MSc the new BSc?

Hello. I am about to do an integrated MEng BEng program in chemcal engineering this September. I have already got one BSc in medical sciences and I can say that in biomedical sciences job preference goes to the candidate with good accumulated marks overs their three years in BSc programs. Those wanting to do research need a masters minmum whereas phd level would be preferred. My engineerng degree provides both BEng and MEng in one package rather coveniently as many jobs in that sector especially undertaking ICHEME acceptance later one require a good BEng degree and masters degree. The jobs I have seen that do not require a masters in chem engineerng are in Dubai for some reason. The US requires masters as does other parts of the world. Any more questions feel free to pm me.
 
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You tell us! How was it finding employment? Was there any feedback on your choice of degree?

I've got a business studies degree. I'm a business analyst, which to be good requires a decent grounding in all areas of business, such as accountancy, marketing, technology, etc. It also requires a number of specific skills, such as UML and soft skills required for extracting requirements and stakeholder management. In other words a business studies degree is just about perfect.

Getting a job isn't difficult and I earn a lot. Having graduated eight years ago there is no different in salary between my friends who went the grad job route and those who didn't. The different is in those who are good at what they do and those who aren't.

I don't think the problem is with degrees (although I do think there are too many people in higher educations) its with the selection processes for grad roles with large companies.
 
Depends on the employer and the degree and how much the employer knows about the degree.... so depends on a lot of things tbh...

MEng is quite common in engineering and so I doubt many employers of engineers have an issue with it or value it as being the same as a BEng or BSc.

Some MSc degrees are conversion courses - CompSci being a good example - we had plenty of 'MSc' students in our 2nd and 3rd year undergrad modules doing the same lectures, same exams. Yet essentially all undergrad material.

Conversely some undergrad masters exist simply as a mechanism for students to do a 'masters' but still receive the same LEA funding/student loan that they got for their first 3 years of undergraduate study. So you can get instances where students doing a masters as a 4th year of their undergrad course are following exactly the same course as graduates from other universities who will be completing the same year of lectures/exams etc.. as a separate masters degree.

MSci's are quite well known in the Geoscience industry, however they are at a different standard (same with the engineering MEng, I was going to go on one of those if I carred on with my Civ Eng course). For starters they are only 120 credits, not the 180 credits that proper masters are. Obviously they are classed as slightly better than a bog standard BSc/BEng but a proper MSc grad will be put way above both.

Well that's a risk you can personally choose to take. I still don't see why anything needs to be done about this tbh... If your point isn't related to taxpayer funding then how are you proposing to remove the need to get into debt from attending masters courses?

You seem to be misunderstanding the point of the thread entirely TBH. It has nothing to do with the funding needs of a masters, but everything to do with the "devaluing" of BSc's and MSc's becoming what BSc's were 30 years ago. The only proposal I can think of would be to reduce the number of BSc's back to what they were a few years ago so they are become special again, so people wouldn't need to do masters just to stand out a little and turn masters back into something that people do to really get ahead, instead of what it is starting to become now.

At the moment I can see someone having to do a BSc and MSc just to get a job on a bog standard grad scheme on something like £16-18k in the near future...

Hehe yeah, even at our uni, most of the students studying Petroleum Geosciences are from overseas. I'm thinking along the lines of Seismic processing jobs as well. I need to send my CV off to PGS and CGG Veritas and they seem like excellent alternatives to BP and Shell etc, where I'm not sure what I'll actually be doing. We had a tour of the Weybridge PGS office a month back and it certainly looks like the kind of thing I'm interested in.

Good luck with whichever path you take!

Concerning the difference between MSc and MSci, I'm quite confused as well. The Master students study many of the same modules we do in our 3rd year and 4th year undergraduate courses but I suppose that could be where the two courses overlap. In our case, they tend to be more specialized in the petroleum side of things while we learn the broader aspects of it. What's frustrating are the company's lack of interest in MSci students despite us still having covered many of the modules the Masters students have as well.

