Article : pointless degrees

Here we go again. You'll get the any degree is good crowd, and the anything not STEM is pointless crowd when dealing with this topic.

 

Well, any legitimately accredited degree is good, as having one is generally going to give you more opportunities than no degree at all. However, it's the utility that varies; sometimes good, sometimes not so good.

 

I really did not like this article. Much of it seemed to be a political tirade around the UK’s costs and how many universities are substandard. I don’t have much to say on those topics.

However, the title did get my interest. I have asked myself many times when reading a CV or interviewing someone why on Earth did they study that?!?! Where I live now, it is an Islamic Monarchy country. A huge proportion of graduates come out of school with degrees in religious studies or Islamic studies and then can’t find work as teachers or in the clergy. They then turn to private industry. The problem is that they have very few relevant skills to what we do in my industry. I mean they can be admins or receptionists but they certainly can’t fill the role of an accountant or engineer. In this case, the degree really is worthless. They can’t enter the premium job market because they studied to do one thing but are forced through circumstances to try to enter another career. This puts them at a serious disadvantage and their degree often does not help them compete in any way. I would argue that in this case their degree is worthless.

I will say that a goofy degree is not always a detriment. One of the best offshore drillers that ever worked for me had a PhD in Ornithology and worked part time as a lecturer in the UK when he was not on the rig. Another good example was a salesman who always made his targets – his degree was in music. These guys are the exception and worked their way up from the bottom to be successful. Not everyone is willing to work that hard.

 

I agree. The article was poorly written and really said nothing about which degrees were useless and what it was that made them useless. While it was about UK schools it could just as easily been about the US. College is too expensive...blahblah...jobs after college...blahblah...debt after college...blahblah.