to think my degree is as good as anyone elses?

[SecretSlattern]

I started off in 2004 doing a NVQ 3 in Early Years Care and Education, 3 months after having DD. I qualified 9 months later, with 2 level 3 qualifications and worked for a bit in day nurseries, pre-schools and after school clubs before studying a Foundation Degree in Early Years Childcare and Education.

At the start of the second year of my FD, I discovered I was pg with DS but continued on anyway and had him 2 weeks before the end of the course. I graduated from Uni in 2008, six weeks after having DS.

I finally went back to finish the last year of my BA (hons) in Early Childhood Studies. I now have 2 DCs, one of which is constantly in and out of hospital, and have now discovered I am pg with DC3. The timing is pretty shit, but there you go. DC3 is due in May, the same month that I am due to finish my degree (although will still have to write my dissertation, which I have done before so am confident I can do it again).

However, when telling a friend of mine what I was up to (hadn't spoken in a while), she sniffed, pulled a face and basically said it wouldn't matter if I didn't finish my degree because it isn't a proper degree anyway. "What can you do with a degree in kids?" was the question I was asked.

I actually intend to go on in the future and do a PGCE in primary, specialising in early years. AIBU to think that just because my degree is "in kids" it doesn't make it any less of a degree? I still go to uni, still have to do a mahoosive amount of work, same as any other undergrad.

OK, let me declare an interest here - I have a degree in media studies, after dropping out of law (which was tedious, for me, although am sure it's fascinating for other people). I went to the place that invented MS, which has a long and venerable history in related subjects - the first place where photography was demonstrated to the public back when Victoria was on the throne, for instance.

I chose it because I had a really strong drive to be a journalist and it has very high employment rates for graduates. And it was next door to Broadcasting House so we actually got paid for work experience, which is unheard of in the media.

If you read the novels of VS Naipaul, a lot of his characters from the Carribean dream of going there - it has traditionally educated the working classes and immigrants, people who were excluded from the more snobby universities.

My lecturers were people who are respected in their field - the media law guy wrote the standard textbook, for instance, and I've never been sued (touch wood).

Out of everyone in my year and those around me, everyone who wanted to work in the media did, and has done jolly well.

If you want a long and arcane debate about post-structuralism, or critical theory, or post-modernism, Roland Barthes or Noam Chomsky, I used to be your woman (although have forgotten most of it now).

So it worked for me. And I'm not noticeably less bright than my schoolfriends from an academic girl's grammar who are lawyers or doctors or accountants. Yes, some places that offer media studies may not be quite as good as they claim. But you can't condemn a whole subject without knowing about it. And the media plays a hugely important role in society - it's a fit subject for academic study, just as politics or the law are.

Btw, I know some thick politicians as well as some bright ones. PPE does not a clever person make (although of course many PPE graduates are clever). Most of the docs I know are clever, too, but you don't need to be a genius to be a good doctor, you need to be fairly bright. The high entrance requirements are a function of demand for the course, just as the ones for vet science became much more stretching when James Herriot made his profession far more stretching.

Oh, and while I'm being defensive, the entrance requirements for my course were very demanding, for similar reasons to vet science at wherever the most popular university for that is - lots of people want to go there. More people applying for each place than English at most Russell Group unis, as it happens.

Wow! Didn't expect this many posts!

Ok, I will concede that degrees are not equal as many replies have demonstrated. I just feel narked that someone felt the need to comment on it in such a negative way and dismiss it in the way it was.

I am extremely proud of myself and my achievements which is probably why I feel so defensive about it. What makes matters worse is my friend sends her dd to the pre-school I am currently working in. I just feel it is a bit of a kick in the face really that a parent of a child who I work with sees it as a mickey mouse waste of time.

My degree is a vocational one, I am employed part time but find I am actually working full time hours, that is without the study aspect of it. That is more to do with planning for every child that comes through the door, and keeping my key children's records up to date. Then on top of that, I come home and do the family thing and study too.

I also agree that ECS is probably seen as "less important" because of the negative press nursery nurses/childcare practitioners constantly receive. You only have to look at some threads here to see what parents expect and what is actually given. I do think some childcare practitioners are in the job for the wrong reasons and IME many of them are just out of school thinking that it will be a doss playing with kids all day. They soon come unstuck though when the paperwork needs to be done!

Thank you to everyone for your responses. I do feel that my friend is perhaps jealous of my achievements but then that is her problem and not one I should be bothering myself about.

I had this conversation with my friend. He said that his daughter (comprehensive) had done 'just as well' as her cousin (Harrow) because she'd got a 2:1 (in comparative religion) from Cardiff and he'd got a 2:1 (in Japanese) from Oxbridge.

