Another stupid student.

[Mrs Ten Names]

Don't you think a university education is wasted, if you only do a fairly manual job, such as decorating?

Perhaps not, gas112 is highly educated (to an expert in finance level), but he wastes his time digging holes.

 

[ellal]

In my youth, I simply never got the opportunity - it essentially, leave school and get a job. Only much later did I update my skill level at university, as a mature student.

But did the later version of yourself who clearly wanted to study look back and ask why you didn't get that opportunity?

Because that's the point...

Everyone deserves the opportunity without being saddled with a lifelong debt!

 

[opps]

Don't you think a university education is wasted, if you only do a fairly manual job, such as decorating?

In my youth, I simply never got the opportunity - it essentially, leave school and get a job. Only much later did I update my skill level at university, as a mature student.

Nah, as I said, I was taught to learn independently. Schools, and to a degree, even some of the red brick institutions teach by rote (depending on the course). The economics side of my degree was pretty "industrial"- by that, you had hundreds of students in a lecture hall and had to write essays at the end of the semester (under exam conditions). The geography side was completely different (even though it was local economics policies in practice). Geography essays were not just marked on content. You were marked on the style of writing, syntax, flow, citations, etc. You were forced to host seminars and take questions from your fellow students. You were marked accordingly.

I appreciate that we live in times where people think that ignoring the press narrative and getting their news from social media makes them think that they are independent researchers, I had to use microfiche to find "trusted" publications to cite. I was taught to see things from both a Marxist and right wing perspective.

Ok, after a few pints, I am going off tangent, but I really am glad that I went to uni, even though my degree and associated debts had no direct impact on my choice of career. Granted, I seldom (read: never) use partial derivatives and advanced calculus during my working day. I do however use trigonometry from time to time. I took my maths O'level a year early at the age of 15 (1985). Had I left school at the age of 15 to become a decorator, I honestly think that I would be a less rounded member of society.

Sure, most of the time, I "put" paint on walls but in the past I have (previously) built relatively successful ecommerce sites,
fixed numerous PCs for customers, sorted out electrical issues that the customer's electrician had left unresolved for years. I do more than "just" decorating. Would I have such a diverse skill set without having gone to Uni? I honestly don't know,

I am painfully aware that there is much that I do not know, but I honestly think that I score very/fairly low on the Dunning Krueger scale.

I do however currently score pretty high on the Kronenbourg scale... hic.