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You heard wrong. Unless you are going to a top notch Uni, you would have been better off leaving school at 16, and doing OU courses for a few years while working. You'll get your degree while the rest of your contemporaries are in their first year, have no student debt, more than likely cash on the hip and have work experience.
Depends who's doing the crediting. Some employers like them, especially in industry as it shows all the opposite qualities that you normally associate with students. Perhaps they aren't as credited by those in the academic world, I wouldn't know about that. Mind you, who wants to be an academic?
From the point of view of the workplace the biggest problem is in having larger and larger sections of the working population either over-qualified or unable to get work in fields that really shouldn't need degrees to be in them in the first place.
Sadly, what will happen is that those jobs that don't currently need degrees will wind up needing them anyway. You'll also have bright, intelligent people owing small fortunes that keep their earnings down and them nice and compliant in the workplace. Obey that corporation, kids! Even worse, it's all by design. It's a social engineering on a grand scale and well, it's wrong.
Well then maybe some of these people should choose not to do a degree, everyone knows they have to pay yet they still choose to.......
I would debate how many don't need degrees as well, in the longer run I would imagine the vast majority of graduates would end up doing graduate type jobs at some point of their career......
i'm currently at a nice university and do a very practical yet academic which interests me immensely - also one that can enable me to go into a high paying profession ala finance and investments, however i want to keep posession of my soul and will probably land up in college teaching because of that - not that that is a bad thing
I didnt mind uni to much, it was interesting and used up time but its just an arse it hasn't got me a decent job yet.
BBB and the fact im blooody good at my subject (chemistry) got me in
problem is my university UCL is becoming more and more like a finishing school for rich kids - they even do exam training for 1st years of my subject which we 2 years ago never had, which is only ever a bad thing
Yeah, but are they graduate type jobs because they need extensive training, or are they graduate jobs because there are loads of spare graduates inflating the requirements for available positions?
Which forces the next wave to get yet more qualifications and more qualifications and so on. All it does is devalue being qualified and seriously fuck over anyone who hasn't spent the greater part of their life learning other people's opinions.
I have seen few jobs that really needed years of theory before they were done. Usually you have a vast amount of tangential information to whatever it is you wind up doing. Waste of time, and you don't get time twice.
Ironically, this leaves the one option to an intelligent young person who wants to get on and doesn't want to waste years at school, that of setting up on their own. What happens is that all those graduates wind up working for someone with no qualifications.
Yeah, but how many students do you know who are just prolonging their teenage years and avoiding responisbility in general until they run out of time and HAVE to work?
agreed - there should be people with the ability to communicate and be able to read, write and spell who haven't gone university
agreed - especially upon 'middle class' jobs
yeh but if your arguing all knowledge and skill which can't be directly applied to work is pointless, it isn't.... HOWEVER i get your point of view to an extent, where people learn sociology, or how culture affects media etc (ie someone elses view on life which isn't definetly proven to be causally linked to some other random variable) which tends to have 0 application in any use in life, not even in deep pub conversations where scientific fields and raw human politics tend to dominate
part of life is taking in other peoples' views and ideas on things and improving them - thats part of life, even if it makes you think "this is bollocks" and doing it better yourself. we can't solo life, well we can but it'd be dull and we wouldn't get as far, though an individual aspect can and often helps improve it better
about 50% of students
This country is going downhill fast, especially in productivity, as we work too long doing crap work instead of taking time out of work to do what interests us, and can often benefit as well by socialising etc. If this country is to develop culturally and econonically and in every sense, we need more people going into highly skilled professions, thus leaving all the twats doing tradeskills etc
ffs when a school had to teach its pupils to use a knife and fork, that said it all, we're turning into america, and just the bad aspects of america ie its urge to do everything lazily and shop in chain discount stores
and yes i should be doing thermodynamics atm
Yup. It's not like it's difficult, it it? All my lot could read and write before they went to school, as could I when I was 'ickle. Yet a fully funded education establishment can't so the same job in a decade.
Oh god no. Most advances rely upon taking things from one field and applying them in another, I quite agree.
The thing is that if you are passionate about something, you will learn all about it, Uni or no Uni. Most people aren't that passionate (sadly) and I don't think it does them any favours letting them wank away their time on stuff that won't serve them one bit once they have to join the rest of us in what is laughably called "the real world".