I could kind of see where he was coming from but the fact that his daughter is now working in a non-graduate job in retail and the cousin is now a graduate highflyer in the Dept. of Industry (or whatever it's called this week), slightly proves that employers know which degrees are worth most.

That's not to denigrate Cardiff: I know it's a very good university.

Haven't read all the posts but briefly - the whole debate about the comparable merits of different degrees from different universities is a complicated one as the length of the thread shows. BUT, above all that, your degree makes perfect sense for your career path, teaches you the appropriate skills and has required hard work and dedication from you. So regardless of any comparisons, your friend's remark was ignorant and mean-spirited. Take pride in your achievements and ignore her words for the rubbish they are.

Well, I would agree that not all degrees are equal (far from it) but they are all hard work and shouldn't be dismissed.

Tbh, at least a vocational degree is more likely to result in a job unlike one in humanities, albeit form a very good university. (bitter experience)

I have to say I think it is a bit of a shame that so many courses are now shoe-horned into degrees unnecessarily. There was nothing wrong with the old diplomas and polys imo. Uni should be for medicine, law, engineering, humanities, pure sciences, etc.

LeQueen - no, didn't read any insult into your words. Just discussing the general principle and how ingrained snobbery (academic or social) sometimes overwhelms the full picture.

Agree with you about English except that some employers still prefer Oxbridge over everything else. Personally I think we need many more journalists with science backgrounds - if I was giving advice to a teenager who wanted to be a journalist, I'd stay study something that makes you stand out from the crowd and gives you a perspective that is unusual in this field. While doing bags of work experience and writing for student papers and all that.

(Actually would say 'don't', tbh, media generally equals v. long hours for relatively crap pay compared to the other sorts of jobs bright youngster could go into - exciting and fascinating though some of it might be. Who wants to write sub-edit a celebrity columnist earning £100,000s while being paid £30k? And the whole free content on the web thing is v. v. v. difficult for the industry...)

OP, maybe you friend doesn't view your degree as a 'proper' degree because you've done it in fits and starts, not in one good. So she has trouble in her mind equating all your courses as totalling up to a degree. But could be she just devalues it because it's in childcare. Which isn't very supportive and it's obviously bollocks that you can't do anything with it. Congratulations, btw.

I agree with others though, that no, all degrees definitely aren't equal.

I haven't read all of this thread but for what its worth my line manager did a Foundation degree and then a GTP to qualify as a teacher and is now an Early Years Advisory Teacher earning I would imagine well in excess of 30k a year.

LeQueeen that may well be at certain Universities- though I know it wasn't this one becuase of an Admissions Tutor I knew at that RG Uni (who indeed gave me my reference for the course I as accepted on).

Abra1d I willresist the bit about comparativce religion (I am sure it is a genuine coincidence you hit upon approximately my degree LOL), I am not sure religion and itsbedmate philosophy are great comparisons as they historically have especially low employment rates; truth is that I would never advise anyone to take on a course in that field without specific aimsor further study (my MA is in an unrelated field, and bordering on the Scientific atm (hence hurting head after time oN EBSCO today doing research)- many of my fellow students went on to teach RE).

I think Oxbridge Universities stand out, ofcourse they do;but I don't think the same criteria should be used in general discussion for assuming ability of a mature student as you may randomly use for a standard 18 year old- mature students are too limited by things such as geography, childcare,employment to apply the normal criteria one would advise a school leaver to use, if that makes sense?

I know I am defensive about my degree; I would have dearly loved the RG one I was offered but in all truth I couldn't afford rent for our family in inner city Bristol, and the comps were shite.So I chose a Uni with lessrep and better / cheaper housing and schooling for my boys.

My cousin is in the midst of getting sorted to do Medicine at Oxbridge, in fact. I am not sure he is any brighter than his brother though, who was shockingly turned down (shocking for him/ school / Aunt) for IIRC Chemistry two years ago.I an see why they amde the choice- he'svery naive, needed a different sort of palcement- but he is doing ferociously well at a decent RG Uni now and I think the lack of palce will have done him onders in all truth.

Whether due to snobbery or merit, different degrees and different institutions have their own values, particularly amongst employers.

And it works both ways. Some employers want top degrees from top universities (this will be proven to make good business sense for them), and others want the other end of the scale (so that they don't have to pay as much).

Higher education has definitely been diluted over the years, obviously in quantity but also quality. What it has meant is that lots of degrees were 'satisfactory' to employers at 1st or 2nd class honours. Now it is either a 1st or a Masters. My degree is a BSc (Hons) from 25 years ago. If I were doing it now, I would have to do a MEng to maintain any notion of parity. This is because a BSc has been diluted by the influx of new courses which used to be awarded diplomas.

