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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To wonder how the HELL some people get into university?

600 replies

SayYuleNowSayWhipTheReindeer · 01/12/2011 18:50

I'm currently doing a degree as a mature student alongside work, and am just amazed at the stupidity lack of knowledge some of my fellow students have. For instance, nearly all of them - on a fecking ENGLISH LANGUAGE degree course - mix up "your" and you're", "there" and "their", and use the spelling "definately".

I overheard a conversation today that involved several students talking about how they didn't know their times tables above 5 or 6. Shock

AIBU to seriously wonder if it's even worth doing a degree if this is the standard they're allowing in at the moment?

OP posts:
Xenia · 04/12/2011 07:12

I learned by tables in the 70s (just) in fact probably started them in the late 60s. My own chidlren have all learned their tables and I dont' think this is just something for schools. There is nothing to stop any parent on here making sure their children learn them at home too. Buy a tape, put them on in the car etc. Be responsible.

lesley33 · 04/12/2011 10:55

Rabies is still an issue in many countries abroad. Basically if you are visiting some countries and are going to be more than 24 hours away from medical help, you need to have 3 rabies vaccinations.

I think there was a time in the late 80's/early 90's where some schools believed teaching time tables was not necessary.

TheFestiveKnid · 04/12/2011 11:05

rabies was around such a long time ago - itls about as relevant today as rickets

You are right, rabies is as relevant as rickets: rabies is still a problem in many countries (and a potential problem here) and rickets is once again becoming a problem in the UK. Neither of them are irrelevant!

breadandbutterfly · 04/12/2011 16:21

On the positive (?) front, I've taught foreign students English and study skills before they started postgraduate courses in UK universities. On that basis, I can confidently say that all those worries about our economic dominance being taken away by brilliant, hard-working Indians or Chinese is entirely groundless - their academic standards were even lower than those of UK students.

Obviously, I expected them to have difficulty with the language - I did not expect them to be incapable of structuring even the most basic essay; to have to teach them v v basic statistics (they were doing postgrad courses in numerous disciplines like Accountancy; O level Maths is my highest maths qualification Shock ; to have no concept of plagiarism or that just copying essay content verbatim off Wikipedia was actually not the thing to do.

Believe it or not, in other countries, their university standard = our A Levels.

Pretty depressing - possibly throws UK educational failures into light relief, though.

BertieBotts · 05/12/2011 00:55

My point stands though, if rabies is only relevant if you're going abroad, why would you know about it if you'd never been abroad?

Although actually I went to Spain, France, The Netherlands and Ireland as a teenager, are those all countries where rabies is extinct or was there a worrying lack of information there? Confused

MillyR · 05/12/2011 00:59

BB, most people are aware of malaria, even if they haven't travelled abroad. It is just general knowledge.

I don't know how old you are, but I am in my thirties and ferries to France certainly displayed lots of posters about rabies when I was a teenager.

yellowraincoat · 05/12/2011 01:02

A girl I know went to the University of London and once asked me if Hitler was a real person.

She also didn't know what a comma was.

She got As in her A Levels.

Seriously disturbing.

Original poster
SayYuleNowSayWhipTheReindeer · 05/12/2011 10:18

Shock at yellowraincoat. Seriously? She didn't know what a comma was? And if Hitler was a real person....??

OP posts:
GrimmaTheNome · 05/12/2011 12:29

My point stands though, if rabies is only relevant if you're going abroad

Even that isn't strictly true - bats can carry rabies. I think the last death in the UK was not too many years ago, a bat rescuer. We've found bats on the ground or hanging on the side wall of our house - DD and her friends know not to attempt to handle them!

BertieBotts · 05/12/2011 12:48

Yes I suppose I am aware of malaria.

I don't recall seeing any posters about rabies on ferries to France though, the first time I went on one would have been 2002 or so when I was 14. Have been a couple of times since then. I've just looked it up anyway and it says it's mainly a concern in Africa, Asia and South America.

The comma thing is slightly worrying. At GCSE English I was in the top set and the week before study leave our teacher was doing a quick run down of what we needed to know, and said something like "Nouns, verbs, adjectives, you all know the difference, don't you?" and half the class said no Shock

Not really the student's fault though, if they keep taking things out of the curriculum on a whim.

DeckTheHugeWithBoughsOfManatee · 05/12/2011 13:10

I find the idea that we can dismiss knowledge that isn't immediately 'relevant' to someone's life situation as unimportant a bit worrying. It seems to me a pretty solipsistic way of evaluating what's worth knowing, and a fine way to encourage narrow horizons and discourage curiosity about the world.

Original poster
SayYuleNowSayWhipTheReindeer · 05/12/2011 13:14

OTH did you just want to use "solipsistic" in a sentence? Xmas Grin

OP posts:
LRDtheFeministDragon · 05/12/2011 13:15

I agree with that manatee.

But I think we also have to be careful about assuming that what we know about is automatically a good standard for assessing anyone else's knowledge or intelligence.

I do cringe inwardly at students who don't know something I think is obvious, or good general knowledge, or should have been picked up at school. But I know what it feels like when you see someone cringing like that, and sometimes the result is that you make someone feel small or stupid - for the sake of a few facts or skills.

BertieBotts · 05/12/2011 13:16

I wasn't saying it should be dismissed, just that we shouldn't expect people to automatically know about it.

