Is a 2.2 really that bad :(

greyster

I can imagine. They are big cash machines graduate courses. My Masters was £6500 before studentship, which was more expensive than my undergraduate as a whole.

I do not regret paying that much. I paid 1/3 of it from saving money from my undergrad SL (you don't get a SL for postgrad), 2/3 2 maxed out student bank accounts (0%).

However there were on a couple of people on the course thinking the MSc will get them better jobs. They were wrong and the research I did suggests this. Do a MSc if you want to do a Phd or a conversion i.e. to get a job that your undergrad has not prepared you for. I took the second reason. Doing an undergrad in computer science and than a MSc in it right after for example, is financial madness. Employers will be asking why too. Personally I think having a gap year seeing the world would be cheaper and you'd have a lot more to say in the interview.

btw bounceyball, this wasn't aimed at you... I am just making a comment for all. I don't know the reason behind you doing a MSc. Good luck with it.

neas

what can you do WITH just a degree in psychology? Its an arts degree right? ot BSC?

melancholly

ok - enough psychology bashing already!

how about some facts (seems some people like to start a fight and only then ask for them ).

psychology can be a BA or (more commonly) a BSc.
departments are, on the whole, in science faculties (and therefore take in lots of students so that the dwindling numbers in 'hard' sciences are balanced out so the whole faculty doesn't go into the red).
it is NOT sociology, although many people get them confused (this also includes many first year undergraduate psychology students!).
it usually has a substantial statistics component making it a numerate degree and therefore very useful for many careers.
it is as useful for graduate training schemes as any other non-vocational course since it requires taking many facts, analysing them, critically evaluating different arguements and drawing justifiable conclusions.
major parts of psychology include topics that most people think of as neuroscience such as brain imaging, EEG, TMS etc.
only a very very small (but nonetheless important) part of psychology is about 'helping' people.
it is not all about body language and questionnaires in cosmo!

further postgraduate training is always required to be a 'proper' psychologist, e.g. educational, occupational, clinical, sports, health or academic. most psychology graduates do nothing based on their degree, as do most people from major science or arts subjects that are non-vocational. you can go into banking, accountancy, insurance, medical sales, teaching, advertising, consultancy... i.e. anything that you can go into in any graduate entry scheme.

the major downside of a psychology degree is it's popularity - languages are highly desirable since numbers of students are declining - if studying french was what everyone did then it wouldn't be so valuable in graduate recruitment. it's a common degree and therefore a good result is a little more important than in other subjects.

neas - perhaps next time you start posting about how useless a degree topic is, you could find out some facts first. if you don't even know if it's a BSc or BA (and presumably can't be bothered a quick google), it really shows how little you can contribute to the discussion as you are so uninformed.

BigBouncyBall

greyster wrote: »

I can imagine. They are big cash machines graduate courses. My Masters was £6500 before studentship, which was more expensive than my undergraduate as a whole.

I do not regret paying that much. I paid 1/3 of it from saving money from my undergrad SL (you don't get a SL for postgrad), 2/3 2 maxed out student bank accounts (0%).

However there were on a couple of people on the course thinking the MSc will get them better jobs. They were wrong and the research I did suggests this. Do a MSc if you want to do a Phd or a conversion i.e. to get a job that your undergrad has not prepared you for. I took the second reason. Doing an undergrad in computer science and than a MSc in it right after for example, is financial madness. Employers will be asking why too. Personally I think having a gap year seeing the world would be cheaper and you'd have a lot more to say in the interview.

btw bounceyball, this wasn't aimed at you... I am just making a comment for all. I don't know the reason behind you doing a MSc. Good luck with it.

I think thats a fair point to make - an MSc in Comp Sci with a BSc in Comp Sci is pretty useless unless you know what you're doing.

I'm doing an MSc to change tack completely - my first degree is in maths but i want to get into film/television special effects/CGI so i need to (well i want to, but i sort of need to too actually) do a qualification in this.

neas

SO your answer was that you can do nothing different/special with a psychology degree? You answered my question thanks, and that its misleading that some of my friends want to be shrinks... because they'd need to do another 3-5 years study on top of their degree? oO, thats alot of student loan lol.

So the general point that pyschology while an interesting degree makes it a little bit harder to get a job is valid still.. as you even state because of volumes doing psychology... you got more competition etc.

oshoshitzu

I have a 2:1 in Theology and Psychology, and a M A in Social Work I still have not found any regular work since I graduated in 04. When I go for interviews and get feedback as to why I was unsuccessful it's the same old story: I interviewed well; but there is a lot of competition and my lack of experience hampers me. Lack of experience means no job: no job means lack of experience. And the only way you can get experience in statutory social work is by actually doing the job. You cannot get experience by doing volunteer work. Employers can afford to be picky because of competition.

I have had agency work where an emergency situation has arisen and the employer needs a quick replacement. Guess what? No interview, you start tomorrow. Permanent jobs are not easy to come by. It's been over 3 months since my last agency work.

[Deleted User]

The general idea of an MSc/MRes is that it should be a 'higher level' qualification and not a 'subject change' qualification. The work should be of a higher standard to a regular degree and the subject matter should be more complex

Voyager2002

ringo_24601 wrote: »

The general idea of an MSc/MRes is that it should be a 'higher level' qualification and not a 'subject change' qualification. The work should be of a higher standard to a regular degree and the subject matter should be more complex

Yes, but not all of them. There are a number of "conversion" MSc courses in vocational subjects, that are suitable for students who have not taken a degree in that area but want to work in it. Computing and IT is a good example.

Voyager2002

neas wrote: »

SO your answer was that you can do nothing different/special with a psychology degree? You answered my question thanks, and that its misleading that some of my friends want to be shrinks... because they'd need to do another 3-5 years study on top of their degree? oO, thats alot of student loan lol.

So the general point that pyschology while an interesting degree makes it a little bit harder to get a job is valid still.. as you even state because of volumes doing psychology... you got more competition etc.

True, but what you have said is true of virtually any undergraduate degree. I cannot think of any BA/BSc course that equips you to do a professional job. Rather, these courses provide the transferable skills that enable you to cope with the training that most graduate employers provide. And as Melancholy has demonstrated, Psychology provides a rather more complete skill-set than does Mathematics or English (or many others).

Voyager2002

oshoshitzu wrote: »

I have a 2:1 in Theology and Psychology, and a M A in Social Work I still have not found any regular work since I graduated in 04. When I go for interviews and get feedback as to why I was unsuccessful it's the same old story: I interviewed well; but there is a lot of competition and my lack of experience hampers me. Lack of experience means no job: no job means lack of experience. And the only way you can get experience in statutory social work is by actually doing the job. You cannot get experience by doing volunteer work. Employers can afford to be picky because of competition.

I have had agency work where an emergency situation has arisen and the employer needs a quick replacement. Guess what? No interview, you start tomorrow. Permanent jobs are not easy to come by. It's been over 3 months since my last agency work.

You are ideally qualified to be a Catholic priest, and I understand that there are lots of vacancies across the whole of Europe. Pay is not that brilliant, but the pension benefits are out of this world!