The university expo was on yesterday, and I did about an hour or so of leaflet-distribution and question-answering.
I died a little on the inside when one person asked these two questions:
"What kind of a job do you get at the end of it?" (What with Arts being a vocational course an' all...)
followed immediately by
"Is it hard or is it a fairly relaxed course? It's just that, if you have to, you know, do lots of things it's probably not for me"
Sigh.
So, if anyone knows of a course where you don't have to do anything but get a (presumably well-paying and respected) job more or less guaranteed at the end of it, let me know. Not that I'd pass on the information.
But what made me die a little more on the inside was this. It's the page of the brochure advertising the university's "New Courses 2012", and European Studies is conspicuously absent as a major. You may remember the furore over the university administration's unilateral decision to cancel the program, the only one of its kind in the state, and the subsequent official anouncements that no such decision had been made and due process would be followed if any decisions were to be made... Now we know how seriously to take those claims.
that's disappointing Sanna, I really don't know what to say :(
ReplyDeleteI don't know what to say either really. I just hope that they do keep European Studies, as I understand it the decision still hasn't been finalised.
ReplyDeleteOn the question of vocational training, even when sitting at a desk marked "Communication Studies" you get that question. I began to think I was going a little mad last year, as I explained to numerous people (parents mostly) that communication skills, and an understanding of the different and complex ways in which communication can occur, are generally well regarded in pretty much every workplace (with the undertone being, "NO, she doesn't have to get a job in journalism!").
I just died inside by extension. I was talking to the MEMS stall volunteers, and they got much the same. My imagined answer to that question is "probably a better job than yours."
ReplyDeleteI always feel like saying "Well, you don't become European at the end of it..." Sometimes I do.
ReplyDeleteI have heard we may be in with a chance still, but given we've been axed from the publications it does at least prove the "due proces" is against us.