so, what IS a 'Mickey Mouse' degree?

[lemonysweet]

inspired by the thread about whether youd like your child to go to uni.

go on then, what degrees do you consider 'Mickey Mouse'

[personally i would never be so throwaway about something someone had invested so much time, effort and money into, but im interested in others opinions]

You are more likely to earn more money if you have a degree - however it is not the same as it being a causal factor in 'success'. From the very small amount of information you have given and making huge generalisations, I would say your dn would be in the same position whatever route he took.

I don't think degrees are easy - in fact after having done one in 1993/6, and then again in 2007, they are considerably harder and slicker than they used to be. Students don't mess about now that they are paying - everyone is there, and work is handed in on time.

IMO Sports Science is a useful and vocational degree !

Thumbwitch- I know there are minimum standards (and FWIW, no, I dont think the bar is anywhere near high enough, but that's what happens when the government arbitrarily sets targets for the number of people it wants to pump through the University sausage machine) but the implication of MrsPurple's quote is that all degrees are somehow moderated and are therefore equal across all Universities and courses, which is simply not true.

Unless my DSs wanted a career where a degree is essential eg medicine or teaching I would actively encourage them not to go to uni. I didn't, I went and got some life experience and worked my way up in jobs and ended up working with people with degrees who were earning the same money as me but had a whopping student debt.

It's only going to get worse with the amount of people going to university now. Why the need? I don't understand why it is so encouraged these days.

Sorry, slightly off the point, but still....

imo a 'micky mouse' degree is where you do a vocational degree and then expect it to open doors like an academic degree.

vocational degrees are FINE (though might be better as dips or certs) if that's the career you want to do but if you study something like 'hotel management' then you should expect to become a hotel manager and not to be on a par for 'milk round' general graduate jobs as somebody who studied an academic degree.

if you know what you want to 'train for' then do that.. but if you don't know or there's some doubt then you must do an academic degree if you have the entry requirements and if you don't have the entry requirements you must think carefully about what the best course is for you.

Mickey Mouse generally means "something which I personally don't see the need for a degree in".....so its very subjective..

My degree is in Comparative Religious and Biblical Studies....everyone probably thinks Mickey Mouse, but

1 - I know I had to work really hard for that
2 - It taught me a great deal
3 - I then did a PGCE (S) so it did qualify me to do a job
4 - Due to the nature of my degree I had far more subject knowledge when I did teaching that most of my peers who had accessed RME teaching through having a degree from a theology or divinity faculty.

As this is my experience I of course don't think my degree was Mickey Mouse. I however have little experiences of science subjects so I take a bit of a step back when I hear of courses that my University did in Aquaculture or Ecology....

I'm sure people who are golf course green keepers can understan the need for a degree in Golf Course Green Keeping - because they know how technical their job is, how many varaibale there are, how many diffrent methodologies you need to consider before deciding what is best in each situation. Just because people who work in offices or science labs think its a "mickey mouse" degree doesn't mean it is - ask the people IN the industry who have experiences graduates with that degree, esp when the degree involves a large of work placements whether its a useful start for someone being involved in the industry before deciding to denegrate everyone who does it (for example).

My Masters was in a very small sporting specialism which again, everyone thinks is pointless, but again, I know how hard I worked and also how, had I have gone into the area I was trained for, how it would have been very well used.

My parents thought any 'social science' degree was a bit mickey mouse but I still did one anyway. It didn't get me a job but I enjoyed my subject.

I think I'd judge whether a degree was mickey mouse based on what uni it was from more than what subject.

When I was doing my UCAS form I came across some quite 'out there' subjects eg Gaming studies, bookbinding, equine studies, aquatic bioscience, american studies etc

I think my degree would be classed a MMD as I'm doing Early Childhood Studies. As a mature student I also attend the nearest uni which accepts anyone I think . I want to teach adults eventually (need a pgce pcet)so took this route and have enjoyed it immensly - it's a big achievement at 44 yo even if funding is being pulled from FE/Adult Ed and I may never get a teaching job .

