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In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

theguardian.com

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Re: In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

#141

Post by ItsMe000001 »

Angostura wrote: post #102
astrodev wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PhD selection committees don't give much weight to grades (did they ever?) and instead rely on letters of recommendation. The corporate world doesn't care what one has gained from their degree apart from the social skills which universities don't grade for anyway. So who needs the grades to be rigorous?

> The corporate world doesn't care what one has gained from their degree apart from the social skills As someone who interviews people for jobs - nonsense.

As someone who has been interviewed numerous times - the only time they ever even checked my university CS degree was for my very first job, and they only wanted it after I had already been accepted, to file it with my papers. The rest of the times I simply had the degree listed in my résumé.

This is IT, where it may be (even?) more lax than in other fields.

However, from following similar discussions for years, for example on reddit and also here on HN, with lots of people commenting who do or have done hiring decisions, the majority opinion seems to be that once you have a work history the particulars ceases to matter. Looking at my own two decades of experience, incl. a small business (sold), now another startup (of 40+ age engineers and business people, software), I would not care either. I had to check young candidates, it never crossed my mind to look at their grades. Talking and then seeing them work was far more revealing.

Related (NY Times opinion piece "The Utter Uselessness of Job Interviews"): https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/08/opinion/sunday/the-utter-...

Re: In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

#142

Post by c12 »

oldcynic wrote: post #71

It's quite appalling how UK universities seem to have changed since tuition fees. Most saddening is the effective destruction of the Open University as they now charge the same fees as everyone else. Few can afford to take an OU course for interest, or mid life career change any more. The youngest is looking very unlikely to attend university at all thanks to feedback from those already in the system. I rather get th…

Omi, so the OU is no longer free? :o

Re: In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

#143

Post by pbhjpbhj »

arethuza wrote: post #120
tonyedgecombe wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Scotland is nowhere near as bad as the rest of the UK although you have to have put up with their dreary weather for three years before attending.

Nitpick: Scots undergraduate degrees are typically 4 years rather than 3 as in the rest of the UK.

If you have good A-levels then it certainly used to be the case that you can skip first year.

Re: In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

#145

Post by collyw »

mayniac wrote: post #46
tzahola wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Define "sexual", define "harassment".

I'm not going to because that's a really fucking stupid argument.

I don't think it is.

I have seen it said before that if you ask a girl out once its fine. If she says no and you continue to do it then its harassment. Except that how a lot of relationships begin. Pretty sure that the story of how Barack Obama got Michelle.

At one end of the spectrum its obvious. At the other end it's not.

Re: In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

#146

Post by c12 »

patricius wrote: post #136
TheForumTroll wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is quite a big difference between students alone paying 100 % (or more like 500 % in the US) and every citizen in a country sharing the price between them. Not only is it cheaper overall per capita but you also get much better tuition when schools don't go where they make the most money but concentrate on teaching and research. Look at how research in the US is today. Research what might make big money and when…

Of course there is a difference. You let others pay for your choices (studying). But it doesn't make it free.

Things like state funded healthcare are free at the point of care and education is free at the point of consumption.

This doesn't mean they don't have costs associated with them as a whole but that for those actually using them they appear to have no personal cost.

Re: In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

#147

Post by senorjazz »

noodlesUK wrote: post #47

As a university student in the UK I find myself reminded of these problems on a very frequent basis. The purpose of universities seems to have shifted from providing academic research and learning to simply being another stage of school, with the sole objective of handing out degrees. One of the metrics that I feel indicates this most strongly is the radical change in hiring at universities in recent years. It's shoc…

It keeps a vast amount of young people off the unemployed figures. Has been a stated goal since the Blair years

Re: In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

#148

Post by collyw »

SolaceQuantum wrote: post #137
collyw wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Universities used to be elitist in that only the smartest got in.

I believe historically universities were elitist in that only the richest were meant to ever attend them, not the smartest...

Quite probably, I am just thinking back to my lifetime.

Re: In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

#149

Post by School-Cotton »

kingkongjaffa wrote: post #129
gaius wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to me it is an elitist view that when you provide a service to the unwashed masses, it must be of lower quality But it must be. An institution with AAA A-level students can teach more advanced material at a faster pace than one that admits EEEs. This is surely obvious, no? It doesn’t mean anyone is better or worse in a moral sense, it just means more or less academically able.

Not at all. The ability to learn at university is not correlated with A-level results. Mastery of the material can help give a good starting point, but I've worked with fantastic E/D/C students and terrible AAA students.

> The ability to learn at university is not correlated with A-level results.

I’m very confident that this is false. Citation needed.

Re: In UK universities there is a daily erosion of integrity

#150

Post by senorjazz »

thinkingemote wrote: post #66
tonyedgecombe wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't help feeling we would be better off if responsibility for grading was taken away from universities as it is for A levels and GCSEs. There are some problems with that but I suspect they would be outweighed by the benefits.

I've anecdotes from two university lecturers on different courses. They both want some form of external moderation. its what happens for Postgraduate degrees after all. What they report is horrifying: * Essay writing skills are lacking, "its at GCSE level" * Students contesting any form of criticism - they go via the official channels to argue why they should get a good grade. All schools are tied up in multiple trib…

> Plagiarism is commonplace. There is an automated plagiarism detection mechanism for electronic submissions - but they are turned off or ignored as it's so rampant. People literally copying from Wikipedia or copy and pasting from papers to make their own work.

this isn't new. People were copying from wikipedia 18+ years ago I can assure you ahem

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