To wonder how the HELL some people get into university?

[SayYuleNowSayWhipTheReindeer]

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.

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

According to the National Curriculum levels, an average 11 year old should know their times tables. It isn't unreasonable to expect your average university undergraduate to have a level of mental arithmetic that is expected of 11 year olds.

Should have said - she is a recent graduate. The email included the phrase "must of bin" (must have been).

One of my past jobs was marking Chartered Accountancy (have already got a 2:1 from a good uni) student's coursework essays
you want spelling / grammar / logic errors
holey moley fanoley
the one who wrote densely on one side of the paper and then the other way up on the back of the sheet drove me up the wall

It would be funnier if we weren't expected to have faith in these people's 'professions'.

LoveInaColdClimate.

I really do despair at the spelling in emails sent in a professional capacity. The amount of managers who still can't tell the difference between your and you're is just ridiculous.

While I'm on my rant..., one of the power point presentations for our lecture was riddled with spelling mistakes. Not typos either. Things like acronyms with apostrophes for plurals. E.g. PC's. Not the sort of mistake you expect from a university lecturer who is teaching English Language!

Yanbu I think, anyone can go to university these days if they want to and I don't think the standard is all that high tbh, but maybe for masters and postgraduate stuff it is? I say this as I got a 1st myself (from a good uni) and my spelling, writing etc is crap and I hardly went to any lectures at all in final year, or properly study the material I was supposed to write about, I just read all the synopsis before the exam then blagged it. So I just don't understand how people think degrees are difficult or worth that much, anyone can get one if they are prepared to put the few years in. But then cos so many people have degrees these days, you might aswel just stick with it as when you apply for jobs it would show on your cv that everyone else has one and you don't.

I'm of the cohort who went to school through the mid 70s to late 80s, when it really wasn't fashionable to formally teach grammar at school. I know my grammar is pretty clumsy and my spelling is not what it used to be. Thankfully, I didn't even consider studying English language beyond O-level, plumping for maths and sciences, instead. All the same, I frequently end up struggling to resist the urge to red pen letters for apostrophe abuse at the very least.

I went to a Grammar School and way back when, you had to be super clever to even think of Oxbridge. But my super clever friends who went only took 4 A' levels max. I fail to see how so many children can get 5 A*s without some level of dumbing down. It would have been the elite that got 3 or 4 As in my day - maybe 3 or 4 in my 6th Form.....

I have a t-shirt that says "An apostrophe is the difference between a publisher that knows its shit and a publisher that knows it's shit."

:o

Love it

I was just making the point that the fact someone claims (in an informal, overheard conversation) to not know all their times tables, does not mean they are poor at English. Although being able to apply maths is a basic life skill it is not essential to gain a degree. If we were talking about vocational courses, where you are training for an actual profession, I would think general intelligence and common sense would have more bearing.

Spelling and grammar aren't very good indicators of how good you'll be at your degree. I mix up you're and your when I'm not thinking hard about it, and my degree is in English. I don't know my tables either - not by rote - and lots of people don't rote learn them but can still do the arithmetic if they need it.

Chances are, unless you're at a very poor university, most of them got in because they're not as thick as you think.

But Backto - as someone already pointed out - an 11 yo should have that ability.

Well I'm happy to be told I'm BU if I am; it just seems odd to me that someone has passed through the education system and got this far - to a degree level - with such poor knowledge of grammar and maths. To clarify, the conversation I overheard was between students who may not have been studying English.

I was just making the point that the fact someone claims (in an informal, overheard conversation) to not know all their times tables, does not mean they are poor at English.

No one claimed it did - it was an example of general stupidity lack of knowledge.

:O Love the t-shirt!

DS1 was composing a thankyou email to my sister, for her happy birthday wishes, this afternoon. Apart from the fact that it was mostly rambling nonsense (something he is prone to, having ASD), with a bit of prompting, he used the appropriate form of it's. He somehow overlooked his declaration that "Im very pleased" though!

My 7 yo knows her times tables up to 6. And she is only 2nd year primary in Belgium.

SayYule - 1 in 10 people is dyslexic. It's quite possible they were. If so, it's quite likely they'd struggle with spelling/rote learning like times tables.

It's not a sign of stupidity. It's perfectly possible to look up spellings, check your grammar carefully, and use a calculator/do arithmetic in your head instead.

I have a couple of different perspectives. I have taught chemistry in secondary schools for nearly 6 years and am currently on sabbatical lecturing in chemistry at a prestigious RG university. The young people we get in 1st year do seem to mostly have reasonable spelling and grammar, I've not come across anything too bad so far. That said, they haven't done their long reports yet! In schools the level of literacy and numeracy is appalling at times. There are several teachers I used to work with who are truly awful at maths and the spelling mistakes I saw on the boards made my eyes water. All teachers have to have a degree....... We need greater emphasis on the basics. When recruiting for a new teacher I threw away anyone whose application had glaring spelling or grammar mistakes. I know lots of teachers who would say 'well you could have thrown away a really good teacher in that lot' but to me teachers are setting an example to the young people they are working with and as such should model good spelling and grammar (at least being able to refer to a dictionary when required!).

LRD - my best friend is severely dyslexic, and he doesn't make half the mistakes these people do. And fair enough if one or two of them were dyslexic - but so many?

sometimes it is so gawky, it is almost sweet. I overheard some students drinking coffee and talking. One was a bit of a show-off and he was rambling on about the platonic wars. Another said she had never heard of them and he explained, the wars between Rome and Carthage - which would be PUNIC. Platonic wars appealed to me

Another time I had a student of history who said she had never heard of Mesopotamia. Now I don't think she needed to know all about it but just some idea of Mesopotamia being the cradle of civilisation would have been handy for a history student.

But it's not university that's the problem - it's the schools! How can someone be in free education for 14 years and not be able to read, write and do basic paths properly.

Until recently, I lectured at an ex-poly. Students were arriving in first year unable to use capital letters, break essays down into paragraphs, use commas or full stops or at times even make themselves understood.

It is not a university lecturers job to teach someone how to read, write and structure a basic essay, but that's exactly what a lot of lecturers are wasting their time doing these days, as the schools haven't bothered.

No wonder the Oxbridge colleges have a disproportionate number of privately educated students - it's not that Oxford and Cambridge are biased, but why should they be forced to take students who haven't been prepared for university? If we want admissions to the top universities to be fair, we have to sort out primary and secondary education, not create quotas.

I really do despair at the spelling in emails sent in a professional capacity. The amount of managers who still can't tell the difference between your and you're is just ridiculous

I don't come across this much myself. Most of the people I work with are PhD scientists, but they don't use their expertise in this area as an excuse for shoddy communication skills. Come to that they don't all have English as a first language, they don't use that as an excuse either.

All dyslexics aren't identical though.

I don't know how many would be dyslexic, I just wanted to point out the possibility before you judged them all.

It's possible some of them are not very bright. But honestly, why do you need spelling or times tables for a degree? I've never needed to be good at either (my spelling isn't awful as it happens, but I've never been asked to prove that).

A degree is Higher Education, it's not the 11+ and no-one gets extra brownie points for arithmetic in an English degree or for stunning spelling in a Maths degree. So I would just say don't worry so much about it. If they're really not bright it will show in their actual degree work I think.

Are one in 10 people REALLY dyslexic? Or is this people who believe themselves to be dyslexic due to poor teaching or inappropriate learning methods?