AIBU to consider a degree instead of full time work while struggling to find a job?

[Karma1387]

I'm hoping the hive mind of mumsnet may have some suggestions on what I should do to improve my life.

I am looking to return to full time work (if I can afford to) after my maternity leave ends but the job market just seems super super tough. I need a 9-5 Monday-Friday job but everything I find online wants people with years of experience.

I want to improve my kids lives but it is looking impossible at the moment. Am I better off going and doing a degree and praying the job market is better in 3 years?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated as I feel a bit stuck but the world is crazy expensive and I have a lot of debt and I know the longer I'm not in a proper job the harder it is going to be to get into one.

Yeah I am keeping an eye on both but nothing so far but I have alerts set up for everything.

@Karma1387 Can you go back to work sooner?
At least you'd be earning more than statutory mat pay for a while.

Unfortunatley not yet as my baby isn't sleeping in his own bed yet and still wakes up 6-8 times a night and due to my partners sleep condition he doesn't wake if the baby is screaming so he can't safely co-sleep and wont wake up if baby needs feeding.

I believe I also have to give 8 weeks notice anyway to return which would almost take me to my return date anyway.

DS graduated in 2014 and I think that he was the last graduate ( or last but one) that his Accountancy firm took on to do ACA since then all have done AAT usually with A Levels, and then progressed to ACA . He didn't do Accounting and Finance at Uni, and his firm found that A&F graduates didn't do as well in the first few years.

Nhs degree apprenticeship - minimum of maths & English needed, paid whilst training and then a job once qualified.

I am keeping an eye out but the only ones I have ever come across are clinical roles which are no good for me due to needle and hospital issues which cause me to pass out 🙈 but I do keep an eye on their administrative apprenticeships.

Whether this advice is a possibility for you or not will depend on what your salary expectations are for a full time role at the moment and what the salaries are like in your area.

I work in financial services, I started at the bottom and worked my way up. The benefit is usually good benefits through the employer, decent pension, private healthcare, decent bonus structure and the flexibility of hybrid working. If you could find yourself an insurance broker or an insurer taking on junior staff you won’t need the experience as they will train you. Insurers will teach you technical info, brokers will also cover that but also if in a commercial brokerage you’ll learn about business (which you may have some idea of already given your background) business finances as you’ll need to get this information from clients and you’ll probably build up a level of accounts knowledge and system use. If you then opt to do your AAT alongside this you may be able to pivot into an accounts role with the employer your with so you’ll have that relationship with them already.

Its worth a shot, however I’d advise that the insurance market is soft at the moment, companies are struggling to make money so recruitment less frequent and may remain that way for the next 12 months. I’d suggest reaching out to a recruiter instead of relying on adverts and seeing if they have anything coming up that might suit you.

If you do decide to do the degree really take advantage of everything-:CV workshops, careers advice, industry links, everything. It looks like you've tried everything. The jobs market is crappy ATM. My DS had to do a personality test for a Christmas holiday job!

When l changed careers after being made redundant. l had small children (both under 5). I became an assessor and vocational trainer. Training providers and FE colleges take on new staff without teaching/assessor qualifications and train them up. I have worked with colleagues who do not have degrees but relevant work experience. You could perhaps assess customer service/retail with your background. With FE you would have holidays and you can work part time.

I’ll be totally brutally honest OP, as someone who’s husband is a qualified accountant and a few of our friends- it’s not for you.

You’ve already said you don’t know if you could fit the required amount of learning & revising around your current lifestyle- you can’t just “cross that bridge when you come to it”, we’re talking about a huge amount of debt here, you need to know you have the time to do the work required before you actually decide to start. With your partner working nights and sleeping all day, when are you going to do the work? And it does take work, lots of work, that you couldn’t successfully concentrate on while caring for 2 very young children solo.

if you were really set on accounting, don’t go to uni to get there when your main and imminent worry is financial. It’s expensive and it’s also a long process. I know you’ve said you’re not having much luck with apprenticeships but as an alternative just apply for entry level positions, finance assistant, accounts assistant etc positions. Once you have your foot in the door you have the scope for them to pay for your training, you can still get the qualifications but someone else is paying for them and you’re earning a wage at the same time.

Even assuming you went through with it all, how are you going to commit to the hours the job requires? Because it takes more than 2 or 3 days a week. There is flexibility once you are established in your career but when you’re starting out and applying for positions if you off the bat only want to be part time you’re going to struggle to get in because there will always be someone with less responsibility who can give more hours, more flexibility, more time. By the time you’re established in your career you won’t need the flex anymore as your kids will be older.

