Student fees - studying in Europe. Its cheaper - but where can you find information?

Oldernotwiser

2sides2everystory wrote: »

I make a point not a flippin' PhD thesis.

As for London Business School being prestigious then if it is so prestigious and I got my first degree in London, have also looked at MBA courses and am trying to help my 2012 entrant son sort the actual prestigious from the pseudo-Johnny-come-lately 'prestigious' plus I have dealt with quite some students in London in recent years, how come I do not already have the opinion that they are prestigious? Is it because I am not easily fooled?

OK they got a neat website domain name. Did they have a neat website before 2008?

Their Corporate Partners page has three entries - a bank I would never rely upon as my main or sole bank, a recruitment company I see as pretty hardnosed, and a flippin' Hedge Fund company :rotfl:

Sure they might be the best of a bad bunch for what they do, but are their courses accredited for anything really useful? Maybe, but 'prestigious'? In what sense? Is someone naturally going to offer my son or daughter a responsible good starting salaried job just because they attended London Business School and got good marks? A Prestigious employer (not Adecco, Man or Citi) are more likely to recruit an MEng of MSci graduate from a real prestigious university don't you think?

.

You seem not to know as much as you think you do.

From Wiki (sorry)

"LBS is often ranked among the top business schools in Europe, and among the top 10 business schools in the world. In 2011, London Business School was ranked number one in the world for its MBA programme by the Financial Times for the third year in a row.[3] In 2009 the school shared this ranking with The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. The school's admissions process is highly selective, making it one of the most competitive business schools in the world. A high GPA, high GMAT score, and strong non-quantitative credentials are typically prerequisites to admission. Successful applicants for the full-time MBA have an average GMAT score of 701."

Or the Financial Times, if you prefer.

http://rankings.ft.com/businessschoolrankings/global-mba-rankings-2011

2sides2everystory

What a total load of cobblers.

'often ranked' ? But maybe not sometimes? What happens every so often then? Are rankers sometimes not taken in?

Why do people seek qualifications from 'business' schools? I mean really?

Once upon a time perhaps it was to equip themselves with the skills to manage efficiently and with integrity. Well the integrity took a hike years ago so we are left with large numbers of prima donnae educated to ruthlessly exploit every opportunity for profit - especially those educated in finance.

Look where that has got us.

I looked at LBS' corporate partners webpage. They chose it, not me. I am sorry but there was no business or brand that I respect listed there. Clearly the choice of partners is a sprat to catch a certain type of mackerel.

Sadly that means I find it hard to respect the LBS brand.

Do you know anything about Adecco, Man and Citi, ONW? Are they outfits you reckon our kids should aspire to work for?

Voyager2002

2sides2everystory wrote: »

What a total load of cobblers.

'often ranked' ? But maybe not sometimes? What happens every so often then? Are rankers sometimes not taken in?

Why do people seek qualifications from 'business' schools? I mean really?

Once upon a time perhaps it was to equip themselves with the skills to manage efficiently and with integrity. Well the integrity took a hike years ago so we are left with large numbers of prima donnae educated to ruthlessly exploit every opportunity for profit - especially those educated in finance.

Look where that has got us.

I looked at LBS' corporate partners webpage. They chose it, not me. I am sorry but there was no business or brand that I respect listed there. Clearly the choice of partners is a sprat to catch a certain type of mackerel.

Sadly that means I find it hard to respect the LBS brand.

Do you know anything about Adecco, Man and Citi, ONW? Are they outfits you reckon our kids should aspire to work for?

If your son is relying on you for advice, then I feel very sorry for him.

2sides2everystory

Who are you to judge me as a parent, Voyager2002? Are you for example a successful parent of a wise graduate?

Oldernotwiser

Universities are not about "brands" and many graduates would be happy with a job of any kind in the current recession.

