People older than 25, if you could choose would you...

[SomewhatMental]

Do a degree or just go for any job you can find to stay afloat

I'd get a job for the time being, then go back to study at a later stage if I wanted/needed to. You might even get it fully or part funded by your employer depending on the industry.

Alternatively, depending on your circumstances (childcare commitments, etc) you could get a job but also study part-time.

It's no bad thing to get experience in the world of work first.

Degree if it will lead to a better job.

I graduated with an honours degree when I was 21. All my jobs have been related to it but as time went on I realised I'd have been better doing a slightly different degree (related to my current field but offers so much more opportunity). I am now late 30s and undertaking that other degree to enhance my career opportunities. It's not ideal at my stage but I've plenty time to create a new career path so figured why not!

I'm late 20s and could have done my job without a degree but for me, at the time, uni was more than a degree and I hands down wouldn't change a thing.

A lot of my colleagues have law degrees. I do T and do the same work for the same money. I bought a house at 24 when they were struggling with student loans. Not many of them own their homes now in their 40's so no I'd just get a job

@SeasonFinale

I qualified as a solicitor as a mature student when my oldest was 2 and a half. Degree every time. If people haven't then used their degree to go into graduate style jobs that is usually down to them.

Definitely it is up to them! So be realistic about what sort of career you want and how your degree will get you that. I personally wouldn't do a "for the experience" degree when I was older and the fees are so much higher.

If you want to be a solicitor though, you need an LLB (I think). So similar to medicine in that regard.

I have a job I absolutely love, but I could have done it without the degree. I don't want to be, for example, a teacher. I could do a pgce and become one within a couple of years, but I don't want to! If I had my time again, I'd still want to be doing my current job and I still would like that I'd have had the experience I did have at university...but I wouldn't do it at 25 instead of 18/19 and I wouldn't do it for the current fees. I think that's when it would change from doing a degree for the love of the subject and experience and become "only for the right career".

I'm doing a masters in my 50s. This subject didn't exist 10 years ago and I only discovered it really during covid.

I think it depends on the circumstances.

If no commitments, probably the degree.

Also agree that a number of law graduates I know have not gone on to be solicitors - they cannot get the traineeships. I also know someone who became a legal executive without a degree. She manages to find work really easily and has a decent income.

I did my degree at 45!

I'm not intelligent enough to do a degree, so job.

If you do a degree, you’ve got to make it count. Get a First from a good uni. Otherwise don’t bother.

I had a PhD by 25, but I did go back at 27 to get an MBA while also working full time. It was right choice as the MBA gave me management and business skills to move up from being senior engineer to managing division of engineering and then being in Director position.

I would bust a gut to get an entry level job in a field I was really interested in. Then work to develop any skills/qualifications required in that field. Often, companies are happy to support people who show a genuine interest their field.

I'd have sacked off the degree and started in a job and moved up from there. Wasted time doing it and left feeling lost and never use my degree though.

Depends on the degree. If the job you want NEEDS it totally do it. If not, do a job and work up.

Neither DH or I don’t have degrees and are high earners - he’s a director and left school to do a YT or whatever it was back then.

I’m in a creative role, now freelance. Know people in similar areas who earn half what I earn but spent years at uni.

Know people who went to uni to study stuff they are interested in, but don’t have jobs that relate to it AT ALL. Also know people with degrees who have done very well.

I left a well-paid job to do a degree because I was thoroughly sick of office politics, the commute and everything else about my job. I was fortunate to have saved enough to cover expenses whilst I studied.
However, if this is not an option, then maybe p/t studying may be an option?

A job, no question. My degree didn't help me get my job, it just delayed me starting on the career ladder by several years. I regret the wasted time. These days so many people have degrees it doesn't impress employers as much as work experience, unless its a job where a degree is a requirement of course.

I did both - worked an admin job full-time, did my degree in the evenings.
It was a bloody harder slog for 4 years but it helped me get on to the civil service fast stream, & I'm now training to be an accountant through that (I did a biomed degree so a bit of a change!).

Either:

• Go to a Russel group uni or better and do a degree that directly leads to a high paying career (accountancy, law, architecture, medicine etc), or STEM (but not media studies or anything wishy washy) and get a min of a 2:1.

• OR go to college and do an apprenticeship in something where there is a skills drought and the job pays £££ (plumbing, engineering, coding etc)

The people who lose out are people who get no formal training for a specific job and mostly end up in low paid insecure work.

The other group of people who lose out are those who pay through the nose to get a third class degree from an ex poly uni no one has heard of, in a subject that doesn't lead to a proper job. (I know this sounds harsh but I get pissed off young people get conned into a life of debt for nothing)

I would not pick a degree I was just interested in - it would have to increase my probability of progressing in my chosen career path.

This is good advice if you know what you want to do.

If you really don't know, a degree can still open doors to a wide range of graduate training schemes. Better to choose something you are interested in, as you are more likely to put the work in and get a decent grade.

Job. I'm 46, no degree, it's never held me back and I've had some senior positions. But, the world is different now so I don't know. I've loads of experience now which speaks for a lot, but if I didn't have, maybe I'd feel differently.

Would depend on the degree, what I could do with it, and if I could afford to do it

Like someone else on this thread, I'm an academic who (mostly!) loves my job. So for me, a degree.

But I'd think about what your end goal is, and then how to get there. I wouldn't just do a degree for the sake of it, especially as a mature student when you're maybe starting to think more about financial security, mortgage, children.

Any job. Degrees aren't worth much. I'm the highest earner of my friends and the only one without a degree