Does a degree help?

[jonny jeez]

My eldest is of university age and has mixed opinions about further education. She is very bright (I say that objectively as her younger sister, whilst entrepreneurial and very creative, is not academically talented) and also pretty well rounded.

But she feels no strong desire to go to uni' and take a degree, she feels that its a waste of her time and she is leaning towards an apprenticeship.

I don't want to push her in any direction, she has been empowered all of her life to take the responsibility and reward for her own choices.

So are degrees as valuable today as they were 20 years ago?

 

[cisamcgu]

Tricky question - and one that is rearing its head in our house occasionally. I would say that they are important yes, because so many jobs now a days have a university degree as a pre-requisite, even if that is patently preposterous.

 

[ScotiaLass]

I'm not sure.
A lot of people I know have a degree and can't get work, but then again, employers seem to routinely ask for a degree for jobs, IMO, that don't really require one!

 

[Archie_tect]

It all depends what she wants to do... graduate programmes are brilliant training for management jobs but she'll need at least a 2:1. If she knows exactly what she wants to do already then she can plan a career path and if experience gets her where she needs to be faster then taking time out to do a degree then she could get an apprenticeship or just the first job on the ladder to where she wants to be. Training and appropriate experience is great but don't fret, my son is 27 and has just started what he wants to do! My daughter decided that she wanted to be a teacher at 21 after her degree and has taken 3 years to get on a PGCE course because she felt she needed experience of life first- I agree with her!

University is a great lead-in to living and coping on your own without the pressures of everyday life, so as an experience it's great [providing you take the work and learning part of it seriously and don't waste it].

 

[Globalti]

No. The significance of a degree has been diluted down by all the wacky courses at second-rate former polys and I did so little work for my own languages degree that I'm still amazed I got it, 36 years later. When I entered work I knew a little about French political history and the mendacity of the USA in Latin America but absolutely naff all about real life - I didn't even know that an invoice is a bill!

My own son has to make the decision in two years and he's half-persuaded to do an apprenticeship. At least that won't mean him starting work with a £60,000 debt hanging over his head.

 

[winjim]

From my own experience, going to university at the wrong time and if you're not sure about it is completely the wrong thing to do. She can always come back later if she decides she needs to.

 

[Globalti]

On the other hand I wouldn't change the four years of my degree course for anything - I had a great time and made lots of good friends, who are still friends now. I guess the most educational part of my course was the third year where I spent five months each in France and Spain.

 

[Levo-Lon]

Well i see it this way..
my step son did collage and left early..he has a top job ,microsoft certified etc etc and a IT manager..work paid for him to get the exam passes.
his wife is a vet..6 yrs of uni for all those letters after her name..earns similar to her hubby.
my neighbour is a financial adviser..owns houses and nice cars..no uni..he wanted to work..
me ..got a few cse's and been my own boss for 30 odd yrs...

think young people are being conned unless they want to be a Dr ,Lawyer,Engineere etc .
when i was a kid all these silly degree's didnt exist..

mind you job in the gravy train industry gets you a big pension and early retirement..by that i mean 60's..

be happy in what you do is best ..life in a job you hate is a pitifull existence

 

[sight-pin]

It's her choice... and bare in mind that you can always take a degree course later in life, but gaining an apprenticeship after becoming a certain age will be almost impossible.

 

[martint235]

I hated university. It was probably a combination of the Uni (Liverpool JMU or Poly as it was at the time) and the course (Computer Science). I was a quiet but arrogant 18 year old who felt that my fellow students were largely just a pita (to be fair most of them were) and that the lecturers knew very little about the subject (again to be fair most of them were struggling to adapt to the beginning of the end of the mainframes). Tried to go in to lectures as little as possible, picked up my degree without fuss and actually denied I had one for years. Started in the civil service at the bottom and I like to think that it's made my management style better than some who entered at higher grades.

I think the tide is beginning to turn where some degrees are genuinely useful to an employer but the determination to just get out there and convince an employer you're worth a punt is becoming useful too.

 

[Hill Wimp]

As someone who doesn't have a degree it has not hindered me in my working life and i haven"t lost out because i haven't got one.

I chose to travel and live abroad during which time huge life lessons were learnt and without doubt helped me when i started work.

I agree with what has already been said in that it really does depend what the person wants to do at the end of the course. One of my bosses has a degree in some daft subject and rose to the dizzy heights on the fast track system we have because of it. They spend their time delegating work and having one of us glued to their side because they have little experience in the work that we do so my collegues and i vicariously decide what is really going to happen or needs to be done.

I prefer to start at the bottom and work my way up, know the job from the start.

 

[Markymark]

Depends on the job.

Nothing else can really be added to the thread.

 

[swee'pea99]

Is a degree as valuable as it was 20 years ago? Probably not. There was a time when a degree marked you out as a high achiever. Not any more. Having said that, as many have said, that's turned it from preferential access to a high-powered career into a bare bone requirement for all sorts of jobs, whether or not they really justify one. Overall, in terms of careers, they're still probably worthwhile for anyone who's not certain what they want to do with their life: a degree is never - or hardly ever - an actual disadvantage; no-degree can be.

The other factor, of course, is the experience of university. If your daughter doesn't fancy it, and has a pretty clear idea what apprenticeship she might fancy (and a good chance of getting onto it) then university for her might well be a waste of time (and, let's not forget, a lot of money). But it can be a great way to spend a few years having fun, meeting some nice and interesting people, and exploring options and aspects of who you might like to be before settling down to the whole business of being a grown up.

Overall, I'd say that if she's as bright as you say she is, unless she's certain she knows what she wants to do with her life, university is a good place to checkout a few options. She might end up discovering that she was born to be a marine biologist, or a forensic scientist, or a theatrical impresario. Be a shame to commit yourself to a single inescapable path, which is effectively what an apprenticeship does, only to discover five years down the line that it isn't your cup of tea after all.

 

[Creamcrackered]

When I went to University it was all completely free - tuition and living all paid - so it wasn't much of decision. Nowadays it's a huge investment and it's not sensible to rush it - you need to be reasonably confident you are going to get a return. If you are sure want to be a professional, i.e. doctor, lawyer, engineer, architect, scientist etc, it's pretty much a prerequisite - off you go, and it's pretty certain you'll get your money back. If you are less certain of what you want to do it's probably wise not to rush off to Uni - go and get some experience of the real world until you are bit clearer on what you want to do and how a degree may or may not help you.

 

[siadwell]

I work for an IT company and it seems that apprentices are very much in vogue. Project managers fall over themselves to get apprentices on the project (they are ridiculously cheap) and the deal for the apprentice is actually a good one, given the cost of gaining a degree.
Although our apprentices are on a low wage, they learn on the job and get (I believe) a day a week at uni with tuition fees paid, so they end up in their early twenties with a degree, several years' real-world work experience and little or no debt.