honestly, there is nothing wrong with an arts degree, but you shouldn’t do a degree for the sake of it. also its a good idea to have a plan for what do afterwards.
I’ll try to be as neutral as possible here, despite the authors utter rage that his arts degree from trinity doesn’t command top tier respect.
Ireland is not an affordable country.
With the current cost of living and housing crisis, I for one am delighted that I picked a stem subject in university, over a different topic that might lead to a poorly paid career.
I would do my best to influence my children to pick a career where they will be financially secure over one where they could spend their whole life struggling to get by.
The problem is the low barrier to entry, oversupply and the university funding model.
Universities receive the same fee payments / government contributions for each undergrad course. So it is profitable, but not ethical, for a university to run offer arts places; big lecture halls and low costs.
I think there should be much less arts places available and course offerings should be linked to the demands of the economy. Expecting an 17/18 year old to know what they want to do is crazy. I’d favour sending them off on a gap year to somewhere in the EU etc to volunteer or have a two year more general university experience followed by three proper years, as they do in Québec.
Edit: Changed wording
While there’s rightly resistance to turning universities into job training schemes, 3rd level is still an investment of time and money so anyone going into it should have a plan on how to get a return on that.
Is the whole point of university to educate people into careers that we need.
And what we need now are stem graduates.
This is where graduates will get good jobs.
Of my friends who done arts degrees, I don’t think any are doing anything in the “classics” as he talks about.
Bit cruel to write an article on the value of arts degrees and then make it paywalled.
The real target audience for arts degrees is those about to retire.
This will ruffle some feathers here, but he’s 100% right. It’s a pity that modern university education has drifted from institutions trying to foster greater learning and understanding to a glorified employment training facility.
There’s a lot to be gained from studying classics, literature, language, etc.
One wonders if the many people who end up dropping out of say computer science would be better suited to studying something else? That perhaps they are pushed in that direction because of economic conditions and repeated Govt failure? And, following from this, does that mean studying the ‘arts’ should only ever be the purview of the well-off?
It’s not 30 years ago. Because everyone has a degree now they mean less.
That means that a primary degree isn’t a specialisation anymore (in most cases).
I did a humanities degree and went into finance, my brother did a physics degree and went into programming, my sister did sociology and went into medtech, I’ve mates who jumped from law to engineering to journalism to teaching to accountancy….
I graduated 13 years ago, no-one knows what my degree was in and I dont know or care what anyone elses degree was in.
People need to relax about it.
To postpone your first day working at McDonalds.
I remember my guidence councillor (I think that’s what she was called) encouraging me to do an arts degree after LC. This was JUST prior to the Celtic tiger getting the mange and I did have art and music as subjects, but even then I thought she was a bit mental to suggest it, I was eager to start working and didn’t have time to be pricking around for a few years with an arts degree. I did computer science and while I’m not on the mega salary that r/Ireland seem to think anyone in IT is on, I’ve never been stuck for work and I must have been one of a minority doing college in a recession not worried about prospects after it
12 comments
Comedy gold
honestly, there is nothing wrong with an arts degree, but you shouldn’t do a degree for the sake of it. also its a good idea to have a plan for what do afterwards.
I’ll try to be as neutral as possible here, despite the authors utter rage that his arts degree from trinity doesn’t command top tier respect.
Ireland is not an affordable country.
With the current cost of living and housing crisis, I for one am delighted that I picked a stem subject in university, over a different topic that might lead to a poorly paid career.
I would do my best to influence my children to pick a career where they will be financially secure over one where they could spend their whole life struggling to get by.
The problem is the low barrier to entry, oversupply and the university funding model.
Universities receive the same fee payments / government contributions for each undergrad course. So it is profitable, but not ethical, for a university to run offer arts places; big lecture halls and low costs.
I think there should be much less arts places available and course offerings should be linked to the demands of the economy. Expecting an 17/18 year old to know what they want to do is crazy. I’d favour sending them off on a gap year to somewhere in the EU etc to volunteer or have a two year more general university experience followed by three proper years, as they do in Québec.
Edit: Changed wording
While there’s rightly resistance to turning universities into job training schemes, 3rd level is still an investment of time and money so anyone going into it should have a plan on how to get a return on that.
Is the whole point of university to educate people into careers that we need.
And what we need now are stem graduates.
This is where graduates will get good jobs.
Of my friends who done arts degrees, I don’t think any are doing anything in the “classics” as he talks about.
Bit cruel to write an article on the value of arts degrees and then make it paywalled.
The real target audience for arts degrees is those about to retire.
This will ruffle some feathers here, but he’s 100% right. It’s a pity that modern university education has drifted from institutions trying to foster greater learning and understanding to a glorified employment training facility.
There’s a lot to be gained from studying classics, literature, language, etc.
One wonders if the many people who end up dropping out of say computer science would be better suited to studying something else? That perhaps they are pushed in that direction because of economic conditions and repeated Govt failure? And, following from this, does that mean studying the ‘arts’ should only ever be the purview of the well-off?
It’s not 30 years ago. Because everyone has a degree now they mean less.
That means that a primary degree isn’t a specialisation anymore (in most cases).
I did a humanities degree and went into finance, my brother did a physics degree and went into programming, my sister did sociology and went into medtech, I’ve mates who jumped from law to engineering to journalism to teaching to accountancy….
I graduated 13 years ago, no-one knows what my degree was in and I dont know or care what anyone elses degree was in.
People need to relax about it.
To postpone your first day working at McDonalds.
I remember my guidence councillor (I think that’s what she was called) encouraging me to do an arts degree after LC. This was JUST prior to the Celtic tiger getting the mange and I did have art and music as subjects, but even then I thought she was a bit mental to suggest it, I was eager to start working and didn’t have time to be pricking around for a few years with an arts degree. I did computer science and while I’m not on the mega salary that r/Ireland seem to think anyone in IT is on, I’ve never been stuck for work and I must have been one of a minority doing college in a recession not worried about prospects after it