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Sugar: Universities full of idiots

Self-made businessman Sir Alan Sugar is a man who knows exactly how to stir things up. And he's done precisely that. In an episode of The Apprentice to be shown tomorrow night, Alexa Tilley, one of the team leaders and a Cambridge University graduate, had to run a pizza stall. They completely bombed at the task. Sir Alan was angry, and amidst all that described further education colleges and universities as [places] "where dummkopfs come to learn where to make mistakes" (To those who don't know, a "dummkopf" is another word for a stupid person or a dolt.)

Naturally, further education establishments have been outraged at the suggestion not everyone in university is very bright. Association of Colleges Chief executive Dr John Brennan has got his pen out, and notes "I can only assume those comments were made in ignorance of the reality of modern further education - and in particular of the real experiences of the four million students studying there... blah blah blah"... >> Details >>

The words "shameless publicity stunt" come to mind, don't they?
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    What's your point? Sugar didnt go to Uni and much like many people who 'made good' after not going to uni he resents those who do.

    Surely you can find a better story to get angry about.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    don't watch the Apprentice avidly but the few clips I have seen, the people in them seem to be quite lacking in commen sense. They don't do anything and all they do is talk in buzz words and wear suits think they are the shit.

    I don't think all people at uni are thick, but people on that show are up themselves.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Yeah, there are better things to do then post on the Apprentice.
    Not Sir Alan Sugar's fault that most University graduates he has comin gto him for jobs have no real world experience.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    .
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    :rolleyes: I'm sure he'll be saying exactly the same things to his surgeon when he's on the operating table after a heart attack or something.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    bongbudda wrote:
    Sugar didnt go to Uni and much like many people who 'made good' after not going to uni he resents those who do.
    He didn't go to university, he got to where he is without a degree. That doesn't disqualify him from having an opinion on the subject. On his show, he has a mixture of "applicants", some with degrees, some not. If he notices differences between them, he's perfectly entitled to point them out.
    Walkindude wrote:
    I don't think all people at uni are thick, but people on that show are up themselves.
    Don't you have to be slightly up yourself to go through that show, however? Going through what is effectively a two-month job interview can't be easy.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    He has a smidgen of a point. In Business in particular it's probably better you start at the bottom and work your way up. A degree will of course be useful but won't be as big an advantage as in other fields. You can't really be "taught" business IMHO.
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    JsTJsT Posts: 18,268 Skive's The Limit
    stargalaxy wrote:
    In an episode of The Apprentice to be shown tomorrow night, Alexa Tilley, one of the team leaders and a Cambridge University graduate, had to run a pizza stall.

    This was on last weeks episode, research your facts properly.

    In a business world, there is only so much a degree can teach you, a lot of it is experience. He is one of those people who has his head firmly up his own arse, only because he did well without a degree he of course will assume nobody needs a degree.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Yeah.

    I mean I'd be tempted to go for it though if you get like a multipe thousand pund a year contract at the end. But if I did , I 'd go for it and do my best and doubt I'd even get on the show.

    they think they deserve it for doing nothing coz they are so arrogant.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    *pfft* who cares what Amstrad thinks - now if it was Sir Clive Sinclair complaining...
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    JsT wrote:
    because he did well without a degree he of course will assume nobody needs a degree.
    i would have thought a degree counts for very little when it comes to making money.
    i'm not convinced you can teach people how to make money in a classroom setting.eliteuniversitat3congratulatio.jpg
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    i would have thought a degree counts for very little when it comes to making money.

    Becoming rich is easy.

    1) Spend less then you earn.

    2) Turn your spare capital into 50% real goods that are inflation proof and invest the rest in your own skills.

    3) Smile, be friendly.

    Wait.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    klintock wrote:
    Becoming rich is easy.

    1) Spend less then you earn.

    2) Turn your spare capital into 50% real goods that are inflation proof and invest the rest in your own skills.

    3) Smile, be friendly.

    Wait.
    Exactly. You don't have to be intelligent to run your own business you just need to have a basic grasp of figures and know your market. To get bigger, you've got to work really hard and the bigger you get, the more you've got to surround yourself with intelligent people to give you the data to do your job. But how many builders, plumbers, electricians etc run their own business, and many of these aren't the sharpest knives in the drawer? I don't know what people do on business degrees, but surely the purpose is to create people to do those surrounding roles to assist management, rather than teach people to run a company, which is fairly simple provided you know your market and put the work in.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    He's right - universities are full of idiots, so i really don't see what all the fuss is about. Too many people do degrees which play little role in developing their intellect and even less the skills they'll need for future employment...that's pretty evident.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    \
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    I do think degrees have become watered down and pretty easy these days. They do not hold the value they once did. My first one was difficult then the next one was a breeze ten years later. I would rather employ someone with an apprenticeship rather than a degree. Employed an engineer with an electronics degree who could not even solder and when I asked why they said there was no practical work .
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    As someone who works in a university, my opinion is that there are plenty of idiots within universities - as indeed there are in many professions and walks of life, often going undetected and getting away with their total incompetence. If many university students are idiots - and i do think there is some truth in this - we can blame ludicrous and damaging policies such as Tony Blair's pronouncement that he wants 50% of young people to go to university, which has the effect of downgrading and devaluing the entire system. University degrees are supposed to be elitist, so that only the most academically gifted have one; and yet now, every idiot with a 2:2 in media or marketing from an old poly thinks they're entitled to walk into a cushy graduate job with a 20 grand starting salary. It makes me furious to see how worthless the degree has become, when people are doing them in Hotel Management and other such nonsense.

