What? Teaching you procedural knowledge for the vocation you are in as apposed to declarative knowledge?
Degree vs Experience
- Thread starter Verbium
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What? Teaching you procedural knowledge for the vocation you are in as apposed to declarative knowledge?
Man of Honour
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Quite but you appeared to be suggesting that experience proved competence. I'm not convinced that even competency tests prove competency - at least not an ability to do something competently for a longer period of time, I might be able to fluke a competency test for say marketing but I probably couldn't do the job (nor would I want to but that's another issue entirely).
I hope your wife feels she got something useful out of them, I'm not pursuing a career in my degree subject but I would have been sorry not to have gone at all. Then again I'm one of those people who doesn't believe degrees have to be vocationally useful to be worthwhile.
It's not so much that you can get into a career in law or medicine without a degree but for law at least (and probably medicine to an extent) what you learn could probably be learnt through an apprenticeship/pupilliage or similar. So while a degree may currently be vital because of the entrance requirements it's not a necessity in terms of learning the skills if you see the difference.
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I highly agree that a lot degree jobs could have been done by apprenticeships or even a-level students provided they get introduced to good practise.
However in this world, to be completive in some professions you need a degree. Degrees aren't easy either. one to two 2500 reports a week or fortnight etc then writing the actual software on top of that for mine.
It indicates competency especially if you have met specific verifiable targets or criteria as part of that experience.
No, she feels it was a waste of time that would have been better spent accepting the offers she had from the big 4 prior to University.
She is very pragmatic I'm afraid and she sees University as a tool to use, not an experience to have.
Indeed.
With some professions a degree gives you the academic basis needed for the real meat of the subject. Having an LLB doesn't make you a lawyer for example, the real exams come after.
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Soldato
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When interviewing recently for a new job I have had people take a lot more notice in my career progression in the three employers I worked at for approx 6 years each than anything else.
Promotion itself often shows recognition of value and ability a lot more than a piece of paper.
I hadn't noticed this before but its quite possible that it was never so much of an issue as I wasn't so far up the ladder previously.
I don't agree with a degree getting you anything at all with a lot of employeers to be honest. Ive seen plenty of degree people failing and people with virtually no quals doing well. Especially in more recent years where you can save tokens from the side of coco pops to get a degree
Certain careers and certain employers will value a degree highly, fi you dont want a degree you simply avoid them.
I started to see the degree nonsense spreading in one company I worked at so I took the opportuity to leave. Same place that brought competancy interviews in and proceeded to select people who couldn't do the job into roles over the people that could do the job.
No, I think apprenticeships teach very specific skills for a vocation. Management is classed a completely different vocation, they won't be taught crap like PRIMO-F and horrible stuff like that.
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Engineering Apprenticeships include both vocational and academic qualifications.
It is not just about Bricklayers and Carpenters like you make out.
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Do they lead to chartered status?
Exactly.
While not all of the Chartered Accountancy exams require a degree, without one will require just as long if you train with any of the Big Four. You need a Chartership if you want to be an auditor.
There's always management accounting!
My wife is chartered and said that given the exceptions her degree gave her, it would have been far quicker to enter practice at the A level stage rather than the graduate stage. Mainly down to gaining the experience required to get signed off.
Man of Honour
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I did my Engineering Apprenticeship at the Michelin Tyre Company and it was regarded as being the best in the world.
Virtually every upper management boss came through the Apprenticeship route.
To get into a Michelin Apprenticeship they didn't care about your qualifications as long as you passed their tests.
I'm 99% sure this is also how Rolls Royce worked.
Associate
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A guy I work with who is in his mid 40 (I'm in my late 20s) used to work for Marconi before it got renamed and merged and split etc. He's described how they used to work and it used to be like that but its changed a lot now (it has been 20 years after all) and forms part of BAe. In his section there'd be one guy with a degree hired each year and half a dozen without one. The guy with the degree would be paid more initially but the others would receive larger pay increases to catch up. It relied on a certain kind of turn over of personnel, which no longer was the case in the mid 90s and the whole system had to be restructured, the merger into BAe not withstanding!
On a slightly unrelated note I've never heard 'plateglass university' before. I've heard of the Russell group and Oxbridge (since I don't live under a rock!) but what makes a university 'plateglass'?
Not as old as Russell groups, not as new as ex-poly basically. University prestige is often correlated with how long they have established, however some break the trend such Warwick now considered one of the best.
Your wife chose the wrong degree - BA Accounting from University of Liverpool got me full exemptions from the entry levels exams.
The school leaver programs for the Big Four take 5 years to fully qualify. This is one year less than a degree + qualification but if you fail your exams twice you're fired, which judging from the amount of school leavers remaining in my office, happens often or they delay to the next intake so they have more time to revise as it's a massive jump from A level standards.
While you can sit the qualifications yourself, you need experience to fully qualify. The degree gets you in to the Big Four if you're decent enough in interviews and have some examples of where you have worked well in a team. The A levels can get you on the Big Four school leaver programs but they face the difficulties described above.
Having seen both methods, I'm glad I done the degree then qualifications.