Originally Posted by John_D

Originally Posted by Kitmarlowe

Wrong in a big way. We don't need hundreds of people with questionable degrees in Media studies, we need Computer Programmers who have the skills to apply the basic rules of programming to any Code set. We need people who know and understand the application of fundemental physics or chemistry laws, who can understand when to apply the basics of enginnering and when to fly by the seat of their pants.

That depends on what you mean by "we need". For myself, I don't accept for an instant that the proper function of higher education is merely training people for work, and I consider all those who take such a view to be barbarians and drooling imbeciles. However, looking at the marketability of the subjects you mention above, I think the UK job market offers much greater prospects of high-income employment to the media studies graduate than the chemist or physicist. As for computer programming -- that hasn't been a high-income job for decades. There is no shortage of good computer programmers; but there is hardly any requirement for them. Cheap, keen fresh grads capable of knitting spaghetti in some trendy nonsense like C-hash or Java, or bad old C++, that's what the market wants, and you should pay no regard to the whining MIS managers who bleat intermittently about an imagined "skills shortage".

All the best,

John.

Really? why then is Computer weekly, a small publication with a small reader base got jobs today offering £50k for Data Architects, a job that requires knowing how to use certain tools and coding? Or 311 jobs looking for skills in Java, C#, SQL, Ajax, Realtime, Asp.net, VB.net, Php, Apache, Perl, HTML, CSS and more..? The lowest paid job kicked in at 20K, the highest about 80K...fresh grads they are not looking for.

It's not the code you learn that counts, it's learning the basics of writing good code. Get the basic pre-code stage right, and that pseudo-code can be applied to anything.

Originally Posted by Kitmarlowe

Originally Posted by smartascarrots

The sorts of jobs that require low levels of academic skill don't exist now in the quantities we need, so we need far more people with an academic education than ever before or the laws of averages say they'll stay unemployed for their entire lives.

Wrong in a big way. We don't need hundreds of people with questionable degrees in Media studies, we need Computer Programmers who have the skills to apply the basic rules of programming to any Code set. We need people who know and understand the application of fundemental physics or chemistry laws, who can understand when to apply the basics of enginnering and when to fly by the seat of their pants.

That part I've bolded is what I believe an academic education to be capable of - and much more besides. Teaching through learning and applying principles rather than through learning techniques by rote. That's what I meant by, "we need far more people with an academic education".

.............. learning a good forward defensive stroke, writing your thank you letters on time and not squealing when the sixth form prefects hang you outside a window by your ankles.............

Originally Posted by GoodIdeaAtTheTime

An article in the Sunday Times was comparing charter schools in the US with UK schools. I'm not a teacher, but I find the quote below from a UK teacher quite frightening; if middle-class values means learn things so that you can get a job and pay your own way what's not to want?

Is this a bit of sensationalism or have any arrsers come across this attitude?

Afterwards their teacher described their inarticulacy as “a serious issue. It’s quite often the reason they get really frustrated�, yet she thought it “patronising� to try to correct them. “I don’t want to push my middle-class values on them,� she said.

This rings true: came across similar attitudes in my first teaching post (in a mid sized comp) when the head - dreadful woman; chippy & sanctimonious - admonished myself & others for "imposing middle class values" (her exact words) on "the kids". What had we done? Expected common courtesies ( "please", "thank you" etc as appropriate; opening doors for others; listening & responding respectfully etc) of our pupils.

This head believed that "a noisy classroom is a busy classroom" and invariably sided with pupils whenever disciplinary matters arose: in fact, she disapproved of "discipline", and stated as a first principle that "inappropriate student (!!?) behaviour is invariably a result of poor teaching." Funnily enough, she spent half her time out of school & never walked around the place when she was on site.

15 young staff left at the end of the year including a number of maths & foreign language graduates whom she'd been damned lucky to hire in the first place, and whom the school could ill afford to lose. 5 of these left teaching...

Although, in general, I'd reckon such attitudes are rarer in schools today, it is a sad fact that they still predominate in teacher training institutions and the "educational establishment". OFSTED is obsessed with "the pupil voice", "safeguarding children" etc, and woe betide the head whose focus is not on keeping the prolific paperwork up to date and "engaging" with the latest ludicrous "initiatives" that've trickled down from on high!

An interesting perspective came my way this morning. In 1900 there were more people employed "in service" than in industrial manufacture. So here in the white-heat of a new technological dawn...blah-blah...just over the doormat of the twenty first century we have a similar deployment of labour. Now it is service industries rather than footmen, housekeepers and of course, my personal favourite, the saucy under-parlourmaid.

So we are still educating for some other paradigm and ought to be looking at what the country needs - apart from as I hear 35000 of you cry "Do you mean a swift kick up the harris?".

[quote="Wessex_Man"]

Originally Posted by GoodIdeaAtTheTime

This head believed that "a noisy classroom is a busy classroom"...

"Groupwork" and noise, more than anything else, has destroyed everything.

Given that policy changes can really only be "gross" and "simplistic" - like Ruth Kelly insisting on schools only using synthetic phonics in teaching reading - government should simply and dictatorially, ban groupwork. Teacher input to explain the task, students work on their own, teacher moves among them, work gets marked.....

Desks in squares and an endless cacophony....jesus

My cousin teaches in (get this) an open plan primary school. FFS

an excellant degree in media studies is actually worth having a lack lustre degree is pointless.
education should not be about getting a job but before you get all arty farty.
you need the basics.
the english public school system is excellant BUT its too expensive for general use and not suitable for non academic puplis.

Originally Posted by brighton hippy

an excellant degree in media studies is actually worth having a lack lustre degree is pointless.

Too true. It's not the subject, it's the teaching. Any subject can be worthwhile if it's taught well. IIRC, they do a media studies degree at Oxford. It's a well regarded entry into a career in journalism for the most able.

On the other hand, there are plenty of so-called universities offering dumbed down degrees in engineering, traditionally a 'hard' subject. Typically, these degrees have little or no maths content beyond GCSE level. People who could get a worthwhile, technician level qualification like HNC/HND leading to a good job end up with a worthless degree and a job in a call centre.

One former college near me is offering a two year 'fast track' degree in electronic engineering. All you need to get in is a C pass in GCSE maths. GCSE to degree level in only 2 years instead of the 6 years it takes elsewhere. Into the bargain, you only get lectures one afternoon a week so there's plenty of time for partying, getting your girlfriend up the duff or funding your course through internet scams.

Originally Posted by brighton hippy

the english public school system is excellant BUT its too expensive for general use and not suitable for non academic puplis.

There is a company that is opening a chain of 'no frills' public schools based on the easyJet business model. It aint Eton but it aint £30k per year either. Your kid may not leave school to go to Oxbridge but they wont leave school illiterate, pregnant, dead or addicted to drugs either.

Originally Posted by brighton hippy

an excellant degree in media studies is actually worth having a lack lustre degree is pointless.
education should not be about getting a job but before you get all arty farty.
you need the basics.
the english public school system is excellant BUT its too expensive for general use and not suitable for non academic puplis.

Entirely the opposite. Good public schools excel in taking thickos and getting them into universities and giving them a chance at the middle class life of their parents. They may never become chairman of RBS but they do end up a lot in government jobs and the armed forces funnily.

[quote="Bouillabaisse"]

Originally Posted by brighton hippy

Good public schools excel in taking thickos and getting them into universities....

...where they underperform, especially the males (see University of Warwick study). What the public schools prove is that you can only polish a jobby to a limited extent.