Education versus money

Having a job you enjoy, that’s happiness.

Doodledog There hasn't been a move away from students taking technical subjects at degree level, or a decline in standards as a result of the 1992 changes. Yes, a university degree is less 'valuable' as more people have them, so those who see it as a passport to a well-paid job for life will be disappointed.

Graduates now have to compete to get jobs that used to be considered a right, which is no bad thing, IMO

Less snobby attitudes and inbuilt elitism - what's not to like?

Agreed, Norah.

I’d say those making the most money here are definitely tradies- plumbers, electricians and builders . More than doctors and lawyers in some cases. They are very short of country GPs, probably because they don’t pay them enough. Doctors have to study for many, many years and rack up massive debts - and they wonder why there is a shortage!

AngieP what makes you think they have wasted their degree?

This idea of "wasting" is absurd I feel. A degree is not like (say) foodstuff which obviouslycan be wasted... You carry your degrees with you forever. You will be forever changed by it.
It becomes part of who you are.

The purpose of a university course, in most cases, is not about the profession you espouse later, surely? It's about creating a critical thinker, an analytical mind, a person who can bring rigour to assessment. This should, hopefully, create a better society which is clear eyed about the world in which we live. It's not for nothing that dictators close higher education establishments pretty swiftly once they're in power ( except for certain engineering courses, obviously- no point in dictatorship without weaponry)

Wonderfully well said Chocolatelovinggran, and why would we not want this for society.

Exactly. The idea that a degree should lead directly to a job or is a waste of money is very short-sighted, and pushing to restrict access or build in a lower tier is elitism at its most obvious.

Doodledog

Exactly. The idea that a degree should lead directly to a job or is a waste of money is very short-sighted, and pushing to restrict access or build in a lower tier is elitism at its most obvious.

On the other hand why waste 3 years and run up debt of £50k when you could train for a career that would enable you to pay the rent.

Chocolatelovinggran

The purpose of a university course, in most cases, is not about the profession you espouse later, surely? It's about creating a critical thinker, an analytical mind, a person who can bring rigour to assessment. This should, hopefully, create a better society which is clear eyed about the world in which we live. It's not for nothing that dictators close higher education establishments pretty swiftly once they're in power ( except for certain engineering courses, obviously- no point in dictatorship without weaponry)

So you train a student to be an analytical mind, a critical thinker for a repetitive job that requires them to work within strict guidelines.

A teacher or a nurse has virtually no freedom of input in their job, you carry out whatever activity according to set procedure, in some cases to a set script. Only when you get to the very top do you have any influence in policy. You are kidding yourself if you think differently.

Education for educations sake should be a progressive thing. I think that is all the chocolatelovinggran means

Katie59

Doodledog

Exactly. The idea that a degree should lead directly to a job or is a waste of money is very short-sighted, and pushing to restrict access or build in a lower tier is elitism at its most obvious.

On the other hand why waste 3 years and run up debt of £50k when you could train for a career that would enable you to pay the rent.

I think the reasons why people might want to do that have been covered in this thread.

My point is that most do not go to university and become a free thinker, you use you education to impose company policies on others, that is the same in Education, Health, Police, or any business. If you are an accountant you learn an established system being creative can get you in jail, nursing was my profession and you had some leeway at the start, now a nurse has a set script and you will get sacked for any variation.

If you want to have control of your life and be creative become self employed an entrepreneur

Katie59

NotSpaghetti

Germanshepherdsmum

Some degrees are a waste of the students’ time and money.

Which ones?

Those with a very loose course content, low entry qualification and no career path following. Media studies, Art, Drama, Fashion, Animal Care, many more, you are highly unlikely to get graduate work in any of those. Art in particular you need talent which you won’t learn at university, avoiding starvation will be a challenge.

Art and fashion degrees can lead to a variety of careers. I don't know whether it's the case now but at one time the designers in the German car manufacturers were Brits. There are many fashion graduates working in the international fashion houses and some set up their own design companies.

Taylor Swift was recently photographed in New York wearing a dress that cost £58 from a small Scottish fashion house called Little Lies. TS was photographed, the pix ended up on Twitter and the the dress sold out almost immediately. This is not the first time this has happened - often to small fashion houses..

The designer of Harry Styles multi coloured cardigan, Jonathan Anderson founded his company in 2008. It is not only a very successful company but is now creative director of Loewe and a trustee of the V & A. Not bad going for someone who graduated from the London College of Fashion in 2005.

There are many museums and art galleries in the UK whose curators and directors have started out with art degrees.

Furthermore, Britain s one of the best "suppliers" of musicians and actors.

You really should not denigrate the degrees that you mentioned.

There are many museums and art galleries in the UK whose curators and directors have started out with art degrees

Furthermore, Britain s one of the best "suppliers" of musicians and actors

Yes, I agree.
There is quite a lot of misinformation regarding degrees and career paths.

For instance, A Media Studies degree is different from a Media Arts degree which can lead to a variety of interesting and well-paid careers in the Arts and Arts Technology world.

Drama

Whilst not everyone may become a household name like Judi Dench or Hugh Bonneville, I must take issue with the denigrating of drama at degree level at university or diplomas at drama school and calling it an easy option. Entry requirements are high (probably AAB at least) and the courses usually include another academic subject too.

Casdon

Some of the least ‘educated’ people even if highly intelligent are those who specialise early in one specific subject and pursue that to the exclusion of others, because they often don’t have a broad general knowledge. Well educated is not to do with IQ, degree or profession, it’s about having a knowledge and understanding of a broad range of subjects. I always think quizzes are very revealing.

I agree.

