Quick Rant About My University

[AJUK]

And they standards aren't dropping.

 

[Messiah Khan]

Excellent post there PoD, I agree with most of what you said.

 

[semi-pro waster]

And they standards aren't dropping.

Standards may or may not be dropping but words like "say" or "claim" are, right out of sentences.

Why would standards necessarily be dropping because there is a limited amount of lecturing time? If that encourages a student to go off and study on their own while still being guided by the lecturers(it isn't as if we can't email them and ask for meetings outwith class time) then is it a bad thing so that they have a more rounded education but they just have to work a bit harder for it. I don't know exactly how long one spent being taught 30 or 40 years ago but I suspect one still would have to do a lot of work in their own time.

I'm not saying the education system is perfect, far from it, I think there are probably too many degrees and the funding system is seriously lacking in comparison to what went before but I'm not so sure that standards are slipping either.

 

[AJUK]

When I was at uni, I never saw a single powerpoint presentation (granted it was a long time ago - oi, watch it! ) and all lectures lasted the length they were intended to. If the subject was covered off before the end of the lecture, we went on to explore another issue. I went to a well dodgy uni as well.

 

[gurusan]

...well I've attended 3 colleges....a Community College in Oregon, Southern Oregon University, and now I'm attending Oxford-Brookes and I've learned a LOT so far.

A university is just another educational tool at your disposal...many people think that knowledge will be handed to them on a plate....but it takes persistence and hard work.

However, I do get frustrated when lecturers aren't enthusiastic about the subject and they just "read" from a powerpoint presentation...but that's how Uni is..you get good teachers and bad teachers...ultimately it's up to you to get the information from them and do the work.

 

[goldilocks]

meh
it costs me £7.10 to get into uni each day (tuesday to friday)
and on two of those days i only have 1 lecture (10-12) which often finish early
i HATE that - i feel like i'm being short changed
especially when a lot of it is power points - i know what you mean OP
i worked out how much it would cost me to pass this year, and if i turn up to every day we have lectures it's about £482 in travel alone (i'm on clinical placement for half of the year too, which work out at even more cost per day)

so yeah, it's expensive, and some days it takes me longer to travel, than i actually spend in lectures, learning!
oh well - only 9 months left to go

 

[PoD]

...well I've attended 3 colleges....a Community College in Oregon, Southern Oregon University, and now I'm attending Oxford-Brookes and I've learned a LOT so far.

A university is just another educational tool at your disposal...many people think that knowledge will be handed to them on a plate....but it takes persistence and hard work.

However, I do get frustrated when lecturers aren't enthusiastic about the subject and they just "read" from a PowerPoint presentation...but that's how Uni is..you get good teachers and bad teachers...ultimately it's up to you to get the information from them and do the work.

It is very true that you do have to do work on your own and ultimately learn with your own initiative (which I think is the key word).
As you say, thought there are lecturers who are not enthusiastic and whom simply read from PowerPoint presentations (often taken from previous years or in some cases just stolen from other documentation or universities there is a lot of this)).

Fair enough none of us are enthusiastic about work everyday, but isn't that where a manager is supposed to come in and apply a helping hand or foot to make sure you are being productive. That just isn't the case at university, they just don't have anyone watching over them apart from other faculty members and maybe a head of department, but as the head of department is also a lecturer who more than likely has a lot more work on and is involved with the university more it means there is basically no one monitoring the productivity.

The other thing is that it’s very difficult to measure human productivity in education apart from seeing that there are some people struggling. If they are struggling they go to lecturers for help, but it’s really pot luck if you get a lecturer who is going to be there and who is helpful.

Ultimately higher education is a tool for learning. It does help, but it could and most certainly should be better revised.

 

[Jest3r]

Is this why degrees take three years? A whole day with only one half hour lecture?

pretty much...

although they claim your supposed to read stuff on your own time, you don't need to do that in order to pass the exams...

my "week" doing business IT currently,
monday, 12 start, finish by four,
tues, 9am start, hour off, 2 hour lecture, hour off, 2 hour lecture.
weds off all day
thurs 3 hours through the day
fri off

it's a bit of joke really, hence already wondering whether i'm wasting my time here...

 

[Laurio]

I hate it when that happens it is really pointless, i travel 60 miles everyday to my uni. If the lecturers werre gonna cut the lecture short or just read from the powerpoint slides then they really should have just cancelled it and told you to do it as extra reading, that would have made more sense

 

[Fishman]

Most of you lot seem to be doing the traditional "lazy student" degree.
I finished my MSci in chemistry at Notts 2 years ago and most days I got 1 or 2 hours off and that was it.

Im sure you had a pretty good idea in advance of how many lectures there would be per week.

With regards to ppt presentations some of my lecturers had the slides but you always got more from going to the lecture. If you just want to pass with a reasonable grade you could probably just get the slides, if you actually want to learn and understand instead of just cramming to go the lecture and pay attention

I knew plenty of people that would select optional modules based on number of hours of time of day, in my opinion that is a pretty weak selection criteria.

 

[Steve09]

semi-pro waster - This is my 1st year mate

 

[edwardcasbon1]

Dude, seriously, you're at uni and your complaining about going home early or lectures finishing early!

Go spend time with your mates rather than going straight home. It seems to me that you might not have any mates, and if so, stay around the uni and make some.

What you gonna do when you get home anyways? Go on the internet and surf all day or play games?

C'mon!

*I dont mean to sound harsh, just my point of view*

 

[manoz]

I'm in third year and every year we have at least one lecturer who stands at the desks and just reads off the notes, boring the hell out of us. Then gives us the notes after, like wtf!!!! If we didn't have other lectures after or before I wouldn't turn up.

 

[robmiller]

Is this why degrees take three years? A whole day with only one half hour lecture?

To be fair, most of the work—for my course at least—is your own research, reading and essay-writing. I do 9 hours a week of lectures and seminars, and then about 12 hours a week of my own work.

 

[Visage]

Hmmm....Lectures?

Arent they the things that you get the course swots to attend and then copy their notes afterwards, thus reserving mornings for recovering from hangovers and/or turfing out whatever bit of skirt you dragged home the night before?

 

[robmiller]

Hmmm....Lectures?

Arent they the things that you get the course swots to attend and then copy their notes afterwards, thus reserving mornings for recovering from hangovers and/or turfing out whatever bit of skirt you dragged home the night before?

NOT IF YOU WANT A CAREER YOUNG MAN

 

[Visage]

NOT IF YOU WANT A CAREER YOUNG MAN

I HAVE A CAREER.





Do you want fries with that?

 

[semi-pro waster]

semi-pro waster - This is my 1st year mate

Thats odd then, I'd assume you must have a fair few hours spread over the rest of the days otherwise it could be a waste of time. However as already mentioned first year is generally just to make sure everyone is at around the same sort of level to begin building for a degree. I loved having free periods in my first year as it meant long lie-ins but you don't even appear to be getting the benefit of that and as it turns out I get even less lie-ins now than I did in every previous year, they start my classes earlier but I have less of them.

 

[da_mic_1530]

yeah that sort of thing annoys me, i drag myself out of bed, just to find i could have got it from the web, as most of the lecture notes are online too

or turning up to tutorials only to leave 2 minutes later


in funnier news, my mate threw up in the lecture theatre today as she cant handle her drink, very funny, went everywhere

 

[A2Z]

thats why i dont bother going to lectures - they just read it off powerpoint which i can just download at home

ive been to the gym more times then lectures lol