You may be a good parent but leave the advice to those who know what they're talking about.

melancholly

2sides2everystory wrote: »

Why do people seek qualifications from 'business' schools? I mean really?

i really don't understand a lot of your posts - your signature claims to want free university education as a right (which i agree with as it happens), but every post you make seems to be about how rubbish the UK HE system is. i just don't get it. how can you want people to get free access to something so 'awful'? or is it that you just don't think it's worth paying for?

also, if you think all qualifications from business schools are pointless, then there's no point giving any advice on the best MBA. my opinion is that an MBA is a massively expensive endeavour and it's often not worth doing one unless you go to one with a good reputation. spending a huge amount of money without any student loan support is risky when this really is a degree about helping improve earnings and career prospects in business. LBS tops international league tables and is well respected. whether or not you like it's website is largely immaterial compared to its international reputation. i don't think they'll lose any sleep over your comments.

in some areas of HE, reputation matters (MBAs/business schools more than most) - i don't mean this to sound unduly harsh, but it is worth being aware of the limits of your knowledge and taking on board the advice of people with more experience in certain areas. you clearly are not as aware of HE as you think you are and this may just be because your knowledge of it from when you were a student is just out of date, nothing more. but things change and sectors change and not being prepared to update views or even consider other opinions isn't good. this is even more important if you're helping your son make decisions. i hope he gets advice from his school because it does seem as if your very strong opinions don't reflect the reality of HE at this moment in time. it's always worth everyone hearing multiple views about this decision, but that's even more true if the main source of information is quite so biased.

2sides2everystory

I surely understand your sentiments about my posts, but you surely realise that HE cannot be properly measured by league tables and polls and surveys. You will be pleased to know that I am not the main source of information. My kids are relatively well advised by a few good teachers, by good friends and through their own research and pro-activity - plus a little facilitation from me.

I visited a fairly prestigious university campus up country recently where every lamp-post on the main drag through the campus had an expensive plasticised banner pronouncing the university as top again in one of the 'important' tables.

But the university was actually tending to shabbiness in a number of respects - the lack of maintenance and updating of many buildings, the flakiness or fluffiness of some of the presentations for example and the revealed softness of some of the courses and options - talk of retakes and resits and ability to take coursework-assessed modules in preference to modules with exams at the end, and that kind of nonsense. They too claimed an impressive list of corporate partners. Whilst there I very much let the young people look and ask questions and form their own opinion, and they did (one of disappointment as it happens). I just facilitated them being there and helped collect course and departmental information and presentation schedules whilst they were talking to staff and existing students, and generally helped them navigate through the day.

I did the same with them at another university just days later (I accompanied three young people this time, each with quite different course preferences). This time they were pleasantly surprised by a number of unexpected opposites to the last visit.

Clearly those of us who have been round the block a bit can recognise the difference between representatives who are slick presenters but actually have built their marketing spiel on surprisingly little substance; those who are adequate but saying things that don't always stack up; other presenters who are just doing a job; presenters who are excellent in every respect of their communication; and finally we can recognise that very special breed of academics who are truly passionate, long term committed, may at first appear zany, but who quickly warm through it and communicate their ideas beautifully and generously and are indeed the best hands in which to entrust our sons and daughters minds.

My advice to my kids will be to visit as many universities as possible and talk to as many people as possible as they can find at these places. I will help them do it.

Quoting league tables and GMAT scores is not a measure of any useful brand of prestigiousness - it is a measure of out of control elitism which does nothing for the students unless they are part of the small group that is already positioned sufficiently AND wishes to mould themselves to join such a club. That's why I said it's cobblers.

If certain types of employer want to use such a facility to take their existing workforce to the next level then let them, and let them pay for it. LBS does not seem to me to be the sort of place many 17 and 18 year olds should be concerning themselves with as a place to spend £27,000 or £36,000 of SLC loan.

It is actually very difficult to sort wheat from chaff in the current HE environment. So many "universities" give the impression of trading too long beyond the expiry of what it was about them that created their past reputation. And too many more are very heavily subject to slick marketing hype based on quite narrow achievements.

Further to Oldernotwiser's apparent assertion, whilst many graduates of any discipine right now in 2011 might be happy with a job of any kind in the current recession, surely ONW cannot be suggesting that 17 and 18 year olds should be sifting university courses in a way which could result (if they have the stamina to absorb so much theory having had so little practice) in them just being churned out the other end as malleable minds fit only for administrative jobs? What else other than management consultancy or specialists in change management, or perhaps slick marketing and advertising can they be good for? Maybe they would take a bolt on Engineering or Law module at the end? Then they could perhaps become facilities managers who know in any office where the aircon sucks in and where it blows out, or HR managers who know a bit about how to hire and fire in any industry before recruits get too settled?

