The Student Room Group

Which degree leads to the worst career prospects?

Scroll to see replies

Original post by ak137
Photography.

Just use ****ing instagram, everyone on facebook is doing it these days :nothing:


Ahhhhhh, Instagram. The bane of any photography students existence. Any and all Hipster thinking by using Instagram they are automatically a ~Photographer~.
Reply 81
Original post by HugoDuchovny
Firstly, Sports Science may take elements from all those subjects, but it is not anywhere near as pure, rigorous or academically meritorious as sciences such as anatomy, physiology and neuroscience.

It is a "mish mash" with elements from them all, putting them into the context of sport.

Yes you may say, that a person with a sports science degree has some value in their education. and you would be correct. But it does not help one with the interest of working in a sports related medical field, beyond being a P.E teacher (UNLESS, they do some form of masters in something relevant, from a good sports focused university, such as Loughborogh).

The question is "Which degree leads to the worst career prospects?"

And a sports science degree, certainly, is not worth 9000 pounds per year.


Nothing beyond a PE teacher? How very narrow minded and ignorant of you. :P
(edited 11 years ago)
Original post by LSD
Nothing beyond a PE teacher? How very narrow minded and ignorant of you. :P


It is fair of you to call me that, and I accept it.

But to me, paying 3000/9000 pounds a year, only to become a P.E teacher is just not worthwhile. It may sound arrogant, but the harsh fact of the matter is, most people do a degree to achieve a good salary, and a certain level of respect.

These criteria are hard to achieve through the degrees I've listed.
medicine definitely.

:wink:
This is really just a thread for people with their science degrees to slag off arts degrees.
Everything has a use otherwise there wouldn't be a course for it.
Original post by adriang458
Sports science is a very good degree. It is very popular (top ten on ucas) and you can become a teacher, physiotherapist, coach etc etc.. People work in the NHS with this degree.

So dont say its not worth it because that just means youre ignorant


This was posted from The Student Room's iPhone/iPad App


I am very well acquainted with the graduate intake of the NHS. My father is a doctor and an NHS managerial consultant.

To be a physiotherapist, one does not need a degree in sports science. You just need GCSE's and A levels.

You are using a wrong argument. I can study, engineering and become a banker. But to be a banker, I do not need to study engineering.

I've acknowledge the career of P.E teaching, but still not worth 3000/9000 pounds.

You don't need it to be a coach. There are better, more efficient alternatives to those careers than sports science.

Also, it is popular on UCAS, because it is so ridiculously easy to get into for most people. Why are there so many McDonalds but very few Michellin star restaurants. Because more people can afford to eat at McDonalds.
(edited 11 years ago)
I read somewhere that graduates of History of Art actually earn less afterwards than people who don't go to university...

Edit: Aparrently Forensics doesn't lead to much, and they advise that you actually just take Chemistry instead :s-smilie:
(edited 11 years ago)
Reply 87
Art

Whoever negged me you're clearly delusional. It's a fact - check the stats. o.O
(edited 11 years ago)
Reply 88
Original post by HugoDuchovny
It is fair of you to call me that, and I accept it.

But to me, paying 3000/9000 pounds a year, only to become a P.E teacher is just not worthwhile. It may sound arrogant, but the harsh fact of the matter is, most people do a degree to achieve a good salary, and a certain level of respect.

These criteria are hard to achieve through the degrees I've listed.


See it's really difficult for me to see your side of the argument because I'm from scotland so the whole wasting £9000 for it doesn't really apply to us. It isn't something I or my sport science buddies have to deal with. But I am trying to see how difficult it must make choices for Englanders/rest of UK.
(edited 11 years ago)
Reply 89
1) I think someone needs to post the "Oh look, it's this thread again' picture pretty damn soon.

2) Career prospects and intrinsic value are not the same things. Engineering has better career prospects than Art History, that's a fact. But that doesn't mean that Engineering is intrinsically more worthwhile as a discipline of academic study than art history. (For the record, I don't do either of those subjects).

3) Even when it comes to 'career prospects', it's still difficult to measure. Someone who studies a generic arts subject at uni - which a lot of people would say has 'bad' career prospects - might get onto a graduate scheme for an investment bank and earn ****loads of money, compared to someone who gets a degree in a field directly related to their degree, but earns less money. So even talking about 'career' prospects' isn't a simple as all that.

4) Trololololo.
Original post by LSD
See it's really difficult for me to see your side of the argument because I'm from scotland so the whole wasting £9000 for it doesn't really apply to us. But I am trying to see how difficult it must make choices for Englanders/rest of UK.


It's just my personal opinion.

The issue is deeper than choosing a subject. I think most people are naive when choosing their university degree, and do not think of the career prospects properly. I speak from experience. I have friends who did very well at A level, (all A's in sciences and mathematics) and studied subjects like sports science and philosophy and now heavily regret it.

