NEW CROSS: Goldsmiths students occupy Deptford Town Hall over tuition fee rise (From This Is Local London)

Poor souls. Little do they realise that the majority of them are wasting their time and money.
They can look forward to graduating to a world of unemployment. If they are lucky, they might start part-time work at a supermarket or at McDonald's.
There is no work, even for skilled and experienced people. What on earth do these children think is waiting for them in the real world?
We need apprenticeships, not degrees in media, business studies and social science. We need skilled people to do skilled jobs, not give us an essay on Sergeant Pepper, how to do a survey, or a lesson in social interaction between gay men, bisexual women and those who have yet to make up their minds. Though I must admit, it would probably be quite interesting.
My advice to anyone on the verge of leaving school is this: leave school and find a job. Start at the bottom and work your way up. In the five or six years these university hopers waste, you will have gained experience of work and working with people, the latter being very important indeed.
While they are swigging back real ale and shots, you'll be learning and maturing.
Let's put it this way. If you were an employer and sifted through hundreds if not thousands of CVs for a potential employee, who would you want to see? The kid who's spent five years studying The Beatles' White Album and Coronation's Street's impact on our social living awareness, or a kid who's kept down a full-time job for the last five years, has learnt a fair bit along the way and can produce good references?
For me, there is only one answer.

'Coronation Street's', rather.
Does that mean I've failed the degree?
Darn it. Even if I'd passed, it doesn't really matter.
After all, now I'll have to go out into the real world and realise what a waste of time and money university really was.

Erastus, that is an argument from ignorance, pure and simple. Firstly, Goldsmiths also teachers degrees like history, computer science and psychology- specialist skills based degrees that feed into the work place at a much higher level than 'getting a job from school'. History, for example, is a mainstay of Lawyers and Politician's alike. Secondly, Media and Communication at Golds is far from 'studying the white album'. It is a sociologically based investigation into the mentalities of media which, ironically, is a massively important skill to those working in the political world of spin. Everything we do is influenced by media and to write it off as 'mickey mouse' shows both a vast, right wing press based (who mostly, ironically, studied Media) misunderstanding of what Media is. I, personally, am Studying History at Golds with a hope to go on to PhD and eventually lecturing, no doubt teaching the politicians of the future.

Your final comment is just stupid. Obviously, those studying media, though not in the way you imagine, would not be applying for the same job as someone who had 5 years experience. If they ARE doing that, then we have to ask why, and the answer would be the current government actions.

Finally, there is a social aspect to Education. As a mature student who has 15, not 5, years experience taking me to a director position before a company collapse, the broadening of my mind and the enrichment of my life, effecting every part of my life, as well as the new skill I have developed would make me a better wage slave, sorry, I mean worker, in the way you suggest we should all be when I re-enter the job market. If I had this knowledge before, I would have done the job much better AND EMPLOYERS KNOW THIS. Experience can be gained on the job, a broad approach to learning cannot.

PS- excuse my type-o's, I wrote rather in a rush.

mrgodbehere wrote:
Erastus, that is an argument from ignorance, pure and simple. Firstly, Goldsmiths also teachers degrees like history, computer science and psychology- specialist skills based degrees that feed into the work place at a much higher level than 'getting a job from school'. History, for example, is a mainstay of Lawyers and Politician's alike. Secondly, Media and Communication at Golds is far from 'studying the white album'. It is a sociologically based investigation into the mentalities of media which, ironically, is a massively important skill to those working in the political world of spin. Everything we do is influenced by media and to write it off as 'mickey mouse' shows both a vast, right wing press based (who mostly, ironically, studied Media) misunderstanding of what Media is. I, personally, am Studying History at Golds with a hope to go on to PhD and eventually lecturing, no doubt teaching the politicians of the future. Your final comment is just stupid. Obviously, those studying media, though not in the way you imagine, would not be applying for the same job as someone who had 5 years experience. If they ARE doing that, then we have to ask why, and the answer would be the current government actions. Finally, there is a social aspect to Education. As a mature student who has 15, not 5, years experience taking me to a director position before a company collapse, the broadening of my mind and the enrichment of my life, effecting every part of my life, as well as the new skill I have developed would make me a better wage slave, sorry, I mean worker, in the way you suggest we should all be when I re-enter the job market. If I had this knowledge before, I would have done the job much better AND EMPLOYERS KNOW THIS. Experience can be gained on the job, a broad approach to learning cannot.

Well, that's just YOUR opinion.
A rather biased one, if I may be so bold.
So because you are studying History, you look down on the Media Studies students. That's the truth, isn't it?
Let's face it, you probably WILL gain useful employment one day, but unfortunately your peers (the ones you like roughing it with and buy the beers for) will be lost in a world of unemployment.
You are lucky, you have intelligence. Your comment is well structured, precise and to the point. Your punctuation could do with some work but that will come in time.
The trouble is, many of your peers will fail. Miserably.
You know it, I know it, your teachers know it and, most probably, your 'caring' friends know it too.
So let's wake up and smell the Danish.

Erastus. As I pointed out, I wrote it in a rush, hence spelling and punctuation errors. My spelling is due to mild Dyslexia and my punctuation is far in advance of the vast majority, yourself included; this is demonstrable and does not need your condescension to be proven.

I do not look down on media and communication at all. In fact, my wife is one such student and as a result I have come to know just how relevant and important a subject it is, when taken seriously. In the modern age of mass media, including this very platform, I would call the understanding of it more essential to day-to-day life than Quantum Physics or Molecular Biology; laudable though they are for their ultimate potential as regards human understanding.

As for 'roughing it with', I do no such thing and that assumption is rather foolish, bordering on the ad hominem.

You are right; sadly, many university leavers will be lost in a world of unemployment, but if you think for one second that a university education will do anything other than assist them in the hellish landscape of Tory Britain then, as an ex-employer, I can tell you that you are deluded. I have smelled ‘the Danish’ and it tells me this: those entering the desperate employment landscape with a good degree will do better than those entering the landscape without. Do you really, honestly, think that employers give a **** about ‘experience’ at entry level? What experience would this be? Would it be the experience of not getting into university when they had every opportunity to do so? I can tell you this does not impress employers in the slightest.

The mistake in your reasoning is that there will be some proliferation of entry level jobs that people without qualifications are more likely to get above those with. This is ludicrous. Entry level jobs will STILL be given to those with a university education before those with no experience AND no qualifications. Most likely, degree holders will still jump above entry level and start at a high position. This does of course depend on the level of degree achieved, but the same argument can be made for those starting from 'the ground up'. If you don't put in the work, you simply won’t work your way up.

Executive jobs have a glass ceiling which, and I agree rather biasedly, only a university education can get you through. My initial degree was in music; without it, I would never have become an operations director. Silly though that sounds, this is the way of the world beyond manual labour and is route, executive and semi-executive employment, is the route most academics would like to take.

It is a ridiculous state of affairs when people are disrespectful to those committed to expanding their minds and the institutions that allow this to happen to such a degree (no pun intended) that they consider them pointless. I cannot work out whether it is jealousy, the selfish arrogance of one who has already enjoyed the fruits of a free education system or , as I stated before, a simple argument from ignorance.

PS: a degree is just 3 years, not 5. 5 years suggests a PhD and there is NO argument to be made that the prefix ‘Dr’ reduces your chances of employment.

*the route, obviously. And the starred out is not a particularly harsh word. Rather the word to express one who would be taken from the eyes of a Christian conception of God, than a word for a bodily function, as the number of letter might emply if you get my drift.

Fine debate, Erastus well and truly shot down.