    And certainly, university degrees don't equip people for success in business, any more than any qualification can, because being a good entrepreneur is probably something that can't be taught, and requires a particular set of personal qualities that you've either got or you haven't. That doesn't mean that degrees are useless or that going to university is a waste of time, because I believe there is value in knowledge for its own sake, but Alan Sugar is correct that it won't necessarily make you a success in business - but then that's pretty obvious I would have thought.


    :thumb: :thumb: :thumb:

    Go Scarlett!!!
    You are right!!!
    100%!!!
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Spliffie wrote:
    universities are full of idiots

    Someone else who could do with raising that point with his surgeon or pharmacist.

    Universities don't teach you how to make money. But that doesn't make the people there "stupid" and "idiots".

    Some of us think that there's more to life than making money. University is something that is brilliant at broadening the mind, seeing new things, reading new things, learning about the world. I'm not saying all students do that, but the benefits of going to university go far beyond the balance sheet.

    But then Alan Sugar is an idiot. His "business acumen" at Tottenham Hotspur was a delight to behold.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Universities don't teach you how to make money. But that doesn't make the people there "stupid" and "idiots".

    If you have people being trained in buisness, it's a fairly obvious point that they should be able to make money. That is after all, the point of business. How many doctors know no medicine?
    Some of us think that there's more to life than making money. University is something that is brilliant at broadening the mind, seeing new things, reading new things, learning about the world. I'm not saying all students do that, but the benefits of going to university go far beyond the balance sheet.

    Theres nothing like education that has no practical value and is paid for by theft is there?
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    klintock wrote:
    If you have people being trained in buisness, it's a fairly obvious point that they should be able to make money. That is after all, the point of business. How many doctors know no medicine?

    But most people at uni aren't there to learn about making money.
    Theres nothing like education that has no practical value and is paid for by theft is there?

    Whose theft?

    I paid for it.

    Anyway, define "practical value". Not everything can be measured on the balance sheet.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    But most people at uni aren't there to learn about making money.

    Quite right, they are there to learn valuable skills they will use to make men like Sugar even richer.
    Whose theft?

    Everyone who holds a pound.
    I paid for it.

    All of it up front? :chin:
    Anyway, define "practical value". Not everything can be measured on the balance sheet.

    Yeah, everything can. Theres that blanket assumption you've made of only having one type of money ofc.

    Practical value - something that someone somewhere will voluntarily trade something for.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Universities are obviously full of idiots. they get everywhere but i cant see theres any higher percentage of idiots in universities than else where, most the idiots i know went into the forces
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    University does not make you smart, it gives you the opportunity to make yourself more knowledgable, more academic and to have it down on paper to say that you can study. For some jobs a certain amount of knowledge is needed but often it seems as if some people go just for the sake of having a degree. This annoys me because so many people are going to university and now it is expensive... I now some very intelligent people who simply cannot afford to go when you have some people who go to university with no career plan or passion, they get drunk all the time and don't attend lessons.

    The problem is that you can be academic and have no social skills, another problem is that some universities will let anyone in.

    In my experience I am glad I went to university late knowing what my passion is and working in my year out as well as part time through my A levels gave me more confidence and better people skills... A lot of students will graduate knowing little more than to write papers and exams... I can't see that as making them very employable.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    some people might consider you to be an idiot for taking life to seriously
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Kermit wrote:
    Someone else who could do with raising that point with his surgeon or pharmacist.

    Universities don't teach you how to make money. But that doesn't make the people there "stupid" and "idiots".

    Never said it did. University obviously didn't do your comprehension skills too much good though, that's for sure.
    Some of us think that there's more to life than making money. University is something that is brilliant at broadening the mind, seeing new things, reading new things, learning about the world. I'm not saying all students do that, but the benefits of going to university go far beyond the balance sheet.

    You've obviously read the bit you deleted, so why fuck bother going to the effort of typing that out?
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Spliffie wrote:
    Never said it did. University obviously didn't do your comprehension skills too much good though, that's for sure.

    I didn't realise there was another way of reading "universities are full of idiots" apart from reading it as you saying that universities are full of idiots.

    My mistake.
    You've obviously read the bit you deleted, so why fuck bother going to the effort of typing that out?

    ?

    The bit I deleted in the quote from your post was nonsensical drivel, to be quite honest.

    "too many people". "degrees which play little role in developing their intellect". "the skills they'll need for future employment". All nice little soundbites that mean diddly squat.

    If you would care to actually illustrate what it is you're on about, it'd be helpful.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Kermit wrote:
    I didn't realise there was another way of reading "universities are full of idiots" apart from reading it as you saying that universities are full of idiots.

    My mistake.

    Full of idiots certainly, that doesn't equate to everyone who's at uni being a complete pillock.

    "too many people". "degrees which play little role in developing their intellect". "the skills they'll need for future employment". All nice little soundbites that mean diddly squat.

    If you would care to actually illustrate what it is you're on about, it'd be helpful.

    Intellectual development - just what you're talking about.
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    What degrees do that, what degrees don't, and how do you decide?

    Especially as there's a school of thought that actually places a lot of importance on HNDs such as golf course management...
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Kermit wrote:
    What degrees do that, what degrees don't, and how do you decide?

    Especially as there's a school of thought that actually places a lot of importance on HNDs such as golf course management...
    Isn't there a degree on David Beckham?
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    Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    some people might consider you to be an idiot for taking life to seriously


    so true....
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