I don't agree that a person should just choose what appeals to them. Because nothing is constantly appealing. When it comes to higher education nothing will be enjoyable all the way through. But it becomes worthwhile when it pays of financially and in terms of respect.
I do engineering, I like engineering, but often I hate engineering. But without meaning to sound arrogant, I know with a high level of certainty that this degree will pay off and be profitable, in comparison to the student loans I take.

And then there are many who choose a degree just for the university experience, which is also utterly stupid but that's another argument.

Long story short -

question is - which is worst degree for career prospects?

answer - In England, taking 3000/9000 pounds of yearly loans + maintenance loans into account, the aforementioned degrees do not provide a high level of job certainty, there is little demand, and low graduate salary in comparison to others.
(edited 11 years ago)
Reply 91
Original post by HugoDuchovny
It's just my personal opinion.

The issue is deeper than choosing a subject. I think most people are naive when choosing their university degree, and do not think of the career prospects properly. I speak from experience. I have friends who did very well at A level, (all A's in sciences and mathematics) and studied subjects like sports science and philosophy and now heavily regret it.

I don't agree that a person should just choose what appeals to them. Because nothing is constantly appealing. When it comes to higher education nothing will be enjoyable all the way through. But it becomes worthwhile when it pays of financially and in terms of respect.
I do engineering, I like engineering, but often I hate engineering. But without meaning to sound arrogant, I know with a high level of certainty that this degree will pay off and be profitable, in comparison to the student loans I take.

And then there are many who choose a degree just for the university experience, which is also utterly stupid but that's another argument.

Long story short -

question is - which is worst degree for career prospects?

answer - In England, taking 3000/9000 pounds of yearly loans + maintenance loans into account, the aforementioned degrees do not provide a high level of job certainty, there is little demand, and low graduate salary in comparison to others.


Fair enough. I'll admit though I chose a course (genetics) in an area I really loved and was passionate about doing. I did look at the fact that job prospects could be quite low, but outweighed it with doing something I loved. Though you're right, if I was paying £9000 I probably would not have thought of it like that.
I can imagine that failing a degree does not have good career prospects. So that. Saying anything other than that and it becomes completely subjective.
Reply 93
Original post by HugoDuchovny
I am very well acquainted with the graduate intake of the NHS. My father is a doctor and an NHS managerial consultant.

To be a physiotherapist, one does not need a degree in sports science. You just need GCSE's and A levels.

You are using a wrong argument. I can study, engineering and become a banker. But to be a banker, I do not need to study engineering.

I've acknowledge the career of P.E teaching, but still not worth 3000/9000 pounds.

You don't need it to be a coach. There are better, more efficient alternatives to those careers than sports science.


you need a degree to be any sort of teacher... If you want to be a teacher you'll have to get a degree of one sort or another. you will i presume accept that it is necessary for society that we have teachers
Reply 94
Original post by HugoDuchovny
Direct job prospects may be low in genetics, however, if you do a masters or Phd in something new and relevant to the times at an institute famous for Genetics (not implying Scottish universities are bad for genetics or anything, I have no idea) , you will be snapped up by bio companies. They will literally fight over getting to employ you.


Funnily enough this is actually my plan, though whether or not I'm good enough to get into a PhD, i'll need to wait and see :P
Reply 95
Original post by AishaTara
what do people do with African studies?


Go to Africa?
Original post by CherryCherryBoomBoom
Wrong thread?


yerp, darn you opera mini.

Quite emabrased now
Original post by SpunkyVanDros
yerp, darn you opera mini.

Quite emabrased now


No need to be embarrassed. I've actually done it a few times myself as well :colondollar:. It's pretty easy to when you've got more than one thread open in different tabs and keep flicking between them, then absent-mindedly write a reply for one thread but accidental post it in the wrong one :p:
Reply 98
Statistically (based on employment rates after x amount of time) fine art is the most useless degree
Most degrees do not teach useful skills, at least not relative to the time and expense, so the more correct answer is "any subject not at an elite university". This is because going to one of these signals that you are intelligent, hardworking, and know how to play the game, regardless of subject. This is what employers value. However even then, it's really just a signal: if people from bad universities, who presumptively are not intelligent, hardworking, or astute on average were simply transferred the top universities, the course content or teaching wouldn't make them any better than they were before.

It would be quicker to list those degrees that do produce markettable skills that can be used in employment by most of their graduates: medicine, law, engineering, and to some extent hard science and maths.

If you're not that smart and want a markettable skill, you'd be better off training to be a paramedic or a plumber. At least until these get turned into degree courses too so that the universities can skim tens of thousands of pounds out of spinning a 6 month vocational course into a 3 year time-wasting marathon.
(edited 11 years ago)

Quick Reply

Latest

Trending

Trending