I would honestly advise you to just leave the idea of university and get a job instead to bring in the extra cash in the short term. If your partner is struggling doing 6 night shifts and needing to sleep all day then potentially the better option would actually be for you both to look at working differently e.g. he can do 4 night shifts you could then do 3 or 4 shifts to overlap for childcare.

Thank you for this.

Clearly accounting isnt for my circumstances. I think we will just have to muddle along as we are until I manage to find a full time job that requires no extra hours or until we pay off the debt and just support my partners career.

I would have to work 16 hours to cover just 1 day dropped by my partner so that isn't an option for us but thank you for the suggestion.

Thank you so much for the input it is very helpful.

I know people who are doing this to generate some income from the maintenance part of the loan because they just cannot get a job. I understand why they do it, although personally I think a vocational degree is the best route.

Reading your recent posts about your partner needing his 8-9 hours of sleep every day and being keen to progress his career 'going after the big money', I confess my inner angry feminist was released. Why does his career and his needs trump yours? Is this not something you can both work together on, to find a way forward that works for the whole family unit? Him dropping a day to do more childcare while you take on one of these new ideas posters have been suggesting, that kind of thing You shouldn't be making all the sacrifices. Not the point of your OP at all, but I bet you don't get 8-9 hours of sleep every night with a seven month old!!

If you have the a levels to get into a finance degree I would just go straight into a training on the job job for school leavers and skip the degree and get paid to be a qualified accountant

What for and when?

I haven't read the entire thread, but if you want to be an accountant, this is probably the best advice I have seen here.

Something very similar worked well if you wanted to be a solicitor but needed to earn: get a job (secretarial or clerical) with a decent firm of solicitors, study in your own time to become a legal executive, make yourself indispensable and then ask to become what used to be called an "articled clerk". It's slow, but well-paid.

I'm not sure you would get a maintenance loan as your husband works, but I might be wrong

I do not get 8-9 hours sleep. But I also don't fall asleep at the wheel if I don't get enough sleep so its something we have to take seriously.

His career takes priority because frankly we couldn't afford for him to lose a days pay each week. It would be over £800 a month lost which I wouldn't earn enough to replace it.

So I do understand your angry feminist but whilat out outgoings are so high his job is the only thing keeping a roof over our heads so it does have to take priority.

Yes I am entitled to a maintenance loan. About 7.5k a year as its done on his earnings from 2 years ago which were a bit less. It would at least make my total household contribution closer to 20k a year.

To balance the PP with the accountant husband - I’m a qualified accountant and recognise the work to qualify and the fairly frequent overtime. However, you don’t need to aim for being a high flier, nor sit higher level exams, until you are ready. I initially retrained in order to get a part time job around my kids.

Just don’t waste your time and money on a degree. Try to find an AP Clerk or accounts assistant type role. Buy AAT books cheaply on eBay or use free online resources to study, even if you don’t sit the exams yet. Don’t use a credit card to pay for them.

I think you could do a professional qualifying degree:

• nursing
• midwifery
• physiotherapy
• speech therapy
• teaching

If you just do a normal subject I don’t think it will help you very much as you will still be looking for entry level roles (presumably you aren’t able to relocate for a grad scheme)

yes - as long as you know the career you want to go into and it helps. I did it, im in an excellent career now with progression. The uni hours and holidays worked round my kids while young. I worked VERY hard in my degree and got a first.

You get help with childcare costs too while studying. You can also get Universal credit over the summer holidays

Health courses (like physio and nursing) come with nhs grants and premium funding (nursing is awful shifts though!)

Its a good idea. Doing a degree also does not prevent you from working at least part time. Many students work whilst studying. Look at the Martin Lewis info on student loans and how they are a education tax in effect. Doing the degree also opens up lots of opportunities, ie access to careers advice and loads of additional training on cv development, career skill enhancement. Its a productive use of time imo. Plus in reality it is 2.5 years as the course is completed usually by May of the final year. But you do need to narrow it down to what you actually want to do otherwise its an expensive whimsy. Many specific courses involve placements or job experience in the chosen career of choice. So its a good way of getting in somewhere. It is expensive though but you would only pay that back once earning x amount and also over time. Debt wiped off after so many years and doesnt count as normal debt. So lots to consider.

Please ignore the suggestions to be a cleaner, nurse, child minder, etc.. You will be worked like a dog's body and not make that much money

do the accounting and you will have a stable job Monday through Friday in a nice office or even from home

You have people on here putting their holidays on credit so don't worry about having a loan for a course at least with the course you make the money back

But how can you afford childcare to go to uni but not anything else? I got most childcare paid at college, but at uni I didn't get any (albeit it was only after school care), and I was a single mother on benefits.