[MrFoxy13]

So...
I started doing voluntary work experience for a company, doing IT. Within four days of being here, the director has asked me "Why are you going to uni?"

The company is very reputable and a decent size, he offered to open a position for me if I didn't go to university...

He then went on to say that if I worked for him for three/four years I would be a lot more desirable to an employer than I would just walking out of uni.

Now my argument was that I would have no paperwork just experience.
He then returned to say he would pay for me to do CCNA and Microsoft exams.

University will offer me a degree and CCNA.
I was all up for going to uni, I am NOT fussed about the debt, (mummy and daddy are not rich unfortunately, but it's just not an issue in my mind)

So basically for those who know, is university really worth it?
With the current econmic climate being quite ****, would I be shooting myself in the foot...

What would you do?

I've considered deferring uni for a year aslong as I atleast get CCNA from work in a year.

I also have intention of going abroad, now will a degree be more favourable over 4 years of experience and certificates ECT

Thank you for your input and actually reading this far!

[theandyguthrie]

University is the best move in the long run. You can only get so far without a degree and you will only be more employable up until a point.


You may get a 3 year headstart but your acceleration will be higher with a degree. Not to mention University is the best time of your life.

[yl_llb]

(Original post by theandyguthrie)
University is the best move in the long run. You can only get so far without a degree and you will only be more employable up until a point.


You may get a 3 year headstart but your acceleration will be higher with a degree. Not to mention University is the best time of your life.

It really isn't.

[hannah60000]

Can you do part time study degree and work or I know there are schemes where uni fees paid but you work for company part time and during holidays maybe you can strike a deal...

[kkid106]

For IT jobs, experience is preferred to degrees definitely.

However, to work in a CompSci-related job, you need a degree.

The additional qualifications which you are offered will be more useful than uni will be

[SirMasterKey]

(Original post by theandyguthrie)
University is the best move in the long run. You can only get so far without a degree and you will only be more employable up until a point.


You may get a 3 year headstart but your acceleration will be higher with a degree. Not to mention University is the best time of your life.

That's simply not true, sure it is in general but you have many exceptions to that in every day life.


Personally, at £9k a year I wouldn't be doing my degree (it isn't computing mind). If you can get some experience now in a company you could possibly have the chance of taking leave, doing a degree and coming back to a job perhaps? Or finding a better job with a degree and 3/4 years of experience on top of that!

[fluteflute]

I think you have to do what you feel most comfortable with / will enjoy most.

[ebam_uk]

Also, I guess it's hard to see but it broads your mind... And you get to meet a lot of people at uni.

I think the best situation is gaining multiple work experiences whilst at uni and also studying but at 9k per year fees it is kinda more expensive :-/


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

[poohat]

It depends on many things ,including the quality of university you would be going to. For example, at the extreme end of the spectrum, if you could get a place doing computer science at somewhere like (eg) Cambridge or Imperial then you would probably have far better long-term job prospects that you would have with 3-4 years of experience. The same applies to the other Russell Group/1994 universities, and probably also (to a slightly lesser extent) to the ones just outside that. But if the university you were going to go to is very low-ranked, then its debatable whether a degree would give you more prospects than several years of (good) experience and maybe some certifications. As long is the job pays reasonably well (>£18-20k say) and has good career advancement prospects then it might be worthwhile doing that instead. But it really does depend on your situation.

As well as the job prospects, university can also expose you to more diverse areas of computer science, both through classes, and from the fact that you have a lot of spare time to work on your own projects. So while taking the job would let you learn about IT issues such as networks and sysadminning, a degree might introduce you to areas like machine learning, bioinformatics, software engineering, 3d graphics, etc (in other words, you would get more breadth but less depth). Its possible to learn all that stuff on your own of course, but balancing self-study with full-time work is hard for some people. So if you think you might want to do something in the future other than IT work/web programming/etc, university might be something worth considering.

But whatever you do, you arent necessarily committing yourself for life; if you take the job and decide you want to go to university instead when you're 21 or whatever then that may still be possible, and if you go to university it may be possible to get summer work in IT.

[DH-Biker]

(Original post by MrFoxy13)
So...
I started doing voluntary work experience for a company, doing IT. Within four days of being here, the director has asked me "Why are you going to uni?"

The company is very reputable and a decent size, he offered to open a position for me if I didn't go to university...

He then went on to say that if I worked for him for three/four years I would be a lot more desirable to an employer than I would just walking out of uni.

Now my argument was that I would have no paperwork just experience.
He then returned to say he would pay for me to do CCNA and Microsoft exams.

University will offer me a degree and CCNA.
I was all up for going to uni, I am NOT fussed about the debt, (mummy and daddy are not rich unfortunately, but it's just not an issue in my mind)

So basically for those who know, is university really worth it?
With the current econmic climate being quite ****, would I be shooting myself in the foot...

What would you do?

I've considered deferring uni for a year aslong as I atleast get CCNA from work in a year.

I also have intention of going abroad, now will a degree be more favourable over 4 years of experience and certificates ECT

Thank you for your input and actually reading this far!

I'm afraid I'd side with your potential Employer.

I denied my offers from Uni after lying in bed one night thinking, "What am I doing? I'm going to come out of Uni with £40,000's worth of debt, I'll have no guarantee of a job and with so many people doing degrees now, its not like it use to be where degrees really set you aside from the rest, they just don't mean as much anymore to many people. Not to everyone, I grant you, but compared with twenty years ago to today, I know that a lot of employers would rather have experience then a piece of paper saying you can read a book for three years and drink copious amounts of alcohol. In a nut shell, anyway.

