Bob

errr...well for each year lacking of a degree, you have to have 3 years experience...so about 12 years without any uni....

Bob

I was talking about when you go for security clearance, not just becoming a citizen, if you want to get any sort of high up clearance, you need to become a citizen and properly drop your other citizenships, problem still comes when you have ties to those countries like family and friends...

Bob

well it helps if your online course is from a proper uni to begin with, the missus is doing a masters through kings college, London, all the benefits of being on campus as a student, even down to those naff uni ID cards and union cards
but it's all online, tele conference, blogs etc, and access to King's digitised library, which is massive, well access to all there online stuff....I guess you get what you pay for, as this ain't cheap, ever so slightly cheaper than being there in person, but getting a degree from a place that is at least worth the paper it's written on, well it's got kudos in the field at least.

Dan725

I'm definately looking into it all at the minute. What I want to avoid though, are those dodgy places that you just pay a small fee and they give you a dgree, which is totally worthless. I want one that'll stand up under scrutiny from a proper accredited place, and is a proper recognised degree in my field.

Ray

Do they do a water skiing degree.....

anotherlimey

I'm sure a UK uni would make you do some assessments; it would be interesting to know what they require.

Bob

Well I think bournemouth do a surfing degree...so why not

st326

I seriously doubt that *any* UK university would hand out a degree of any kind purely on accrediting past work experience. It is possible that some may give exemption from certain units, or in a fully modular degree count experience toward the total number of modules, but that's as far as I'd expect it to go. Anything else is 99.99% likely to be a complete con, and the place won't actually have any official standing at all.

What can happen (it did in my case actually) is for past experience to be accepted in lieu of a degree when applying for a higher degree. I got onto an advanced M.Sc (i.e. a master's that normally requires a 2:1 or a first in the same subject) without an undergraduate degree or any A levels, then later went on to get into both Oxford and Cambridge. It's not common, but it can be done. However, I still don't actually *have* an undergraduate degree. By the time my PhD is conferred, I will actually have spent a total of 4 and a half years in full time education since leaving school, i.e. 1 year on the masters, a year at Oxford (went horribly badly, fell out with PhD supervisor and I left at the end of my first year), then 2.5 years at Cambridge (went really well, thankfully!). It tends to make people blow a fuse when they hear about it sometimes, but it just proves that it can be done if you are crazy enough to attempt it.

Dan725

Now that would actually be one worth doing Ray!

Elvira

No,, but I believe Poole Technical College does.
Or whatever they're called today.
Probably Poole Metropoletan "University" or some such...

Bob

actually, depends on the course, but they can, you still have to do all the end semester exams to qualify and get the degree, but the experience can be used to get you out of actually having to do the classes....

Ray

You ought to put up your pic of you water skiing ...
Elvira would be up for jumping your bones
straight away ..

User Name

When I was doing my chemistry PhD a fellow PhD student (different department, but we both lived in the same graduate student block) told me about the hard time she was having with her two PhD supervisors. The two supervisors hated each other, which made life rather awkward for her.

rincewind

Nope, don't have one. My interview was based around my experience and my grades were never a topic of discussion. Never had a problem.

User Name

*nods* I simply don't see not having a degree as a real barrier to getting a job or starting up one's own business. Getting your own clients, particularly clients that are very happy to have you work for them, is a very liberating experience. I honestly believe it is all down to focus, hard work, common sense ... and good plumbing.