nettlebed

Student sues Queen's University Belfast over 2.2 degree. Claims that with better supervision he could have got a 2.1.

WARPed

Sigh...

Clearly can't accept the responsibility of his own actions. Of course it couldn't be his fault, after all I'm sure he thinks he is the dogs bo11ox. Must be someone else to blame. Let's sue the other guy.

Prick.

nettlebed

Yah. And you just know if he turns up here with a criminal record and finds out immigration is going to be tough, he'll blame us for telling him

SultanOfSwing

What a load of bollocks, and how effin' embarrassing that it was someone from my old uni as well. Better supervision my knob, if I hadn't spent all my time pissing it up in the Student's Union bar I'd have a first now.

I hope this one gets laughed out of court.

Although - maybe I can sue the university for having a bar in the first place, because imagine where I'd be now with that first . . .

Sally Redux

From what my hisband tells me about working at Birmingham Uni, (UK) the way to get a degree now is to have mitigating circumastances of either medical problems or deaths of realtives overseas.

avanutria

Seems like a good way to scupper one's chances at employment - any employer who has seen his name related to this issue will not want to risk bringing him aboard.

Englishman in Eugene

LOL exactly what occurred to me before I read your comment. I'd marry you, if we weren't married to each other already.

Way to not get employed: show prospective employers that you can't organise yourself in a timely manner and will try to blame others for your inadequacies.

hobbes79

Funny actually, but I probably had better grounds than that...

I also got a 2:2 and was within a whisker of at least getting to go to a review where I'd have been close enough to be considered for a 2:1. A few in my class got within a percent of a 2:2 and were given it despite only really getting a third.

Anyway, fast forward a year of internship at Nokia in Dallas, TX when I was offered a full time position. For that, they required a transcript from my uni, which after some struggles I obtained.

I got it and noticed a very below par grade on a course I actually did quite well in. For those that care (not many at this point??), Concurrent Engineering.

I specifically remember initially receiving my grade and being told, "don't worry it's so low, they forgot to inc your coursework". Coursework made up 50% of the grade for that class.

I knew I'd already gotten a decent grade on the coursework and that, though no Einstein performance, I was on for a reasonable score. Left it at that. Was assured all would be fixed.

Well, would you adam and eve it... when I got the latest transcript, they never changed the blasted thing!

A degree is just a means to an end, and I already had a job. Plus, many in the US don't know what those levels mean anyway. I haven't been asked the class of my degree for about 10 years and just put "N/A in UK" when asked for a GPA on a form.

And at the end of the day, it would have only snuck me through for consideration. Nothing more.

But it does occasionally go through my mind... !

I'm calling Perry Mason.

paddingtongreen

I wondered, "What the hell is 'Concurrent Engineering'?" don't worry, I looked it up, it looks like a new name for the 'Critical Path' method that we've used for a zillion years in the design and construction industry.

I was surprised when potential employers wanted to know, in detail, of my education even though I had 40 or more years of experience, how can that be relevant?

lapin_windstar

Why isn't it possible that the supervision could have been negligent? Or, to put it another way, if the quality of supervision isn't relevant to the quality of the work product, why does it exist at all?

dunroving

Well, I think there are at least three relevant problems going on in UK higher education at the moment.

First is that due to cutbacks and drastic changes in the job description (e.g., I'm expected to bring in large amounts of research money and publish a half-dozen peer-reviewed research papers a year), university lecturers have increasingly less time to spend giving students individual attention outside of lectures. University lecturer used to be similar to being a teacher, but at a higher level. It's no longer as simple as that.

Second is that there is a generation of students coming through who were educated in a school system that spoon-fed children and shied away from words like "unsatisfactory". Consequently, many undergraduate students have limited initiative or ability to respond to the idea that their work is of insufficient standard. There is a body of psychology research in this area, and the idea of a "narcissistic" generation.

Third is that thanks to our Tony, we now have almost 50% of school-leavers (over 50% in Scotland, thanks to Alex Liver-Lips Salmond) entering higher education - but standards are supposedly rising! Hmmm, something doesn't add up.

An example of the problem is that where I work, each Honours student is allocated 5 hours of supervision time for their Honours Dissertation (that's not per week, it's across the whole year).

Did this student have "insufficient supervision"? Who knows, but by the time you get to Honours level, you shouldn't need a lot of supervision - it's supposed to be an independent study. If he had no supervision, or bad supervision, added to being a weak student, he may have had a case. But a 2:2 is supposedly "average" - if he truly was of 2:1 or 1st-class standard, he wouldn't need a lot of supervision - or he would have had the initiative to do something pro-active about his situation.

Of course, he's entitled to his day in court. And of course the "accused" (university staff) should be considered innocent until proven otherwise.

lapin_windstar

...nettlebed, WARPed, SultanOfSwing and Englishman in Eugene all do, apparently.