If education is all about getting a job, the humanities are left just to the rich – Recent utilitarian changes to the priorities of universities do little to foster social equality
If education is all about getting a job, the humanities are left just to the rich – Recent utilitarian changes to the priorities of universities do little to foster social equality
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Education isn’t all about getting a job.
It’s not though
Studying English literature at university is utterly pointless unless you’re going into one of a select few fields. And I say this as an English teacher.
What should be improved is the standard of secondary education. It is, quite frankly, pathetic in comparison to most European nations. Stopping maths at 16? Great idea!
Rather than the middle class obsession with university, secondary education should be enormously improved in its scope and rigour. History, ethics, citizenship, and more should be mandatory until 16. Then, the need for people pissing away four years on an arts degree won’t seem so necessary.
I love the idea that academics are listed by the author as members of the elite. Have they ever met someone looking for funding in the art history department? They’re running on fumes!
The very rich know how the history of the last 200years can be used against them; how it shows that there are -and were – ways of making a more equitable society; and that current taxation levels on the very rich are a joke.
Its no surprise they want to retain a humanities degree for themselves but deny it to you and I.
I mean, if you’re spending the best part of £50k to get a degree you better be getting your monies worth out of it.
First problem here is that they don’t really prepare for a field in the Job sense anyway. It’s an advanced theory and practice in theory ext. After all it is an academic system. This is problematic because it is seen and even requested at times to have.
But to say the least… It’s expensive no matter what.
With a dept of 70k after finishing this year I will be starting work in the field for 19.3k a year (negotiated upwards from 18k through longer work days – set annual salary). Now, do not get me wrong I never expected high pay straight way but the way it is by the time I will be able to be able to start paying it all back I’ll be about 100k in debt and by the time I’ll have the full qualification for my field it will likely be even around 200k if not more…. With my full qualification I’ll likely be making 40-50k a year (before tax)…. Which after the tax will make it much less… So whilst it isn’t a full loan (payed off differently) is will be there as a burden anyway. This is also why I am doing everything not to return to university for the rest of my qualification….
Which is why they capped the interest rate on 7.3% instead of 12%…
Then again, Humanities are crucial, but are a lot more critical before University as once you are at university it’s needed for almost any field in one way or another. There a reason historically Scientists used to be close to philosophy (long after these two separated) or why Sociology, of all subjects, was always present and visible without being a separate subject area. They usually form the underlying fabric of a vast number of fields.
So yeah. You are pushed away from becoming an expert in the fields which do not offer Short Term profits to Society… Even if their long term presence is a binding factor for the society across time.
There’s a whole load of history graduates who work in finance, although they tend to be very posh
Those same rich who would get a decent job without a degree too. Everything is easier when you have connections, it is the same with STEM degrees, those kids whose parents knew people in the right industry always do better than the working class kids who are the first in their family to go to university. Who do you think gets almost all the unpaid internships at major journalists and broadcasters?
We need to make it so that not going to university does not close so many doors to the working class, which means both better secondary education and more post-secondary options. Only then will we not see the need to run universities like businesses again.
Universities need a “truth in advertising” rule where prospective students can be advised if their chosen degree will be useful for employment or not. Right now they are being lied to because it fills classrooms.
I didn’t bother with university, and I’m far better of financially for it. Homeowner, in London, by the age 25 while my friends who did go to university struggled to get on the housing ladder. Some still haven’t made it nearly 20 years later.
The logic of the Grauniad becomes more and more impenetrable.
If the idea is to foster equality, we should encourage working class kids to study university subjects that have decent job prospects. English literature does not pay as much as most working class jobs.
Right of the bat, I work as an academic at a northern university. I thought it would be interesting for everyone to see it from someone in the inside. The problems, at least from my point of view, start and end with constant ranking/metrics that universities now have to compete with. Universities are a place of learning, however this idea has been lost in the constant fight for NSS scores. We are now teaching for scores as opposed to teaching for learning. I teach a STEM subject, and there is a clear correlation between scores and when we run our hard modules. Delay hard modules towards the end of the year, NSS scores go up. Front load them, scores go down. So then we are told to increase scores, what do you think we do – reduce difficulty. Government is happy, VCs are happy and frontline staff are miserable. Secondly, universities are an easy target for just about everybody. Increasing careers provision has universally been done, however students simply do not engage. What most media outlets forget is that students are adults. We can’t make them do anything. Tutorial attendance is <50%, pre-lunch lectures are almost empty, assessment scores are down across the board. In meeting with students, and helping them write cover letters, CVs etc, it is clear they have no idea what interests them. This is a result of pushing too many into degree courses that are “employable” as opposed to what they are interested in. STEM is seen as the big employment pathway, however this is simply not true, particularly if students are not interested. There are many transferable skills in arts and humanities, however these are being dumbed down due to the aforementioned chase for scores.
TL:DR The chase for better scores and metrics in the NSS/rankings etc has led to less demanding courses at university and therefore less employable students.
To be honest with you I’m not even sure I should get another degree in humanities or if it’s worth it, seems like it’s hard for me now to find something in my field.
We used to have a split between universities and polytechnics.
Universities were all about learning for the sake of learning, where people could study purely academic subjects.
Polytechnics were all about learning for the sake of getting a job, even to the extent that polytechnics would often specialise in the industries of their local area.
But back then only 10% of people went to uni. Having half of the top 10% studying humanities was probably about right.
Now all the polytechnics are called universities and 40% of people go to uni. But we certainly don’t want 4 times and many humanities graduates, and we still need a lot of people with qualifications that are directly relevant to industry.
It seems fair enough that we should limit the number of people studying humanities.
How to do this fairly is a whole different question. TBH, it has always been a tough call to study a degree that might not result in a job, unless you have a wealthy, connected family who will find you a job whatever happens. That’s why BoJo studied classics while most of the working class students I knew (at around the same time) were doing physics or chemistry.
meanwhile russel group unis are saying that student loans need to increase or government funding on universities need to increase otherwise they’ll have to restrict Uk citizens from studying sciences in favour of overseas students who pay more.