What uni are you studying at? Imperial?:) From what I understand with the MSci at my uni the MSc students will share some of the courses but will do an extra half on top of what you do (180 credits instead of 120 credits), plus maybe a bit more of their thesis.

I did an internship with PGS, onshore, not processing and I really enjoyed it. I'm hoping to get into the marine side of things with either PGS or CGG but at the moment am having no luck. I know from having spoken to a few people from PGS that they don't really see any difference between the BSc and MSci.:)
 
I don't think MSc's are becoming the new BSc's and i think telescopi has picked up on a very valid point. It would seem a lot of companies would rather take the lazy route and use qualifications to filter down the candidate as oppose to properly going through the applications.

*SNIP*
So to conclude my rant it's unlikely that the degrees are becoming less valued but there is a lot of competition out there. The attitude of employers who to be frank can be very lazy in the filtering process does not help but ultimately people do need to try and set themselves apart from the rest by any means possible if they want to land the high paying respected jobs.

That's exactly what I was on about, to get through the filter we seem to be getting to a point of needing MSc's to actually stand out, even if you did a superb course, you're just a standard BSc student. Essentially it's inflation. More and more people are doing BSc's which is "devaluing" BSc's as a whole, so to stand out you need to do an MSc, problem is more and more people are doing MSc's so to stand out you need to do a PHd....

It's all very well having a good interview technique but if you can't get to an interview either because all the jobs "require" an MSc, or because all the other prospectives are MSc grads it's not going to work.
 
What uni are you studying at? Imperial?:) From what I understand with the MSci at my uni the MSc students will share some of the courses but will do an extra half on top of what you do (180 credits instead of 120 credits), plus maybe a bit more of their thesis.

I did an internship with PGS, onshore, not processing and I really enjoyed it. I'm hoping to get into the marine side of things with either PGS or CGG but at the moment am having no luck. I know from having spoken to a few people from PGS that they don't really see any difference between the BSc and MSci.:)

Yup, Imperial :). That's what appeals to me about PGS and CGG. In fact, when CGG came to give us a talk, the guy mentioned how he got in with a BSc in completely different degree and still manages to work on the seismic data processing side of things. I imagine you could get into those companies and switch to marine later on, as they seem to pride themselves on the level of flexibility they offer to their employees.

I think you are right about the MScs. From what I gather, they have to work on a real world project during their first term and this year they were working on the Wytch Farm project.
 
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My MSc at UCL as been ******* hard work so far, very little spare time. It kills the student lifestyle that the BSc had associated with it :(

But as people have said every one has degrees these days, having extra be it an MSc or PhD is going to make you stand out of the CV pile if nothing else. The question is if they are actually financially viable and pay for themselves over the course of your whole career.
 
I don't recognise the picture you're painting. I went through the graduate recruitment round 4 years ago and a BSc from a decent university was easily enough to qualify for the vast majority of jobs on offer.

The exception seems to be my field of engineering where a MEng is now the norm - but this is because of the new MEng requirement to reach CEng.

Welcome to the recession.

This...

But it's more complex than that. I guess it will also depend on what area you want to head into after you graduate. Anything technical and you really start needing a MSc or PHd, as you point out actually, people with a bog standard BEng (which when I did my civ eng year still made you eligable for chartered status) are not going to have much chance in that sector...
 
Yup, Imperial :). That's what appeals to me about PGS and CGG. In fact, when CGG came to give us a talk, the guy mentioned how he got in with a BSc in completely different degree and still manages to work on the seismic data processing side of things. I imagine you could get into those companies and switch to marine later on, as they seem to pride themselves on the level of flexibility they offer to their employees.

I think you are right about the MScs. From what I gather, they have to work on a real world project during their first term and this year they were working on the Wytch Farm project.

Especially processing as I think they do a little bit of processing on board too. :)

You're looking at the statistics in far too simple a way, as previously mentioned.

