Is University worth it?

[LC]

I went to UUJ in the late 90s but dropped out after first year. Two years ago I decided to get the degree as I wanted to get off the site's and into consultancy or a government job(In the South) but no matter how much practical knowledge and experience I had the lack of qualifications stood in my way.

I've now two years completed and going into final year in September as a part time student in the University of Ulster and I'm furious with UU. Paying 6500 a year and you cant get a response to emails, you have to send 3-4 more mails to get an answer. You struggle to get meetings with staff, lectures are cancelled last minute. I know when I was 18 these things wouldn't have bothered me as it would have been the parents money, but at 44 year old spending my own money I'm disgusted with what they're providing.

The past year as a part time student I had 6 hours of lectures on a Monday, the lads on the same course full time only had 3 hrs on a Thursday more than me. Nothing on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Friday so when I look at these young ones renting digs in Belfast for that is crazy. I know if I had young ones I wouldn't be pushing them for a full time degree at uni having a birds eye view of it as a mature student. There's so may better options such as apprenticeships with degrees.

Fair play to you going back to the books at this stage.

[imtommygunn]

I found queens really unimpressive when I was there too. In final year pre Christmas I had 12 meetings setup with my project supervisor. He made one of twelve. They were only interested in their spin off companies. Now this was a while ago as I am exactly pbat's age however nothing I hear these days seems much different.

[Tony Baloney]

The drive to get everyone into uni started in the early 90s and I was the first from the family. It was great at the time but then the marketplace became saturated with graduates coming out with poor degrees. The eldest son has just finished first year at uni and dont think was driven too hard. He has a mate doing an apprenticeship through PwC which seems like a good approach. My workplace have a huge HLA drive on because the universities are turning out desperately poor science graduates.

[Milltown Row2]

Was chatting to a lady today behind said her granddaughter worked out the period she was there and based on what they paid, they should be getting half their money back.

First year no lectures second year lecturers on strike and final year the first two years seemed that things were rushed to be finished.

My kid was the same, on graduation day they still didn't get their results while doing the whole graduation day! Joke

[Gold]

9 hours a week in UUJ I did. Lecturer reading off PowerPoint , learned nothing, a pile of absolute and utter shite. All the work for exams was done by reading yourself. UUJ was horrible and soulless (especially at night with no car) in that part timers did the course and 2 nights a week we had lectures to like 730pm.....literally half of the 9 week contact time to 730pm, f**king up football etc and part time jobs. The bus out there (2 buses or 2 trains) was horrifically grim. A seminar at say 1030 to 1130am then a lecture from 530 to 730pm...f**k me

Self important Creepy lecturers who'd never worked a day in the actual field talking shite and chasing students, madness, its a racket

Got a job in that area but only because I had the qualification, I knew NOTHING. I had to learn on the job. Good craic drinking in the Holylands but weekend drinking would have done rightly in hindsight, as would a trade but our school was mad for degrees, going into them blind with not a notion

20yrs later just paid off student loan. Wouldn't do it again

[naka]

Was at uni in the 80s and luckily did a vocation  degree which has led me to having a good life but times have changed .
Daughter graduation  was at start of summer and the reality struck that uni is now a money making exercise .
60% we're foreign nationals who queens are simply extracting cash from.
A lot to be said for apprenticeships but even that's a mess , why does a kid need English and maths gcse to become a brick layer or joiner .

[Milltown Row2]

Was at uni in the 80s and luckily did a vocation  degree which has led me to having a good life but times have changed .
Daughter graduation  was at start of summer and the reality struck that uni is now a money making exercise .
60% we're foreign nationals who queens are simply extracting cash from.
A lot to be said for apprenticeships but even that's a mess , why does a kid need English and maths gcse to become a brick layer or joiner .

You need the basics, bricklaying isn't just putting one brick on top of another, there are drawings, measurements, costings, dealing with customers, marketing your business, managing projects timing etc.. you also have your accounting to sort out too.

Now if you just want to be a labour for a brickie then you'll not need to have GCSE in math/English

[Sportacus]

I'd come down on the side of Uni for two reasons:
1. It's potentially a great experience if you live away from home and friends to be made from much further afield than your wee school bubble.
2. I have a hunch many employers (maybe of a certain generation) are still old school and like to see a degree, whereas they wouldn't be as sure, or maybe even understand, exactly what a HLA or other qualification is.
But I'd agree it's a money racket.  Isn't everything.

[naka]

Was at uni in the 80s and luckily did a vocation  degree which has led me to having a good life but times have changed .
Daughter graduation  was at start of summer and the reality struck that uni is now a money making exercise .
60% we're foreign nationals who queens are simply extracting cash from.
A lot to be said for apprenticeships but even that's a mess , why does a kid need English and maths gcse to become a brick layer or joiner .

You need the basics, bricklaying isn't just putting one brick on top of another, there are drawings, measurements, costings, dealing with customers, marketing your business, managing projects timing etc.. you also have your accounting to sort out too.

Now if you just want to be a labour for a brickie then you'll not need to have GCSE in math/English

milltown,
i disagree
some of the best brickies from my era hadn`t a CSE or o level
when i was a kid  schools taught woodwork, metal work etc and every kid had a chance to go to a training centre to get an apprenticeship
we now have shed loads of kids where this avenue is now closed off and left to rot
my brother is a fabulous eletrician who has no qualificationa and trust me he could buy and sell most of us   

[thewobbler]

Not all that long ago, I'm only talking the 80s and 90s, university wasn't really about what how much you learned or what subjects you took, so much as being able to prove to future employers that when left to your own devices - without the discipline of home, and in the face of various temptations created by living away from home - you were still capable of learning, and of evolving as a person.