Obviously when someone has a particular career path in mind, they should do a course that will help them on that path, regardless of its overall status. I would suggest that an ECS degree is not the only path to becoming a foundation stage teacher. The majority of FS teachers will not have come from this route.

At the end of the day, it doesn't really matter what the OP's friend thinks, or what I think. It is what the OP thinks about her achievement that counts. If she is content with her achievement, then what does it matter where it fits in the complete socio-economic ladder? The orchestra can't play without the second fiddles.

'Or are we really meant to pretend that everybody is equally academic/intelligent? '

Perhaps not; but we should acknowledge that allpeopleareequally valid,and that vocational degreesareas valid in a different way:perhaps if people had been awarded respect for what they did achieve then there wouldn't be this deeply felt need to make qualifications homogenous? If we could see that we need X GPs and X Lawyers and X childcare professionals,and we want them all educated to the absolute best standard possible, we migt start to value them independently of their place of study IYSWIM?

In the field I am aiming towards my place of study will be irrelevant as I will be my employer: what will amtter is rele3vanceand content,both adequalately supplied by my MA.

DH'sdegreeinterests me WRT to this sort of thinga s well.It is a very rare degree and one very few people IMO oculd do; past students have gone on to great things in the field(it'salighting technology degree- by great things Iman for example the lighting design for West End and major TV productions); there is no exact degree offeredelsewhere (similarities at trwo others) yet it is only available in the Uni ofGlamrogan AAT. As it has no comparisons,it stands alone IYSWIM which he rather likes.

'orchestra can't play without the second fiddles.
'

She'snot second fiddle

Most people have no degree, they are not second fiddleeither

Society cannot function without a wide range ofroles,and each one is of equalimportance in the widerschemeof things.

That was just rude, tbh.

I didn't say society could function without all contributing members. But society really does not grant equal status to everyone. It really, really doesn't, even if you feel that it is politically correct to do so.

I don't think I am being rude but just bluntly realistic. I am no social anthropologist, but I do believe that society grants more status to 'thinkers' vs 'doers'. Status is not the same as importance, btw - everyone has their part to play and a fullying functioning body needs all its parts.

Quite frankly, if someone does an honest days work then I couldn't care less what degree (or not) they've got.

Some people care very much about status though - it says more about them than anything else.

Equalvalidity is not the same asequal status

It'sabout respect, and accepting that allpeopleare valid becuase they play a part

Actually- just noticed something in your post from a different angle. Sorry.

I've a big interest in working class culture (my former Lecturer is wanting me to write something on W/Culture and how where I live now (S E Wales) took to religion (my degree) when my home area (W C part of Somerset) took to other activities- esp. carnival, it's something I am intrigued by as I see many parallels.

Anyway, your comment about thinkers being valued over doers- where I grew up that simply wasn't the case, thinkers and academics were seen as a joke tbh; better be in a factory than studying something academic. Isn't that part of the reason why so many people from the Valleys went on to study teaching / nursing? The practical nature of it, academia seeming so inaccessible.

I am not sure it's possible to give a blanket 'more valued' as a result, certainly it might be the case in a narrow MC section of academic-focussed society, but more widely I think there is a large group that doesn't agree, and indeed would not push their children that way- causing a lot of very capable children to choose 'easier to access' careers (certainly I saw this in my childhood).

Sorry a bit away from topic LOL, but just caught me.

Not sure what your point is now, virgin.

I would say that status is variable. Importance is pretty much equal according to market forces.

As for validity - that simply means that the course of study is relevent and helpful to the future employment - that it delivers. There are lots of ways of measuring this.

I don't really get the comparison between status and validity.

I am shocked at some of these responses. I have a Politics and Economics degree from a top university. After working in the city, I am now a primary school teacher, after doing a PGCE

A degree in my field of work would have been so much more useful than mine. I have since gone on to do an MA to have a sounder understanding in different theories.

Well done secretslattern, I'm sure you will be a great teacher after all your dedicated work!

I nearly had a drama and english degree. But I got pregnant and dropped out. And the uni I went to specialised in sport. Nuff said.

Obviously if you only look at things from your own perspective, then you are going to think your way is the most important.

It is easy for 'doers' to only value 'doing', but they are providing a service for someone, ultimately a 'thinker'. The other thing is that there are often far more 'doers' than 'thinkers' so market forces have to intervene.

Perhaps the OP's friend was saying that 'ECS is not important to me'. I can understand that perspective, although it is self-centred and does not look at the wider value to society. I can safely say that ECS is not important to my family, as I have been perfectly capable of bringing up my own children, and that pre-school has been just play (oooh, I can hear mumsnetters screaming out in apoplectic fits if it was anything but play). However, I recognise that there are needier people in our community, but I am also skeptical about needing a degree in order to help this sector.