Pagwatch - I agree with you.

My cousin studied Football Studies at a 3 year old Uni (used to be Southampton Institute). A complete waste of time. His final dissertation was a study on footballers in the media which basically could have been cobbled together from a few Heat articles. He now works in Somerfield. Cannot get a decent job. £20 grand in debt. He is not particularly academic at all, was encouraged to go to uni (by school, and by his family) and with his grades (Cs and Ds at A level) got into to low-grade uni. He would have been better off training as a plumber.

I also know someone who studied Gambling Studies at Salford. If that aint a Mickey Mouse degree, I don't know what is. He has tried since graduation to get jobs in Casinos etc both in the UK and abroad. His degree is laughed at. They don't want Gambling graduates, they want statisticians and shit hot mathematicians.

My under-grad is a micky mouse degree.

Well I got a 2:2 in Sociology at Manchester Metropolitan Univeristy (MMU - Micky Mouse Univeristy?) so I think mine was for me, but that was because I dont use it.

Im 31 and I feel as though I went as it was just the next step after A levels. It was something that I was forced into encouraged to do by my parents.

I really wished I hadnt gone to uni back then and maybe done something else. My degree has not got me anywhere career-wise. Its not really given me great advantages in life and in-fact I know people who didnt go to uni and just got a job at 18 worked their way up and are now in a much better socially acceptable place than me, ie own their own house, get a decent wage as apposed to me currently in a council house, wondering what I really want to do with my life with not much to really show for anything.

PS Ive tried to strike through a couple of words, but on the preview it hasn't worked.

lmao at 'Football Studies' and Heat articles.

You're right though-why this obsession with getting everyone into university? What the hell is wrong with a trade? My babysitter's 22 year old boyfriend is an electrician and earns tonnes. Good for him.

I never went to uni (not through choice really, I would have loved to go but got pregnant) but to be honest it has not held me back career wise. You just have to be a bit more bullish in order to overtake the graduates. Mind you, a lot of the graduates on the grad training schemes in teh companies I have worked for have been complacent and not that clever, so have been easy to 'overtake'.

My DP is a bricklayer by trade, is never out of work and earns a good whack.

Mind you, I would have loved to have gained a degree. If I won the lottery tomorrow I would go to uni and study something like architecture or biochemistry. The thought of spending 3 years studying something in depth is wonderful.

Moondog, I think Sports Science is what you'd do if you wanted to be a personal trainer, PE teacher, physiotherapist etc. Sort of like biology mixed with sport?

I did my BSc 12 years ago at an ex-polytechnic, albeit one with a pretty good reputation. I never used my degree but the majority of people who saw my cv didn't express a preference on which university I had studied at.

I am now in academia, doing a PhD at a Russell Group University, the best in my subject area and it was only when I was doing my MSc there and applying for PhD funding did I realise how opinionated academics are about where people study, the courses they do and the marks they got. Academia is highly meritocratic like that in a way that I imagine the majority of jobs are not. It is catching though, I have started to think that way too, which isn't necessarily a good thing. I have a friend who got a compensated pass (not even a 3rd) from Sheffield Hallam and he thinks because he has a degree he can command £20-25k in his first job and turns down other work because he has a false idea of how important his degree is.

From an academic viewpoint, someone who couldn't even get a 3rd in a business degree at a university such as that, is probably lower on the scale than someone who has decent GCSEs or A-Levels but who went into a trade or vocation instead of university. That's why I consider my friends degree to be worthless, therefore Mickey Mouse. It's academic snobbery but I think it's pretty rife, unless you have a good 2:1 or 1st then that's the opinion some people will have.

I loathe the term 'Mickey Mouse' degree. I guess my own degree would probably come under that bracket - an obscure branch of social science which is meaningless to most people, from a former 'institute', turned university. But I don't think it held me back - I got into the (completely unrelated) industry and job I wanted within months of graduating, the things I studied and skills I learnt at university have set me up well in many areas of my life, and I'm basically a better, more confident person for it.

