Final weeks of my degree...

[arwenant]

After 5 years I am finally finishing my degree with the final exam on the 23rd May. I am exhausted and due to the way life goes, I no longer want to do what I wanted to do when I was 18, so feel like i'm finishing the degree for the sake of it. I can't wait for it to be over. Did anyone else feel like that? Or have a complete change of heart during the degree which has meant you've never used your degree?

Also how much should I worry about the final classification? Is it really significant?

TIA just having a morning of no motivation!

[murraymints]

welcome to the club !!! although a good degree is useful regardless of subject matter as it demonstrates your ability to learn /apply information...good luck

[factor-fiction]

Is it a medical degree? Five years is a long course.
I agree with murraymints.
You may feel differently after a long summer break or in a year's time

[arwenant]

I don't have anymore breaks Factor30, like I said, I finish in May. It's not a medical degree, it's a French one, due to personal reasons I had to take a year out so the four year degree has taken five years.

[factor-fiction]

I mean the break from studying after you finish. Are you already working as well or will you be starting work straight away?

[daffy654]

If you are fluent in French as well as English it should stand you in good stead for jobs in many different fields of employment.

[arwenant]

I'm already working in accountancy, no breaks left.

[pdq1]

Most graduates never take up employment related to their degree subject. Whether its a waste of time or just training the mind to analyse a subject is not really clear. Put in money terms thats 5 years of no wages. Interestingly the IT moguls never seem to finish their degrees but end up multi-millionaires which would never have happened if they stayed on for the full term.

[DTCwordfan]

stick with it, you are nearly there. The memories of finals soon goes; wait until you walk out of that last exam, the relief!

First degrees are rarey vocational and more the training of the mind to analyse, think, conclude and ideally provide new reflections and leadership (if you want a first). Even if it is vocational, it will still offer the same.

Sometimes your degree comes back to haunt you! Let me explain.

I studied geography and geology and went onto my first Masters in Glaciology. 1st year geography meant a cruising of various aspects of geography including historical geography. I scored pretty well at the latter and one of our projects involved the mapping and historical patterns of mediaeval windmills in Scotland.

Yes, I agree, potentially totally useless information - however several decades on, my mother had a crumbling Grade 2 dovecote and in restoring it, one of the necessities for the Conservation Office was a paper on its research. The memories came flooding back and I saved a grand or so by doing the research myself.

[DTCwordfan]

which Scottish University are you at then, arwenant?

[wolf63]

DT - if only you had known how important that degree was going to be to your mother's dovecote. :-)

[murraymints]

If it is scottish most likely St Andrews...

[factor-fiction]

Yes, you never know when your degree may help you.

My degree was in maths and it helped me get my first job, but in 25 years of work in financial, HR and management roles I don't think I ever used any of the maths I covered at university. Twenty five years later, however, I took redundancy and went into teaching. A maths degree was an essential requirement and now I'm finding my knowlege is helping me when I teach A level classes.

[murraymints]

Factor...a maths teacher ?????....poor you ...you have my sympathy...in my experience the kids of today do not have any numeracy skills to speak of..without the omnipresent iphone /tablet to do the most basic of calcs...I offered my oh's son a log book to help him and he looked horrified..had NO idea how to use it..he is 18 btw..

[DTCwordfan]

my thinking too, murraymints, and my alma mater too.

[murraymints]

DT..St Andrews eh ??..you in Scotland now ?

[factor-fiction]

Numeracy skills are appalling and I don't understand why because teachers put so much effort into teaching. The main problem is that too many students are just not interested and believe that it's a waste of time as they have calculators. Getting some students to even write down the date and title, never mind copy down an example, is a real battle.
Lecturing them about how much value employers place on numeracy skills makes no difference- they think they know best. The problem is, unless we tell them which buttons to press they can't solve a problem even with a calculator.
Maybe we need to drastically reduce the national curriculum for weaker students and find new ways of teaching maths- eg letting the pupils run car boot sales, run ebay businesses etc

[murraymints]

Factor..or put up a dart board and open a bookies...hee hee...

[arwenant]

Well I figured out I was too good at maths to keep doing French lol!

[factor-fiction]

I've done the darts!
As I student I used to work in a factory in the holidays and was always amazed that although most of the workers didn't have a clue about percentages they could add up scores on a dartboard faster than I could and knew how much they would get back if they had a pound each way on 3 horses at 4-6, 7-2 and 8-1

[DTCwordfan]

No, long gone, though Fife remains dear to my heart and I wouldn't mind having a cottage in somewhere like Crail, Anstruther, St Monans etc - or even near the Peat Inn.

You are right about the numeracy, darts or betting and they soon understand it.....and why not.