In what way? Yes we spoke about jobs possibly needing more skills than they did before, however that doesn't really touch fully on what you quoted. There may be a lot of jobs that haven't really changed yet now with the skimming of CV's the people with qualifications that would have been fine a couple of years ago are now appparently not good enough.
 
Now considering you used to be able to go to university at a heavily subsidised rate (grants etc) and BSc's were quite rare and well thought of, we are now starting to get into a situation where you will need to not only pay the £20-30k for an undergrad degree but also the £20k for a MSc before you're likely to get a decent graduate job.

If you do the masters in one go as your first degree then you do not pay anything extra above the normal undergrad rate - which makes much more sense than doing a BSc first and then an MSc at another uni (like I am for MEng atm)
 
how much is it to do a degree now?
I could never afford to do one but now I'm in full time work I guess I could.
pity I'd not have the time to do it.
 
how much is it to do a degree now?

£3225/year (or something) :mad: fees plus living expenses
Unless you are Scottish, in which case it is free (quite why Scotland does it differently from England I shall never know :mad: :confused: :mad:
 
If you do the masters in one go as your first degree then you do not pay anything extra above the normal undergrad rate - which makes much more sense than doing a BSc first and then an MSc at another uni (like I am for MEng atm)

But an undergrad masters /= a full masters in most cases. It's also interesting to note that employers are much more interested in someone having done a masters at a different uni, due to having gone out of their comfort level more.

how much is it to do a degree now?
I could never afford to do one but now I'm in full time work I guess I could.
pity I'd not have the time to do it.

I was lucky and it cost me £1200 a year, but now thats £3300 and around £7k a year living costs. So a 3 year degree costs around £30k and a 4 year course around £ £40k. A full masters year will cost around £5k (depending on course) and £6k+ for maintenence (suggested around £20k all in for the masters i'm looking at...).

That means around £50k for new grads who have done a masters as well, most of that won't be covered by the SLC either...
 
But an undergrad masters /= a full masters in most cases. It's also interesting to note that employers are much more interested in someone having done a masters at a different uni, due to having gone out of their comfort level more.

Depends in what field usually.
For instance for what I'm doing you an do both BEng and MEng, with the BEng you leave without learning many of the useful things that you would use in industry - while on the MEng you cover them.
I would say doing MEng in one go is the way to go, due to the way the modules are laid out and intertwined with some of the BEng ones (as you do some MEng modules in 3rd year and some BEng ones in 4th) really helps with learning and understanding.
 
nice so really I'd have to save up enough to have the deposit on a house, or two to three years wages to take a degree.
screw
that

I've worked with people who have degrees and are thick as pig muck. Guess it's more about who can afford to do it than who is willing/able.
 
Depends in what field usually.
For instance for what I'm doing you an do both BEng and MEng, with the BEng you leave without learning many of the useful things that you would use in industry - while on the MEng you cover them.
I would say doing MEng in one go is the way to go, due to the way the modules are laid out and intertwined with some of the BEng ones (as you do some MEng modules in 3rd year and some BEng ones in 4th) really helps with learning and understanding.

Yet if two similar candidates were applying for a job, one with an MEng and one with an MSc the MSc candidate would probably get the job, especially if the advert specifically stated an MSc..

nice so really I'd have to save up enough to have the deposit on a house, or two to three years wages to take a degree.
screw
that

I've worked with people who have degrees and are thick as pig muck. Guess it's more about who can afford to do it than who is willing/able.

Remember though that at least £18k of an undergrad course would be through the SLC and as such not a proper loan, although it's still something that will habg over your head.
 
Yet if two similar candidates were applying for a job, one with an MEng and one with an MSc the MSc candidate would probably get the job, especially if the advert specifically stated an MSc..

I doubt it as my all in one MEng course is better than the do BEng first elsewhere then come to the SAME course (but as MSc).

The reason the MEng all in one courses sprang up is because they are actually better overall often than doing courses at two separate institutions.
 
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