when young people were still able to buy a house and when Mark Rutte, logically, was still practically an unknown.

255 euros. People who are even more boring than that Marcel van Roosmalen voice in which I would like you to read this column, will say: something is better than nothing. At least you won’t need to borrow as much money anymore. It’s a compensation. Students will have less debts. They won’t need that many side jobs anymore. Yes, it’s all true, but that’s exactly why these are boring arguments. It’s true that something is better than nothing. It’s an annual sum of 255 euros, but that’s all there is to say about it.

255 euros. I have no idea what that sum is based on, but I’m pretty sure that it isn’t based on a thorough cost-benefit analysis. The only thing I read in the news is that – yes, it’s true – the basic grant will make a comeback. The rebirth of a gift that was abolished in 2015 in order to make better use of money intended for education. A gift that has now been reintroduced by a minister of education from Princeton who has yet to unfold his vision on education.

255 euros. When I received my final student finance payment on 23 August 2013 it was more than that: €272,46. Enough to pay my tuition fee (which was €1835 back then), but not enough to pay my rent. For that, you needed a side job, or borrow some extra money. Fortunately, students still paid significantly less than 300 euros for a student room. If the basic grant is supposed to represent the thinking in those days, I can tell you: much has changed. And it’s not just that we exchanged Avicii for Mart Hoogkamer.

255 euros. I understand that people will be happy with that. I know I would be. It’s a good thing that young people are once again able to finance some of the high costs. However, the money that was saved over the past few years didn’t lead to lower work pressure among teachers and better education. On the contrary, university personnel are under increasing pressure. It’s only after our cabinet finally realized that graduates are up to their eyes in debts, that they started to feel nostalgic for that sum from 2008. A boring measure for a depressing reality: we haven’t taken a single step forward, but we did manage to get an entire generation of students into debts.