Original poster
SayYuleNowSayWhipTheReindeer · 05/12/2011 13:19

LRD - I would never outwardly cringe at someone's lack of knowledge. I'd just come and post about it on MN instead :o

But seriously, it's not like I'd go to the person who didn't know what rabies was and say, "FFS you're so thick, don't you know what that is?"

The latest one is someone in my class spelling "hungry" as "hungary".

OP posts:
LRDtheFeministDragon · 05/12/2011 13:30

SayYule - yeah ... but by posting on MN you are pretty much outwardly cringing at someone's lack of knowledge.

I know it's a bit of a fine line because we all come on here and post stuff we wouldn't say to someone in RL as a way to let off steam. It's just an awful lot of this thread really hit home to me and felt personal, in a way I'm sure wasn't intended by the posters.

I know you wouldn't go up to someone and say 'ffs, are you thick'.

yellowraincoat · 05/12/2011 13:41

I think there's a difference though, between general knowledge and the kind of stuff that actually EVERYONE knows. If you grew up in a city, without ever having had a pet, maybe you WOULDN'T know what rabies was. I can see how that would happen, and we all have gaps in our knowledge.

Not knowing what a comma is, or who Hitler is, when you're 18 and about to go to study JOURNALISM at one of the best universities in the country, is a bit different, and shows, to me, that you don't actually care about your work at all.

LRDtheFeministDragon · 05/12/2011 13:55

No, that's general knowledge.

It's ignorant to assume what you personally know, is stuff that 'actually EVERYONE knows'. I am sure if you went to a different country or culture, you would find that you were the person who didn't have the appropriate general knowledge.

I do agree that not knowing what a comma is or who Hitler is, is a worrying lack of general knowledge. But it is general knowledge ... how on earth else could you define general knowledge?

LRDtheFeministDragon · 05/12/2011 13:56

(TBH, I would be just as concerned by a student who didn't now that general knowledge is not 'stuff EVERYONE knows', as by a student who didn't know who Hitler was. Both suggest a really worrying ignorance of culture and history.)

Original poster
SayYuleNowSayWhipTheReindeer · 05/12/2011 14:09

It is a very arbitrary line between "stuff everyone knows" and "general knowledge". I have to admit, areas of my general knowledge are appalling. Ask me anything on sport or politics and I will look at you blankly. But stuff everyone knows? I guess that's to do with National Curriculum. I mean, if you didn't know who Hitler was, it's worrying because you have to wonder what the hell you were taught at school! But it doesn't necessarily make you stoopid.

LRD I am truly sorry if any of this thread has offended you; that really wasn't my intention. As you say, it was just started as a bit of steam-off-letting (yes that is now a word! Xmas Grin ) and really wasn't intended to insult anyone.

OP posts:
MamaLazarou · 05/12/2011 14:12

My husband works with a woman who is leaving to do a Phd. She doesn't know how chips are made, will not eat anything with a 'foreign' sounding name (e.g, cashew nuts) and was really disappointed when she found out her sister's baby was going to be a girl because she had 'wanted to see what a little boy's willy looks like'.

LRDtheFeministDragon · 05/12/2011 14:17

Oh, I know it wasn't your intention! It wasn't you, either, TBH, so don't worry.

The thing is, I'm a big girl, I can take it and I've been very lucky so I am one of the people who has a foot in both camps - I know what it's like being the stupid one and having people sneer and I know what it's like being the teacher and being quietly gobsmacked at what people come to university not knowing or not bieng able to do. But not everyone gets to that position where they can look back and think 'no, I wasn't just stupid'.

Some people have very inflexible ideas about what constitutes 'intelligence'. We can all agree on this thread that it's awful if a child hasn't learned what school set out to teach them.

But so, so many children don't learn for reasons beyond their control - they have difficult childhoods, they're ill, they have ill siblings who take their parents' attention, they have bad teachers (I am not slating teachers but it happens), they're in classes where most of the children don't want to learn, etc. etc. My brother taught an 18-year-old who could give you a learned explanation of what cystic fibrosis entailed and how best to care for his sister who had it - but who had, along the way, not picked up a lot of the skills he should have done at school. Now that's exceptional. But I would think that within any university class of 10 or 12 students, you might find one who has good reason to have failed to pick up some of the knowledge he or she should have. That one person is reason enough to be really careful, IMO.

grovel · 05/12/2011 14:26

People also have blind spots. My DH is insufferably good at University Challenge, Mastermind etc but he simply cannot remember whether the sun rises in the East or West. I must have told him 50 times. He is also a brilliant speller but he has got a bit of paper in his wallet with the word "accommodation" on it. He simply cannot remember how to spell this word after using it probably thousands of times.

Very strange.

Pendeen · 05/12/2011 14:29

Elementary punctuation is not 'general knowledge.'

How on earth could a Univerity undergraduate not know what a comma is?

LRDtheFeministDragon · 05/12/2011 14:39

Pendeen - maybe she didn't know the name of it. Or maybe she had not learned how to punctuate her work.

Yes, she should have learned this. Yes, it is frankly shocking she didn't know it.

But it is general knowledge. Knowing what a comma is, is knowledge rooted in our particular culture and educational context. Many, many cultures and educational systems would not teach you that, because they do not have the name or the concept. So what?

How would you define general knowledge, if it's not culturally and educationally determined? And how could knowing what a comma is not be culturally and educationally determined?