is spending money on university degree worth it?
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I don't agree with the above statement. many MNCs or govt sector have a tiered structure.... For non-grad, they will come in at technician level, for grad, at engineer level. in some org, there is almost no way for a non-grad to be an engineer...Originally posted by Gordonator:no offences to undergraduates. a degree might be important if u are into bussiness or management related jobs but for engineering it's a totally different story.
engineering requires experiences. imagine this, two 20 years old after NS, 1 started working as a engineer and the other goes into university.
4 years later, the 2nd guy finally graduated. but the 1st guy will already has 4 years of working and engineering experiences while the 2nd guy is only a noob with no working experiences and only textbook knowledge of what he learnt in university.
from my experiences, employers/customers/clients' expectations for a good engineer is that they don't care whether u are a degree holder or O level, as long as u can set up/troubleshoot and maintain the system, u are the person they want.
Also, the above statement is quite short-term in outlook. experience is more important. but do you want to maintain a system all your life??
With a degree, you are better positioned to progress in life, maybe move on to another higher level job with your technical skills, maanage a team of engineers for example... -
Yupz.. I agree! Basically, it all boils down to prospects... Experience alone wont get you very far... You need both experience and paper qualifications to climb up the corporate ladder... If experience alone is sufficient, then the CEOs of all the companies must be at least 100 years old because they are supposed to be the most experienced in the whole organization...Originally posted by spencer99:I don't agree with the above statement. many MNCs or govt sector have a tiered structure.... For non-grad, they will come in at technician level, for grad, at engineer level. in some org, there is almost no way for a non-grad to be an engineer...
Also, the above statement is quite short-term in outlook. experience is more important. but do you want to maintain a system all your life??
With a degree, you are better positioned to progress in life, maybe move on to another higher level job with your technical skills, maanage a team of engineers for example... -
No. No. No no no no no.Originally posted by january:you can easily find out what modules the course if teaching, go to the university bookstores and buy those textbooks and read yourself.
That's learning what to think, and if you're going down that track, you're headed in the wrong direction. -
i dunoe who started this thread but its obvious u dun belong to the university education system. learning is a process, and if u dun enjoy it, most likely u wun get anyting out of it..
if alll the knowledge in the world can be read from textbooks, den why do we still attend sch??gaining knowledge is one thing, having the right attitude to learning is another. thats why singapore is revamping its education policy. Gone are the days where simply memorising will get u an A. Memorise for what?? Are you a harddisk?? All the info u'll ever need is available on the internet.
But i cant agree more than having a university degree does not necessarily gurantee success in life. what degree u have determines where u start..where u end up 30yrs down the road is more likely a result of ur personality and attitude. -
General statistics show that degree holders are paid more than non-degree holders. Specific examples may deviate from general statistics. Some towkays have no degree and are damn well off. A teen genius can be a trader too.
From my experience, all things being equal, a degree will open up more opportunities. The HR dept looks to academic qualification to screen applicants. It is not ideal, because they will miss out some non-degree talents. However, HR cannot interview every applicant.
In many line of work, relevant knowledge is acquired on the job. Most of the things taught in poly or unis are not very useful. In my line of work, I use addition, substraction, multiplication and sometimes division. Don't need trignometric functions, hyperbolic functions, forget about Bessel or Chebyshev functions. I could have left school at O levels and will still be as smart or dumb on the job. However, without a degree, I'm sure I won't get pass HR screening. -
I disagree that university is a place to gain knowledge. It provides you with opportunities for learning, but by itself it is never a place to fill you with knowledge.Originally posted by DriftingGuy:Actually a university is there for people to gain knowledge, not just to get the paper qualification for a better job.
Given the right circumstances, I would have chosen subjects that I would be interested in, and not those that I chose because of course requirements or because I can get an A in that.
Somewhere down the line, the universities stopped becoming centers of learning.
The notion that to gain knowledge is learning is a misconception. -
yup, for engineers, w/o a degree, the door to PE board is shutOriginally posted by spencer99:I don't agree with the above statement. many MNCs or govt sector have a tiered structure.... For non-grad, they will come in at technician level, for grad, at engineer level. in some org, there is almost no way for a non-grad to be an engineer...
Also, the above statement is quite short-term in outlook. experience is more important. but do you want to maintain a system all your life??