As it stands, I've set plans for at least two decades of travelling. I'm now in possession of a US Permanent Visa, I've got a five year Australian Visa and I've also taken my TEFL Course so I can now teach English abroad and I'm heading to several European countries to do that at a later date as well as Vietnam, Cambodia and China.

However, he's the rub. I'm doing this because I have very, very little intention of working full time for much of my life. I can't abide the idea of doing the same ****ing job day in, day out. That's not what I want from my fifty years left here. Furthermore, you've also got to consider the fun you'll have at Uni. As many have said, its the best years of your life. And I don't want to smear the effort a good deal of people see in Degrees; yes as I said it is just reading, but it does show commitment, dedication and an interest in the topic you studied.

Don't neglect the bone that's been thrown by your Employer, though, many people wont have the opportunity you've been given and its worth considerable consideration. And just because Uni wont work for me obviously doesn't mean it wont for you, but Uni isn't everything and I would say don't risk the job on the basis you may get another one, but consider Uni as something that may springboard you up and even if it doesn't, you'll have considerably more knowledge in the area you studied and you'll have a great time.

[poohat]

(Original post by ebam_uk)
I think the best situation is gaining multiple work experiences whilst at uni and also studying but at 9k per year fees it is kinda more expensive :-/

Remember that you arent paying £27k up front, you are paying 9% on everything you make over £21k. So if going to university eventually gets you (eg) a salary of £30k while not going gets you (eg a salary of £28.5k, youre better off going to university. For a vocational degree (eg compsci) at a decent university, I would be quite surprised if it didnt pay itself back fairly quickly.

[ON A GOOD DAY]

40k pounds is nothing

[ON A GOOD DAY]

I mean it's worth going to a university.

[ForensicShoe]

(Original post by theandyguthrie)
University is the best move in the long run. You can only get so far without a degree and you will only be more employable up until a point.


You may get a 3 year headstart but your acceleration will be higher with a degree. Not to mention University is the best time of your life.

Untrue.

My father (along with countless other people in this country) left school at 18 and worked his way up to the higher echelons of an international sales company purely through working hard and churning out decent sales stats for the same company for 40 odd years.

[theandyguthrie]

(Original post by ForensicShoe)
Untrue.

My father (along with countless other people in this country) left school at 18 and worked his way up to the higher echelons of an international sales company purely through working hard and churning out decent sales stats for the same company for 40 odd years.

That was a time when far fewer people went to university - your grandfather's story will be even more exaggerated.


But in todays society many more people have higher education, and you plan to compete with them without it. You will be at a disadvantage.

[Lou819]

I think having a degree in the long run is always the better option, its an expensive back up but it may work in your favour as you can get into graduate schemes etc after uni and like you said, you have the piece of paper to prove you can do the theory.

I agree that is not always the best experience ever, but it gives you experiences that no job can give you and is definitely worth doing for that in itself

[AminurRahman]

I would recommend to go to university with a good reputation, and try getting a sandwich year abroad if possible, because that would be great experience. Although it depends really on whether you are fed up of studying or not. If you're happier studying, go for uni, and if you're happier just starting to work and fed up of learning, try it for a year at least and see how it goes. Your debt from uni is the last thing to worry about, as you'll have a really long time to pay your loans back. Experience with a degree is the only way forward nowadays, having only one of the two does not help you in the competition for jobs nowadays. But it's mostly about what you want to do really. If you don't see yourself spending a long time at uni, at least try for a foundation degree? You have a lot of options, consider them wisely and see which will help you in the long run, and not just for the next few years. Hope this helped.

[ForensicShoe]

(Original post by theandyguthrie)
That was a time when far fewer people went to university - your grandfather's story will be even more exaggerated.


But in todays society many more people have higher education, and you plan to compete with them without it. You will be at a disadvantage.

*Father.

That may well be true but the fact remains that it is possible to work your way up through a company without requiring a form of higher education. I have friends who are doing it right now.

[ebam_uk]

(Original post by poohat)
Remember that you arent paying £27k up front, you are paying 9% on everything you make over £21k. So if going to university eventually gets you (eg) a salary of £30k while not going gets you (eg a salary of £28.5k, youre better off going to university. For a vocational degree (eg compsci) at a decent university, I would be quite surprised if it didnt pay itself back fairly quickly.

Well, its hard to balance it up really.

Since if you are not "guaranteed" a job.. you still will have to obtain a job post uni...

And also University isn't a ticket to a career. It is academics really..

[MrFoxy13]

Thankyou for all your responses, left it a little time to stew so I could get a variety of ideas and suggestions:

As it stands they are a bit slwo with proccessing EVERYTHING so I am worried that when it comes to sitting ym CCNA and MCITP exams I may be messed about a bit.

I am jubious about sticking it for a year as if I started earning money,(But not certification) I dont think I would have it in me to become "A poor student) haha and then I am semi-stuck in a job I am not progressing in just because the money I am earning would hopefully still be okay.

I have given them a deadline for next tuesday to offer me a decent salary and a contract as any later than this and its too much effort with uni accomodation and halls,

I am happy to do either currently and am fortunate enough to be in a position where I can do whatever,,,

As for uni I am going to go to Plymouth doing course G420; Computer Systems and Networks,
I would aim to work with a relative or a family friend in either China or America for my year in industry,

once again thanks for your different views on such a difficult decission, Ill keep you updated for those who are really that curious lol