Someone just got me the highly worthless book, "Cheeky Guide to Student Life" (basically a load of pretentious second-guessing written by failed sociology students) and it pisses all over both Philosophy - as rendering a student utterly unemployable - and Lancaster university, as being the arsehole of the academic world. Are either of these assessments on the money? Because guess what, I'm leaving to study Philosophy BA at Lancaster uni in october
Lol - sounds like an interesting book. I'm guessing it was written by a Philosophy failure at Lancaster... My friend Azeem is heading there this October as well, to do Law.
There's a university of Lancaster? I did a Masters in Aerospace Engineering at Glasgow University, so for any course that has less than 15 lectures a week is basically day-care, and any university that isn't at least 100 years old is just a technical college. Ofcourse, my opinion isn't important. If you really want to do Philosophy at Lancaster then go for it.
Pretty much my experience, yes. I was forced at gunpoint to take a "Certificate in Advanced Systems Administration" (yes, quite) at Lancaster, and they're a completely useless shower. So much so, in fact, that I attended the first session and never went back, completing the course entirely distance-learning style. I'm hoping that they'll get around to posting the certificate to me one of these days, because I'd rather not go back for the award ceremony if it's all the same to them.
Degrees are a waste of time if you choose to do something pathetic. Do training to become a Plumber or summat. Much more money they being someone's office monkey junior.
I went to Lancaster University and studied Psychology as a part one and then got BA HONS in English Linguistics and Creative Writing. The uni itself is very nice and like most universities it varies on topic. For English Literature and Linguistics it was one of the best in the country when I went and several of the lecturers were people who actually invented their fields and gave way to new sides of Linguistics. That said, it's **** for Creative Writing. It's also crap for foreign languages, geography and politics from what I hear. Good for business though. Whether having a degree or not is good depends on your field. For me, my degree hasn't helped me massively other than to put me slightly ahead of my equals (though often not enough to get hired). If your chosen job requires (as in REALLY requires in) a degree, go for it. Other wise you're best off getting experience. Put it this way: I only know one journalist with a Journalism degree, and she's had to go abroad to find work since she was too busy studying to get the experience. Me, I organised a work experience placement for myself at PC Format and let my career grow from there instead. Now, I'm more successful than her by a long way.
Philosophy as a degree is, in my books, a little pointless nowadays (and from what I heard the course an Lancs isn't great). Unless you intend to actually be a philosopher, it isn't good for anything. Yes, I know, it shows reasoning and the ability to communicate and think critically etc, but A) so does every bloody degree and B) for any job where those ideals are considered important enough for you to have proved at degree level they are usually just considered 'Common Sense', rendering the degree only loosely worthy. Good thing is at Lancs you have to study three degrees for your first year and can then choose to continue with which ever you prefer, so you can experiment a little bit there.
Myself including others who got degress a few years ago all agree that they were a waste of time. We all did vairous subjects (I.T. to English Lit) but none of us ended up doing anything remotely similar to what we studied. I see lots and lots of "media" students who all dreamt of being the next hot new TV/film..etc producer working as a runner for a large production firm like "The Framestore". Basically, Degrees in most subjects mean ****, only in Law, Financial or medical profession's they have any clout. I met a guy who is studding History. Even he said it was useless.....just shows how teachers/educators twist the truth to students. Expect to be doing something you never intended to do. Thats why i wish i studied something like Plumbing, thats where the real money is.
The man speaks the truth. There's no point getting a degree just to be an office monkey unless you really want that. Plumbers and tilers etc make much more money than anything you might expect and most are far less qualified. In virtually every job you could want experience is much, much more useful to anyone. Whether or not that fact would have stopped me going to Uni is debateable as I had a great time, but my course certainly hasn't really aided me heavily in my line of work other than to help me develop my writing style and introduce me to a few good books about grammar. And to be honest, I was already on that track (and with a lot more passion) long before I went to University and got lumped with a student loan.
Exactly Joe, people ask me why im not in the I.T industry (im a geek and got the degree). It's simple, i didn't want to start from the bottom, have a basic starting pay and get orders shouted at me and be generally someones bitch. Thats is why i stayed at my current job and co-manage a large-ish retail store and earn more money than a starting I.T. position. And I get to shout the orders.
I don't know... I'm down for Medicine, which I'm told guarantees me a job at the end of it. Though I suppose every degree must have its use. If you do what you like, and you like what you do, and you happen to be good at it, I'm sure there must be somewhere in the world where your efforts can pay off. If you're passionate about something, and your mind is set on it, providing it is not suicide-bombing, I'd say give it a go...
I would really like to study philosophy. If I could do three degrees, philosophy would be one (since you're wondering, maths and medicine would be the other two). I just think it would be very interesting in a expand-your-mind kind of way which I'm sure you don't get from doing a BA management. Whether a philosophy BA is useful for getting a job I have no idea, but then I think a lot of degrees are pretty worthless these days. You might as well do something you enjoy. As for the university, I don't have much to add. I lived in Lancaster for 6 years and it's a nice place, but I probably wouldn't go there for university. There's not a massive amount going on compared to any other big university cities in the North like Manchester/Liverpool/Leeds/Sheffield. But different strokes for different folks, y'know? The one thing about Lancaster is that it's campus-based so you'll spend a lot of time with other students only. This may or may not be your cup of tea.