With a degree, you are better positioned to progress in life, maybe move on to another higher level job with your technical skills, maanage a team of engineers for example...
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Your post is a little weird to me.Originally posted by No9:if alll the knowledge in the world can be read from textbooks, den why do we still attend sch??gaining knowledge is one thing, having the right attitude to learning is another. thats why singapore is revamping its education policy. Gone are the days where simply memorising will get u an A. Memorise for what?? Are you a harddisk?? All the info u'll ever need is available on the internet.
So does attending school cultivate the right attitude to learning?
Or can you have the right attitude to learning without attending school?
The latter is certainly possible, in fact it is what we do after graduation.
Actually memorising is part of the learning process. If you don't memorise, it is hard to appear cultivated .. lol .. imagine the following scenario - "A certain philosopher said this, let me paraphrase .. oh shit .. I can't even paraphrase cos I cant remember a thing"
By the way, you think internet very powerful? Make you work in government agency like MHA or DSTA .. limited or no internet access .. let's see how you do your work. -
If you are those towkay/entrepreneur sure-make-money type or those stock-god type then by all means camp at home and dun bother to go uni.
Unfortunately for me and quite a couple of others, we are neither and have to go to Uni to get a degree and increase our prospects. What nature dun give us, we have to nurture at least. -
U misinterpreted me.
I nv mentioned the internet is powerful.what i meant was all the information is available on the net..hence problems now shud emphasize more on critical thinking than memorising...u may want to noe how MIT people do their examinations..own time on target..with a labtop by the side..
thats what i mean..
with regards to attitude to learning, it all depends on indivuduals as well as educators..some can interest u so much u'll wana do ur own research on the subject..some r so boring with going thru the motion, u juz wana get done with the exams n nv touch ur notes again...Originally posted by Icemoon:Your post is a little weird to me.
So does attending school cultivate the right attitude to learning?
Or can you have the right attitude to learning without attending school?
The latter is certainly possible, in fact it is what we do after graduation.
Actually memorising is part of the learning process. If you don't memorise, it is hard to appear cultivated .. lol .. imagine the following scenario - "A certain philosopher said this, let me paraphrase .. oh shit .. I can't even paraphrase cos I cant remember a thing"
By the way, you think internet very powerful? Make you work in government agency like MHA or DSTA .. limited or no internet access .. let's see how you do your work. -
Laptop by the side? Own time own target?Originally posted by No9:U misinterpreted me.
I nv mentioned the internet is powerful.what i meant was all the information is available on the net..hence problems now shud emphasize more on critical thinking than memorising...u may want to noe how MIT people do their examinations..own time on target..with a labtop by the side..
Can use MSN or not? -
let me try to talk abt tiered structure...Originally posted by spencer99:I don't agree with the above statement. many MNCs or govt sector have a tiered structure.... For non-grad, they will come in at technician level, for grad, at engineer level. in some org, there is almost no way for a non-grad to be an engineer...
Also, the above statement is quite short-term in outlook. experience is more important. but do you want to maintain a system all your life??
With a degree, you are better positioned to progress in life, maybe move on to another higher level job with your technical skills, maanage a team of engineers for example...
for non grad, he cannot be engineer, but there is still a technician system where he can climb.
even for grad, he can be a professional engineer, but the engineer system itself will have a ceiling also. it is not as if degree person can climb all the way.
if he wants certain higher position, he has to hit the books again for doctorate or higher.
let me talk about technician view again. first, by opting not to go university, he has already saved $35000 dollars. he can go out earlier and start working as a technician and start savings. withing the technician system, there will be some levels to rise to be very senior technician.
engineer with degree will also has similar path.
the technician job is a kind of basic pay job. some companies rely on degree cerfiticate as a entry point. Some companies , if they are smart, they will also think of method to look for people with no degrees but still has the capability of degreed people becaue all they want is people who can produce work.
i am quite sure its possible to get jobs the same pay as degree people and thus save urself the 35 000 dollars. most non grad dun achieve this because non grad are usually not capable than grad in the first place because they have not as good environment when they grow up.
i talking abt people who has the chance to go university . it would be better if they know that without the degree, they can save money and still get a high pay job same as degree people but they must have the vision that there is such a way. and they must have the continous learning attitude.