I agree "Business" courses seem to appeal to many thesedays - perhaps largely to those whose parents thought it was a good idea to do such a subject at A level? But surely it would be better to encourage prospective undergraduates to make a good stab at choosing a subject and course theme to match a career choice and a passion? And surely few parents would advise a student who had shown good promise and a passion in real sciences to drop one like maths or physics in favour of a business studies A level? Why then, having got good A level passes in sciences would they be prematurely interested in a Business or Finance degree?

How many 17 and 18 year olds have developed a passion for management? Most of them haven't even developed a passion for how they will vote in their first election Many of them will even be slapping tomato sauce on everything for another year or two :rotfl:

No, if what ONW says was true, it would most definitely be as strong an argument I have heard for extending a free university education to all 17/18 year olds i.e. treating first degrees at university especially business courses perhaps, as simply part of accepted general education with no commitment to focussed career choice until later.

melancholly

well in terms of what presentations you might see, i'd often suggesting visiting a uni away from an open day to get a feel of what the place is really like. i also know from the other side of it that plenty of great academics won't be at the open days being involved in the 'selling'. i think it would be very unwise to pick a course based on just a handful of presentations from people who may not end up teaching someone.

unfortunately, league tables are the best indicators out there to compare unis. they can't capture everything and i'd never suggest that they would - the difference between a uni at 25 and one at 30 is marginal, however the difference between one the top 5 and 50 will clearly be significant. they don't say everything but they play a major factor in how well a uni is viewed. if you have the academic ability, it would be mad to pick a uni that scored badly because of meeting one great person at an open day over a top uni which didn't spend as much time on an open day trying to aggressively sell themselves. like it or not, university reputation matters - for job applications or future careers in academia, where you went will contribute to how you are viewed. obviously skills, grades, work experience and a whole host of things matter too and i'd never suggest that they didn't, but a first from a top ten uni will be viewed more highly than from lower ones. to dismiss them as 'cobblers' is naive.

in reality, almost all unis allow retakes (and that has been the case for at least 15/20 years). it isn't that standards are suddenly awful, but a lifeline to plenty of students who don't necessarily apply themselves as much as they should in the first year! retake marks are usually capped anyway, so students who fail first time do suffer in terms of final marks. coursework is also very common - and important. it allows students to do group working and individual longer term projects. that's an important part of their learning. a full 100% exam structure isn't going to be as intellectually rigorous as a course including some kind of project or dissertation - where the student has more time to develop ideas and discuss theories. i feel very strongly about not dumbing down, but i don't think coursework does that when it's done well (and equally, exams with the same questions year on year don't encourage much learning). it's all about the way it's done.

and fwiw, i'd recommend the LBS for an MBA, but not an undergrad degree. it was discussing MBAs that they came up. it is outstanding internationally in terms of what an MBA does, but such a specialised place won't have the same advantages as a broader uni for undergrads - it's all about what courses are best as well as what unis. i don't think specialised business BAs are usually a great idea. most big FTSE100 companies would sooner have people come in fresh and learnt their methods rather than coming in thinking they know it all. a good 'classic' degree can often take someone further in business. saying the LBS is great for MBAs isn't the same as saying it's great for BAs - i don't want my comments to be misrepresented. i certainly don't think ONW is saying people should pick courses based on starting salary options (i'd imagine she'd say quite the opposite - pick a subject you love!). to me it was clearly a statement on the current financial climate. i think you're taking comments out of context a fair bit.

Voyager2002

2sides2everystory wrote: »

Who are you to judge me as a parent, Voyager2002? Are you for example a successful parent of a wise graduate?

Since you ask, I am a parent of two undergraduates. I also hold a PhD; have worked for and with universities in several countries; and believe I know my way fairly well around the higher education system.

You have made some bizarre statements on this thread, and have demonstrated that you are incapable of distinguishing between prejudice and authoritative information. That does not provide a firm basis for making important decisions.

Oldernotwiser

I don't know where you've got the idea from that I'm advocating people doing a degree in business - I can think of far better ways of spending 3 years!

However, if someone actually wants to do this as a career choice, then there are going to be institutions that are better and more prestigious than others; one of these is the London Business School.