If you went to university what courses or degrees would you say are worth it and what is pointless to study?

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Whether you went to university or would start over and go back to university what would you study.
How many of you actually use the degree you got is it actually relevant to your life or a complete waste?
What degrees would you say are absolutely pointless to study and why.
If you had the chance to change your career what would you study.
Or would you bother going to university if you had your time again.
What degrees are worth it either getting you into a job with work life balance good salary job prospects ect

@BrimfulofSasha agree. Accountancy is the one professional career where University is completely unnecessary. My DH didn’t got to Uni and basically studied for his AAT qualifications in the evenings. He is now half way through Level 4 and had a very good job.

Has not had

Best degree courses are STEM if you want a good job.
Worse ever course is gender studies.

No degree is pointless but I would say that if it’s not something that’s clearly leading to a profession - make sure it’s from a really good university and get at least a 2.1!

I have a first class arts related degree from a Russell group top ten university. That was enough to open all sorts of doors for me, even though I spent a few years being all poor and arty post uni before I got fed up of working all the hours and not getting paid.

I then put together a good Cv and went to recruiters - getting my entry job I don’t think would have been so easy without that.

Penguin: my DD with a MFL degree is a barrister. A friends MFL son is a city lawyer. Some companies actively want linguists. MFLs do train the brain differently to other degrees! You can do anything afterwards! Except Stem jobs. MFL grads are a shrinking pool.

BubblesBuddy One of the interesting thing about that graph is that being a graduate is more worthwhile for a girl than a boy. Unskilled women are at the absolute bottom of the pile and earn minimum wage and can never compete with female graduates, whereas there are more unskilled boys who go into trade and can actually earn more than some graduates.

It’s also interesting, if you read the full report, that university matters a great deal for the subjects. They compare earnings from a low ranked university for Economics and a grad from LSE. They make it clear that, overall, Russell Group grads earn more. So it’s not just subject, it’s university attended too.

The tables I posted do show slightly differing rankings for men and women studying the same subject. The subjects near the top are where we need more students though so you would expect the earnings to be higher. They are also perceived as challenging subjects with good rates of employment.

Oh yes. I know boys can earn more than grads if they have a trade but girls could learn a trade too!!

Also, I read somewhere that (on average) men are more motivated by money, whereas an important thing for women in the workplace was feeling that the work was fulfilling/valuable/ethical. Definitely the case for me. Those sorts of jobs like care work, charity & public services tend to pay worse, whereas sectors like alcohol/gambling/weapons/finance pay pretty well.

Oh yes. I know boys can earn more than grads if they have a trade but girls could learn a trade too!!

You have to consider structural sexism. If you want to have kids, how many well paying trades are compatible? Women with degrees will have more options for decently paid flexible working/earn enough as a family for good childcare/tend to defer starting a family (or choose to be child free) etc etc.

If you want to have kids, how many well paying trades are compatible?

Quite a lot, as you can be self-employed and run your own business and therefore control your hours. Why does this problem only apply to women? Men should also consider whether their hours fit with childcare.....

I did a chemistry degree and never been a chemist or a scientist. But it set me up for a life and I walked straight into a grad Software job earning £28k and that was 25 years ago. I've never been unemployed and having a chemistry degree shows I have a heavy weight background with the brains to do any job (well almost) and guaranteed me job interviews. So I don't regret my degree for a minute even though I didn't all that enjoy it.

Btw I got a 2:2 class degree and I now earn high six figures. In all my job interviews, I probably had about 10 jobs over the years my 2:2 was never mentioned once.

These days, CookieDoughKid, grads with a 2:2 would be lucky to get a grad job. Most grad schemes exclude them. Also getting into further courses and training would be limited too. A friend’s DS took a year to get a job with a 2:2 in maths from Cambridge. He’s doing well now but it was a slog for a year.

I don’t think young women think about families and childcare at 18 or even 21. Very many jobs require long hours and are not flexible. Especially well paid ones. Teaching and public service jobs are better for flexibility. The issues with working and childcare kick in for the majority in their 30s now. The age of mums when they have their first baby is now over 30 and a women in a trade could well be in this stat. I don’t think women should write themselves off by childcare in the distant future. There are plenty of working years from 18-30!

Btw I got a 2:2 class degree and I now earn high six figures.

£500,000? Blimey, not many chemists who stay in science would get to that earning level. I write scientific software and full time equivalent salary would be more like high five figures.

Education for education's sake is valuable.
Learning more and exploring new ideas is valuable. Meeting people you would never have met otherwise is valuable.

I find it depressing that people think a degree is only worth something if it leads to a well paid job.

Very many jobs require long hours and are not flexible. Especially well paid ones. Teaching and public service jobs are better for flexibility.

What? Teaching is surely the worst for long hours - it's on average 55 hours a week for fairly mediocre money. Part-time teaching is about 40 hours a week. It's the reason they struggle to recruit STEM grads. For the same money as teaching (30-40k), you can have a very cushy job in something like data analytics and an easy life. In my old industry there were people working 3 days a week/school hours for 50k (pro rata'd), and it genuinely was 22.5 hours and not a minute over. And if you want the 55 hours a week and stress of teaching, you can go into the City and earn 6 figures for it.

I would really consider training as a teacher but not with those hours and the prospect of getting yelled at by students and parents.

I was wondering about a chemistry degree.....but no-one I know with one actually does chemistry! They're all accountants or bankers. Are chemistry jobs just dull or non-existent?

Education for education's sake is valuable.
Learning more and exploring new ideas is valuable. Meeting people you would never have met otherwise is valuable.

Valuable but to the tune of 40k? Not sure.

If degrees cost 10k for the entire thing again, I would quit my job in a heartbeat and go and do another one. But 40k is a hefty house deposit.

I did IT. I never worked in that field and the skills are now redundant, technology has moved on.

My daughter did law and is going to be a commercial lawyer, so that worked.

Law degree, became a lawyer which set me up. No longer work as a lawyer but the credibility that being a former lawyer apparently brings has allowed me great success. So no regrets.

I loved History but ended up doing a Biology degree at an old poly. It was one of the top new Unis for life sciences. Got a 2.1 but struggled to get a graduate job in the field. First person in my family to get into to higher education and naive to job hunting.

I’m now a qualified management accountant. I agree that an accountancy degree is pretty pointless as you have to do all your professional exams whilst working anyway, might as well spend 3 years doing something interesting.

I work in NHS research and find having a life science degree really helpful when discussing research protocols with medics and researchers. Lots of transferable skills from a science degree. It’s always got me positive attention at interviews when everyone has English or Business Studies.

Part time jobs are common in teaching. They can be like hens teeth in some areas of work. If you think 55 hours is a long week, you are not in the real world! So many young grads do way above this. However they earn more. They would not be going part time either. Teachers don’t seem to know how hard others work and what their terms and conditions look like, let alone their pensions!

You won’t be earning 6 figures in the city and working 55 hours a week as a young grad. If teachers hate it so much, go and apply for city jobs. See if you can get one. I suspect it might be more difficult than you think. I know teachers don’t take all their holidays but they do take more than city people take. I really don’t understand these comparisons. If anyone thinks working for a six figure salary is easy and not time consuming, think again.

I was wondering about a chemistry degree.....but no-one I know with one actually does chemistry! They're all accountants or bankers. Are chemistry jobs just dull or non-existent?

I'm a chemist - my job isn't dull at all. DH too - though his in industrial chemistry was harder/stressful he did do a lot of interesting things.
And obviously I know lots of other chemists - in academia, industry, patent agents and my own field of software. It's pretty diverse.