Once you get in the field though, things are only done one way most of the time. So that's the only one you need to learn and improve upon. No point learning twelve theories when you only use one practically. Learn how things are and then come up with something different.
Well, exactly.
The rest I more or less agree with. (and stop skiving...bloody students....)
You would not be saying that if it was you that couldn't go to university, would you?
no we shouldnt be telling young people to go to university just to boost their job prospects, as theres a big flaw in that - the reason why graduates tend to earn more is because they tend to land up in more stable fields of work and tuhs dont land up unemployed lowering figures compared to say most regular jobs in shops etc which have huge staff turnovers
my dept hasnt expanded its undergraduate courses too much, infact they're rather eager to take on more as they want researchers, the problem is most undergrads in my dept. inlcuding myself are going to 3 years and bog off - however i was considering going into chemical research which is a HUGE field and very stable in terms of job prospects - my year had a surge of new students, but not due to them accepting more through ucas, but because strand polytechnic a la kings college shut its chemistry dept over the summer without informing students until they were shutting, and my university happily took the ones who wanted to do chemistry still
the government wants more people to do maths degree to go into teacinhg however theres fat chance of suceeding as most maths depts arent losing students, they're just graduating and going into finance.
and im not advocating uk undergraduate quotas, im just saying ti shouldnt be encouraged for most 18 years old to go university for the sake of it as so many do
I would imagine most people, even if they are a little worse off financially, are still glad they went to university.
If the demand is there then go for it, like I say you would be pissed off if there weren't the uni places for you so you shouldn't complain really.......
Well, if you want to not pay them back, you could always ask for proof of their loss.
Now I would say that the population as a whole benefits form having a large number of well educated people, and thus that they should contribute.
But I would also say the students themselves benefit more than others do in terms of economic benefits and other less tangible benefits and thus that they should contribute also.
Therefore I disagree with your position that students shouldn't have to pay anything themselves directly but I certainly don't think that studentd should pay the full cots of their education.
Getting the balance right is difficult. I would personally say that £3000 is too much, £1000 perhaps too little, £2000 perhaps?
We could call it higher rate income tax and set the threshold at a level at which most graduates would expect to earn after a few years in the job, say £32,400. :chin: But the figures are just arbitrary based on what people are willing to put up with, and it's a slippery slope towards an American style system of monstrous fees and debts for popular courses and institutions.
I've paid four year's worth of just over a grand and the NHS pays for this year. So that's about £6000 when they say to run my course costs £250,000. One wonders how this money is actually spent because I dispute I've even had the £6000 worth.
Graduate tax is a bad idea because it takes all the risk out of it. You say if you never earn enough then you shouldn't pay, so why shouldn't everyone go to university?
Yes they rae based on what people are willing top put up with, exactly like the price of everything else, demand and supply etc.
Do you really not think you will make up £6000 worth of earnings over the course of your career, or that the experience itself was not worht that much?
I don't think everyone needs to go to university and I think klintock is right to say that degrees have become necessities for some jobs only because there are so many graduates out there. So of course it is a self fulfilling prophecy to say we need more university graduates to fill the jobs. However, if the argument is that we genuinely need them, the economy which is benefitting from the degrees should support the system providing them. I expect to earn more than the average wage from the first year of employment, and I can't argue that my degree won't give me serious earning potential. But I'd still rather it was paid for through general taxation.
I think it says a lot that something like 40% of jobs (don't quote me on any of these figures, just what I remember off the top of my head) requiring a degree, didn't actually require a specific subject. I think that shows how many 'graduate jobs' are actually using the skills and knowledge from the courses.
I agree that university degrees should only be accesible to about 25% of 18 year olds. Not by restricting them by placing unfair financial burdens on them, but by ensuring that university places are only available to the top 25% of 18 year olds based on their A-Level results (another qualification which has been devalued, incidentally). I've heard of people needing 3 D's in their A-Levels to get onto some university courses. I don't think that's good enough. I think by increasing the standard required to get onto university courses, employers will have faith that a degree still means something. It will stop employers specifying a degree as an employment requirement, simply because they can, rather than because they want a person with those specific skills. Even if you kept the loan system, at least those from poorer backgrounds would be more likely to think it's worth it, because at the moment not only do you end up with a huge debt, but it seems that you don't end up getting a better paid job in the long term. I think this, as much as the debt itself, is discouraging people from poorer backgrounds from doing degrees when they are clearly capable.