I think what you do once you've got your degree is more important than the degree itself. You could get a first from Oxbridge, but if you sit back and expect everyone to be clamouring over you the moment you graduate, you'll get nowhere. If you get a degree in Wine Studies from a Poly but then throw yourself into selling yourself to employers, proving you know your stuff, that you have a good work ethic and contacts in the industry, then you're likely to do well.

'Unless my DSs wanted a career where a degree is essential eg medicine or teaching I would actively encourage them not to go to uni.'

I would, too. I have an English degree.

I'm already making it a point that any further education they undertake should be for the goal of getting a job that will support them. Doesn't have to be high-paying, but some sort of skill.

And if they don't want to do that then they need to start working at 16.

Looking back, when I did my degree in 1998-2002, it was far from easy and the content was pretty gruelling. BUT - we only had 11 hours of lectures a week and we were encouraged to do a lot of private study and research. I didn't...I chose to spend my days at my part-time job/in the pub, and therefore ended up with a 2:2. Regret that, really. With just a bit more work, and less play, I could have done better.

Incidentally, it was Languages (joint hons, at a Russell Group uni) - is that considered Mickey Mouse?

Slack, but if you want to be a physio, you do a proper physio degree not some half arsed mishmash.

Might be considered Mickey Mouse, but TBH, it was damned difficult. It's basically some of the hardest bits of programming, with lots of degree level mathematics.

I was shit at it.

Advertising, marketing etc are all valid degrees as they do have specific skills that can be taught.

Media studies is a bit of a joke, simply because it takes a lot of bits and pieces from degrees such as the ones above and doesn't cover them in much detail at all. Fine to do as an extra at GCSE or A-Level to get the basics but not as a degree. (I've taught it at both these levels.) But there are many like this I think, sold to people by saying "do what you enoy"...which isn't always the best advice.

Mickey mouse degrees are those degrees available to people who arent capable of getting one.

Employers wont touch them, but I guess it keeps people off the dole for a few years longer.

my DSS has wanted to be a forensic scientist since he was small (thanks to watching crap like CSI, but that's another thread...) - he's hoping to get into uni next year but it won't be a very good one as he's not got good grades.

when I was at college I asked about it on his behalf and was explicitly told, if you want to be a forensic scientist DO NOT do a 'forensic science' degree - do biology/chemistry etc. similarly if you want to be a journo, do English rather than Meeja Studies.

I'm not really sure what I define as Mickey Mouse though. because even a proper in depth degree subjects won't be well respected if from a lesser institution, unfortunately. it is a total fallacy to tell young people that going to uni will lead to great careers, and it's led to all these ridiculous courses being invented and teenagers are getting their hopes dashed :(

my DH worked with someone who had a law degree, and you would not believe it in a million years. eeeesh. whereas my dad got a geography degree at cambridge and hasn't used it at all!

MMM, apparently a big problem, loads of young people not realizing the level of theory and expertise you need to get into that field.

There is also a fair amount of misunderstanding on some matters...

My Mum had to expalin to her sisters that someone doing "Computer Games Programming" at universirty was PROGRAMMING games, not PLAYING games...(its a very good course at a vocational university based in a city with a computer games industry)

Its like I've often heard of "Degrees in David Backham"...again mince - no-one is going up to a graduation ceremony and being handed a bit of paper stating they have a BA (Hons) in David Beckham. They may however have been studying an aspect of his career and media profile for a degree in marketing, or media, or Sociology, or even Anthropology, or Journalism or Sport Science or a whole range of subjects..

And someone can write their dissertation on the a-synchronous melodic method in 197y0's Scandanavian Popular Music, but no-where on their degree certificate does it say they have adegree in Abba...

My cousin is currently studying what he considers a mickey mouse degree in graphic design. He has 7 hours of lectures a week, is the only one in his class that seems to take the work seriously and was furious when his first assignment wasn't even looked at by their tutor but "peer assessed".

He says he has learnt nothing in the first year he didn' already know from being a bit of a techy and thinks that the course has been a complete waste of time and money. He is considering dropping out as he doesn't want to throw more money down the drain