Holly Thompson: The positive side of a vocational degree

On Tuesday 3rd February, ITV screened their take on the higher education debate: ‘The Value of a Degree: Tonight’. The programme showed several sixth-formers being interviewed on what they planned to study at university or college by a panel of ‘experts’ in the higher education field, set to the theme tune of BBC2’s long running student quiz show, ‘University Challenge’. While it was clearly a hastily cobbled together attempt to join in the university debate, it did highlight the rather depressing truth about the direction of higher education in the UK.
Those students who had decided to follow a vocational path for their higher education were praised by the panel for their forward-thinking. However, when it came to those wishing to pursue an academic degree, one example being Mathematics, the student in question was told, “You need a plan, before you start.” The panel were all in agreement that should a student wish to take an academic subject, they should know precisely which career they wished to pursue, and the precise steps they were going to take to get there, before they even filled out their UCAS form. The thrust of their arguments, so it seemed, was that learning for learning’s sake was not going to get you anywhere in the ‘real world’.
Less than a year ago, this argument would have seriously angered me. I was always a pioneer for the love of learning, believing that a love of a particular academic subject was the most important quality to have while studying, and indeed beyond university. However, fast-forward to today, and my idealistic bubble has long since been popped by the atrocious job-market, and the reaction I have had to my humanities degree.
I decided to study Theology. Not a popular choice by any means, but an intense academic subject that I absolutely adored and threw myself into. I never had a ‘plan’, either before, during or, unfortunately, after my degree, but it seemed that neither did anyone else on the course. It was never pressed upon us that we needed one, it didn’t seem necessary. Somehow it was implied that we would be fine once we left university, that we’d slot into the employment market just as well as anyone else. However, I soon learned – after being handed by scroll in July 2010 – that that was, sadly, not to be the case. My lack of a ‘plan’ was coming back to bite me on the arse.
Despite being awarded a first and a prize for the discipline I specialised in, I was rejected at every hurdle, for every job that I applied for. I decided to cast my net wide, applying for retail, local government, transport… any sector you can name but was refused, often completely ignored. I soon came to realise that had I chosen to spend my summers interning rather than working to save money, I would have had the upper hand. Had I chosen to do a subject in a more vocational-focused sphere, I would have particular skills relevant for the job sector, rather than my transferrable skills being translating Biblical Hebrew and knowing a hell of a lot about ideology in the Book of Kings. Pretty bloody useless, apparently.
It is sad that those who wish to take a purely academic degree should be forced to know precisely what they want to pursue as a career at the tender age of seventeen when filling out their UCAS forms, but the sheer ferocity of the job market is unfortunately dictating it so. I would encourage those wishing to pursue a more vocational qualification to do so, as when they graduate, instead of cobbling together a slightly-iffy CV, they can revel in the skills they have, proudly proclaiming them to the world as their ticket to employment. As much as I adored my degree, it saddens me to say that I wish I had taken their route.
HOLLY THOMPSON is a graduate of KCL and one of London Student’s Comment Editors.