Oh and as a recent graduate, I'm sick of all these 'graduate jobs' asking for one/two/three years experience in the field. That is not a graduate job.
you really dont get it that 3As at A Level doesnt mean you're the best at your subjects, and you forget that universities themselves are private bodies and can stop accepting government money at will without any effect to their reseach etc which brings them the money
a level results are important, but aren't the sole measure, thats what interviews do, and why some people with 5 a levels get turned down from course - simply because they've learnt exams not subjects - the sooner certain students and their parents get that through their thick skulls, the less exam training will occur
the ONLY realisic way of reducing student numbers is to remove that stupid 50% target, put more funds into other forms of higher/further education like tradeskills etc and to stop telling children university is the only way but that the best way forward depends on the person, how they do their work best and what field it is
Yes of course you would, but no-one has ever convinced me that this is anything other than naked self-interest, which is fair enoughas long as you realise it and realise that because of that fact you are not going to get it changed.......
Like I said before, you wouldn't be crying out about student numbers being so high if it was YOU that couldn't go to university, would you?
What does that tell you about A-Levels then? 3 A's at A-Level should mean that you are the best at you're subjects. You should be able to look at someones grades and then say someone with an A is better than someone with a B and so on. Interviews could take place to distinguish between students with similar results (remember, universities have access not only to the grade, but the exact marks for each module), but overall it should be simple. If there is a problem with this as a selection programme, then it is entirely down to the validity of A-Levels as a means of testing. But this doesn't get around the fact that there are university courses out there that are specifying 3 D's at A-Level as a minimum requirement for automatic entry. No interview, no additional testing. Is this a good enough standard for degree students?
As for the naked self interest point by Toadborg. Surely this is the same with any public service that people are forced to pay extra for? Yes my parents and I have paid taxes all our lives, and yes, we expect to get a decent level of education using the money which we have contributed towards it in the form of taxes. Education is a basic public service, and one that people shouldn't have to pay extra for, when they've already paid so much in taxes.
yeh but im not advocating a cut in number through force, more through getting people to realise, a degree for a degrees sake is pointless and that theres other ways you could spend the 3 years whether it be trying out jobs, working part time and doing your ideal job as a part time hobby if its music or whatever etc etc
its kinda hard to explain but thats it
and universities dont need the government to cut numbers, oxford and cambridge are planning not to accept any more uk/eu undergraduates as a number, whilst increasing the numbers of places in total thus meaning a higher full fee population, most of whom are rich international kids
LSE is 60% non uk students for example in it's batchelors degrees
in my honest opinion, there are too many people in this country going to university for the wrong reasons as it stands, i honestly are not saying this for reasons of selfishness as im not one of the people who are going to university to earn more but to do the subject i love in more detail, and im considering teaching it
and to walkindude, you're severely mistaken if you thinks its possible to base admissions purely upon exam results, i hear of people i know getting rejected for interview stages with Bs whilst i got in my university choices without interview with Bs. I'm doing better than many of the public schoolkids who got 4As at A level in my university as theres less parental/teacher based input/coaching
It is hard to explain because it is wrong.
I think that a degree for a dgrees sake is quite a good idea actually, why not do it, for most people it is fun, if you are willing to pay for it then why not?
Beleif in education purely for career purposes etc is a dangerous route to go down, following that logic many degrees would be scrapped altogether, why bother teaching thick kids until they are 16, why not get them out to work earlier etc?
oh i get you now, yeh i don't mind people going to university for the sake of a degree, however expecting it for for the sake of it and free is out of the question
and i agree about degrees linked to jobs as a bad thing partially, because there are some fields that NEED a degree, can't be a doctor or solicitor without some form of higher education whilst there are some that really don't even though they ask for it - like management consultancy
haha love differing in opinions yet agreeing somehow
im happy paying for my degree, well i dont pay due to my mums wages but ill make it up in student loan repayments :crazyeyes and under the top up fees system id be better off as id need less loan as id recieve a grant, and my university will make sure you get 150% of what the government says you get, like if i got £2000 grant my university will give me another £1000, so id only have payed £0 for the year as i do atm
Every demand for public services is down to "naked self interest". That vile woman who demanded Herceptin from her health authority won her case and got it, and her demand was certainly down to self interest, without regard for the effects of her demand.
Is it any wonder that students and young people generally are so disinterested in politics and so cynical of politicians when they are continually ignored and shafted by those in power?
How is the number of students currently decided each year?