35 000 is a large sum of money. if you can save 1400 to pay per month. you will need 25 months of work to repay the fees. but my guess is that most singaporean , they will have parents chipping in to pay, that is why they do not see the effect as much as i do.
the other point is people talking that university is not also about certifcate but also learning.... my argument is......
u dun need to go to university to know that learning process is useful and great. even if u are not university , wherever u are, you can learn and gain knowledge. learning and applying knowledge should be done all the time and at all situations and at all cases..... -
I think can.
heheOriginally posted by Icemoon:Laptop by the side? Own time own target?
Can use MSN or not? -
then all hell is loose.Originally posted by No9:I think can.
hehe
mass cheating. -
What you want through a Uni education is my question???
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Indeed? Well, let's see.Originally posted by january:u dun need to go to university to know that learning process is useful and great. even if u are not university , wherever u are, you can learn and gain knowledge. learning and applying knowledge should be done all the time and at all situations and at all cases.....
You say that:
So it's entirely possible that non-degree holders can go as far as degree holders because it's a matter of their intrinsic characteristics rather than their education? Well and good.Originally posted by january:let me talk about technician view again. first, by opting not to go university, he has already saved $35000 dollars. he can go out earlier and start working as a technician and start savings. withing the technician system, there will be some levels to rise to be very senior technician.
But wait a minute! Later that you say that:
Well, you've already said that the degree doesn't add anything to the person's capabilities, but you've backtracked here by saying that the non-grads' lack of capability is due to their being non-grads. Make up your mind - is it nature, or is it nurture?Originally posted by january:most non grad dun achieve this because non grad are usually not capable than grad in the first place because they have not as good environment when they grow up.
Put simply, you've just shot yourself in the foot. The irony of this is that logical errors like the one you just committed are covered in first-year undergraduate Critical Thinking subjects. In other words, you could have been outdone by someone who's spent a short six months at university, using something that doesn't even register as a party trick at university-level learning.
If you want to believe that a university education provides you no value beyond meaningless qualifications, go right ahead. You've said you can achieve the same learning without university but I've just shown you how you've shown you can't, and that's just the tip of the iceberg of what you don't know about university education.
Still and all, if you do wish to cling to your illusions and stick to pithy platitudes, you're perfectly entitled to. Just don't be disappointed when you get nothing out of it - your argument would never lead to anything actionable because it's got such huge holes in it. -
i get what u mean by my contradiction.Originally posted by Gedanken:Well, you've already said that the degree doesn't add anything to the person's capabilities, but you've backtracked here by saying that the non-grads' lack of capability is due to their being non-grads. Make up your mind - is it nature, or is it nurture?
Put simply, you've just shot yourself in the foot. The irony of this is that logical errors like the one you just committed are covered in first-year undergraduate Critical Thinking subjects. In other words, you could have been outdone by someone who's spent a short six months at university, using something that doesn't even register as a party trick at university-level learning.
If you want to believe that a university education provides you no value beyond meaningless qualifications, go right ahead. You've said you can achieve the same learning without university but I've just shown you how you've shown you can't, and that's just the tip of the iceberg of what you don't know about university education.
Still and all, if you do wish to cling to your illusions and stick to pithy platitudes, you're perfectly entitled to. Just don't be disappointed when you get nothing out of it - your argument would never lead to anything actionable because it's got such huge holes in it.
i did not explain the concept clearly enough....
ok point taken. unclear explanation is quite common actually. -
what make u so sure a non grad cannot be an engineer?Originally posted by january:let me try to talk abt tiered structure...
for non grad, he cannot be engineer, but there is still a technician system where he can climb. even for grad, he can be a professional engineer, but the engineer system itself will have a ceiling also. it is not as if degree person can climb all the way.
for your information, there are many capable non grad engineers out there. senior engineers, project engineers, team leaders etc. -
ok, its my mistake.Originally posted by Gordonator:what make u so sure a non grad cannot be an engineer?
for your information, there are many capable non grad engineers out there. senior engineers, project engineers, team leaders etc.
but this shows us that if a person dun have a degree, he will be able to save 35 000 and still have prospect of being senior engineer. -
Ya la, what I meant was as a place of learning, not just the chase for paperOriginally posted by Icemoon:I disagree that university is a place to gain knowledge. It provides you with opportunities for learning, but by itself it is never a place to fill you with knowledge.
The notion that to gain knowledge is learning is a misconception.