A friend's son is extremely clever, specialised in history going from A levels to Oxford, now at another university as Professor. He has never left academia.
I really could not decribe him, at 50, as a well-rounded individual with all-round knowledge of the world in general.

Back in the 60s my Father worked in the Space Research Dept at UCL. The academics then were extremely well educated in terms of their speciality but they had little knowledge of other subjects/topics, especially the arts. I have a vague memory of suggestions that scientists in particular should learn other subjects.

It is necessary for many employees at a high level to be able to communicate with people from other organisations, often in a social setting, on a number of topics.

I wonder when did University become just about the Bread and not about the Roses? Bread and Roses by Joan Baez and
her sister www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqJHUkOTLOQ
One of my favourite songs

When it cost £50k or thereabouts? Including the living costs.

My father was a manager in the CS, in an engineering department, and it drove him mad when he had to manage new graduates who had degrees that were entirely irrelevant to the area but went in at manager level, supervising people without degrees who had years of experience and learned expertise.

This is one of the reasons why I believe that fair competition is important. Yes, those people had proved they were intelligent, and had transferable skills that may have made them good managers at some point, but they should have been trained in management - a degree in (for the sake of argument) History doesn't make someone good at people skills, particularly when they are 22 and many of the people they are managing are in their 50s. Similarly, many people without a degree are naturally good at getting the best from people, and it seems madness to preclude them from having a chance to use those skills.

In a sensible system, people should all be able to go as far as they can in education (assuming they want to) and then the expectation would be that they would learn the job, whether that is as a plumber, an engineer, a teacher or a generalist manager. IMO that is the only way to stop the snobbery inherent in the claim that 'university is not for everyone'. Why should it be unusual to have graduate plumbers, or non-graduate managers? If someone has the ability and aptitude, and has taken advantage of the opportunities offered by university, they will probably be promoted faster, but there should be no automatic right to that.

Where specialist knowledge is essential then obviously employers would choose from the pool of people who have a degree in the relevant subject (as they do now) but in a lot of areas subject specialism is not important. I'm thinking here of the police, the CS, the armed forces, retail management etc, where currently graduates are 'fast tracked', regardless of the subject they studied.

It would require a rolling back of the way a lot of people think of education, but I think it would be better for individuals, employers and the country as a whole if everyone were encouraged to go to move to the next stage of education on passing the current one, so passes at level 2 (GCSE/O level) would allow progression to level 3 (A level), then to level 4 (1st year undergrad/ONC/BTEC level4), and so on, up to level 7 (Masters degree), and then those with an aptitude for research could go on to a Phd if they wanted to. The right to this progression should last for life, with gaps where required, and be paid for by the state, which would benefit from having an educated population. Maybe there could be a contribution in the form of a tax on employers who also benefit from a state educated workforce - individuals who benefited most from their education would pay higher taxes than those who did not, anyway.

I’m trying to grasp how the state benefits from having a plumber with a degree - and what the price of the plumber’s services would be if his employer were required to pay a ‘graduate tax’ - not to mention the concept of it being accepted that individuals who derived less benefit from their state funded degree (perhaps because they got a lousy degree or studied a subject which did not lead to relevant employment?) paying lower taxes.

Germanshepherdsmum

I’m trying to grasp how the state benefits from having a plumber with a degree - and what the price of the plumber’s services would be if his employer were required to pay a ‘graduate tax’ - not to mention the concept of it being accepted that individuals who derived less benefit from their state funded degree (perhaps because they got a lousy degree or studied a subject which did not lead to relevant employment?) paying lower taxes.

Are you really trying to grasp that, or suggesting that you don't agree that it's a good idea?

The state would benefit by having more people working to their potential, instead of being held back because of not having qualifications they are capable of holding. It would also benefit from having the best people doing a range of jobs, not just those who were allowed to get an interview because of a degree. Someone who wants to be a plumber could also have an interest in archeology or poetry - why shouldn't he or she be able to explore that before specialising? Many people who go onto management training, or conversion Masters' or 'fast track' recruitment schemes have had a chance to explore their interests before doing so. Everyone always says we need plumbers when these conversations arise, but they seem always to want other people's children to do apprenticeships after GCSEs. I would suggest that this is what puts a lot of people off, and that if plumbers were genuinely given the same respect as, say, retail managers, and allowed to specialise in plumbing on graduation instead of retail management there might be more people to choose from when your boiler springs a leak.

I don't know what you mean by a 'lousy degree', but if someone didn't get a well-paid job they would pay lower tax than someone who does, just as happens now.

A 'state-funded' degree is, in reality, funded by everyone. If we all benefit from being educated to the highest level we can benefit from and we all pay it back from taxation, surely that is fair? That is the basis on which state education used to work, except that there were built-in obstacles to prevent many people from progressing through the system, so a lot of people paid taxes to allow others to be educated, and in many cases to get a passport to higher salaries as a result.

If education were free and available to all, then we would have more chance of a genuine meritocracy.

I’m afraid you’re describing Utopia Doodledog. A society of people doing what they enjoy, at the taxpayers’ expense, maybe never contributing much in tax to pay back their lovely experience obtaining a 2:2 or worse in a subject they enjoy but of no practical use to an employer or to society. Don’t you think the economy would grind to a halt? But hey, what does it matter, everyone had a wonderful time whilst there was money to indulge their whims.

Why would everyone get a 2:2 and not contribute much in tax?

If people were able to find out what they are good at, and learn to get better at it, wouldn't they be more likely to do well at jobs that suited them? Having a good time doesn't equate to being unproductive, and doing things that are of no practical use, does it?