Discovering Higher and Degree Apprenticeships with UWE Bristol, get free advice >>

Got a job where everyone with the same or similar job title has a degree

I created this account as a bit of a throwaway, as I don’t want to post it on my main account. But back in 2018, I decided to drop out of university but I didn’t really alter my career goals. I still wanted to do what I wanted to do, but for various reasons I wasn’t doing well with university.

I staid in communication with my faculty about it and I networked in my chosen profession (education) while I was still at university. When I finally decided to drop out of university, I left on good terms with a Certificate of Higher Education and with a job in a secondary school. I guess even then most of the people I worked with had degrees but I didn’t give it too much thought.

I should note, I haven’t abandoned my educational pursuits however. I’m presently studying to become a counsellor and I am in the midst of doing my Level 4 Diploma in Therapeutic Counselling. My goal is to follow this through to Level 6 and eventually return to university to do a Masters in Psychology. While I was at university, when I started becoming distant from the course, one of my lecturers suggested that Psychology might be more my speed. It is something that stuck with me. But as it stands, I lack a degree.

Anyway, I recently found myself not enjoying working in secondary education. I’m very passionate about working in a student support role. While a degree isn’t required for one, in schools they require a lot of experience, there aren’t many roles in that area and they are extremely competitive. My career felt like it hit a dead end where I’d been pigeonholed into roles I wasn’t really interested in and that weren’t progressing my career.

As a result, I changed my focus to working in higher education. The jobs I wanted proved to still be rather competitive but there seem to be a lot more student support focused roles. It took me 6 months of job searching and I finally landed myself a job in the area I want and I’m very excited to get started on a career path that I am passionate about.

I explained earlier on that I had some issues with university and it is part of the reason I want to work in student support, as those issues predate me going to university and dropping out. I have some very applicable lived experience to bring to the role. Not to mention 5 years of working in education. It’s not like I don’t bring anything to the table and like I said, these roles are still competitive. I got the job, so evidently the university that has hired me has seen that too.

Regardless though, out of curiosity I decided to look for other people on LinkedIn with a similar or identical job title to mine. Mainly for networking purposes and to get an idea of who I’d be working with. But I noticed a very clear pattern. EVERYONE had a degree. One person even had a masters degree.

I know I bring a lot to the role and I proved myself in my interview, evidenced by the fact I got the job. But I can’t help but feel a little intimidated by the fact, from what I can tell I am the only person with this job title who lacks a degree. At the same time though, I guess it doesn’t really occur to many people to pursue a career in higher education if they lack a degree though.

I’m probably overthinking things and I’m just really writing out my thoughts. I guess it is more a feeling of imposter syndrome than anything else. But has anyone else on here found themself in a similar situation?

(edited 3 months ago)

Quick Reply

Related discussions

Latest

Articles for you

What university is really like

What is an LLM and how could it benefit your career?

Powerful questions business students forget to ask their career advisers

Why I chose a law degree and what studying law was like