But the well-meant but utterly ridiculous notion that everyone should go to uni, coupled with the blurry-lined integration of technical colleges, completely distorted this picture. For inevitably, if everyone wants to go to uni, then everyone has to pay. And once people begin paying out of their own pockets, they want value for money. And universities were never really devised around providing value for money. They were designed as seats of learning for the academically inclined. Not as upmarket skills training centres.

The frankly absurd "one for everyone in the audience" direction undertaken during the 1990s was always going to end up with a derailment somewhere. But it can't even derail yet, for it's now stuck in the economic sewage of a culture of greed in which it has become virtually impossible to both be a public sector worker and enjoy middle class comforts.

When someone decries the poor standards on display at QUB and UU, it's better to take a step back and ask yourself why anyone who is bright and focused would take a career in these institutions.... unless it comes with a promise that they can research and t**ker simultaneously for the private sector.

See the NHS for the exact same problem.

[andoireabu]

Went to Queens and did an engineering degree that had that wide a scope of topics you didn't know what you were qualified to do at the end of it. One module could be electrical engineering and the next could be thermodynamics. Lecturers only interested in their research students and PhD lads. Came away with a load of debt and a degree I could barely use because I graduated right before the recession and everything tightened up. Couldn't even get a placement year during my degree because most places weren't taking students on. Had a good time from the social side of things but it finished me playing football and to be honest if I could talk to my 16 or 18 year old self, I'd advise going the trade route and then get the qualifications in something you have tried and enjoyed rather than something you took a chance at and got the grades to get into.

[NAG1]

Went to Queens and did an engineering degree that had that wide a scope of topics you didn't know what you were qualified to do at the end of it. One module could be electrical engineering and the next could be thermodynamics. Lecturers only interested in their research students and PhD lads. Came away with a load of debt and a degree I could barely use because I graduated right before the recession and everything tightened up. Couldn't even get a placement year during my degree because most places weren't taking students on. Had a good time from the social side of things but it finished me playing football and to be honest if I could talk to my 16 or 18 year old self, I'd advise going the trade route and then get the qualifications in something you have tried and enjoyed rather than something you took a chance at and got the grades to get into.

I would imagine this is a story which could be repeated over and over.

The biggest problem here IMO is career advise in schools, what would a teacher know about the world of work in the real sense. How do they know at 16 what to advise when they have no experience of it themselves. Other than directing kids toward more academia.

The whole system needs to be looked at, we need to be looking at which sectors need to be developed where the jobs are going to be in ten years and using industry experts within this.

There will always be those who choose to go down the more 'Arty' degree route and if they want to do so that is more than fine, but they pay for the privilege. Those sectors which need development should be subsidised to encourage recruitment to the courses.

[imtommygunn]

Went to Queens and did an engineering degree that had that wide a scope of topics you didn't know what you were qualified to do at the end of it. One module could be electrical engineering and the next could be thermodynamics. Lecturers only interested in their research students and PhD lads. Came away with a load of debt and a degree I could barely use because I graduated right before the recession and everything tightened up. Couldn't even get a placement year during my degree because most places weren't taking students on. Had a good time from the social side of things but it finished me playing football and to be honest if I could talk to my 16 or 18 year old self, I'd advise going the trade route and then get the qualifications in something you have tried and enjoyed rather than something you took a chance at and got the grades to get into.

That's exactly it.

[samuel maguire]

Went to university myself and studied an engineering degree. Wishy washy as f**k. Learnt a lot about everything but nothing about anything in full. Gave a brief understanding of various topics. I had 2 Indian lecturers who the whole class couldn't understand as they had such strong Indian accents. It got the the point we stopped going to the classes because it was a waste of time, we just looked at the powerpoint slides ourselves.
Had great craic drinking 3/4 days during the week with all my mates. Cracking open cans of beer at 10am and things like that. House parties, night clubs, and all that comes with it.

When i finally graduated i had to learn on the job. I would say i used about 5% of the things i learnt at uni in my working career.

[armaghniac]

But the well-meant but utterly ridiculous notion that everyone should go to uni, coupled with the blurry-lined integration of technical colleges, completely distorted this picture. For inevitably, if everyone wants to go to uni, then everyone has to pay. And once people begin paying out of their own pockets, they want value for money. And universities were never really devised around providing value for money. They were designed as seats of learning for the academically inclined. Not as upmarket skills training centres.

That's it exactly, a university is a seat of learning for a student who appreciates the insight into the subject that they obtain there, that is not a person whose first thought is what can I use this for. A person with true insight into the subject may still have to learn on the job, but they will have an increased capacity to do so.
The modern trend has been to let more and more people into university, allowing in people who are less and less interested in what they study there. To pay for all this class sizes have to be increased and lecturers paid less, which of course reduces the experience.
In the 6 counties the policy has been to not provide enough places and to send students to obscure ex polytechs in faded English towns. In the 26 counties, the policy has been to pack them in and this has been achieved by cutting the spending per student. The 26 counties had a reasonable plan with more practical courses in ITs and traditional academic courses in universities, but now they are beginning to lose that distinction and that may not be a good thing.