Students!

DaithiSurfer

Was just listening to a friend who is a student at Maynooth harping on about Coca Cola - again!!!

It made think about a few things that i havent since i was in Uni.

Do students take it too seriouly that they are the future of the world?
I mean yes, they are the future workers and all that but most of them think that they are more special than anyone else around.
Do they really have an opinion of themselves that is way too high?

Some examples of complete uselessness and misdirected efforts to be counted come to mind here.

I started Uni when i was 21 and left at 25 about 9 years or so ago. I think i had a more 'wordly' point of view because i wasn't still a child who still hadnt been in the 'big bad world' at that stage.


1- Qeueing to get into the bar the younger students than myself were all talking about how much they could drink etc . Every few minutes the fire doors open and more legless people get thrown onto the pile of limp bodies already lying there. Then next day these same people are going on about how much drink they 'handled' last night. Not saying it doesnt happen to older people but it definitely happens more to students.

2- Students union people - Groupies who are easily impressed by assholes who are legends in their own opinions. i'll say no more on that one.

3- a)They will protest at the opening of a can of beans. examples. The Nov 17th marches in the city center where the students pleaded poverty and that they needed bigger grants because they were on the breadline. That night o'connell street was full of students falling over, passed out in puke all pissed out of their trees. They really proved they were on the breadline there.

3- b)Albert Reynolds (then illustrious leader) comes to open a new building at DCU.
The students union mobilize the zombies and think of something to protest about. Firstly they scream we want more security on campus etc (the week before they were protesting that security kept throwing out their mates from the campus)
next the scream we want a cresh. (the cresh was in the process of being built right beside them).
next they scream we ant higher grants. Then they throw eggs and toilet rolls at reynolds (good idea. now you'll really get him to help you out)

4- Talk about builders, carpenters etc like they are second class citizens. These guys have done their time training in their particular skill. They know a hell of a lot more than students do, even after tehy leave, about their chosen profession. Treat these people with the respect they deserve. Having said that i also hear people old enough to know better say the same things in my office about carpenters etc.


5- When students leave uni they all look back and say. we had a great time but we were really children and were clueless at the time, but hell did we have a good time.


I guess the point i am trying to ake is that at the time all students see themselve as being the moral conscience of the worl and the people who will stick up for the little people etc . they think of themselves as super heros but never ever realise that its just a few years you go through wher you are changein from child to adult but are still very much on the child side of it.
Enjoy the time and forget about all these waste of time protests etc. Do what you do with a view to getting yourself into a job which will then get you a posession to follow your beliefs. You will by then have a grown up view of what is right and wrong and be in a better position to do something about it

Your views????

davej

Most students aren't like this at all really. I think the perceived problem comes from a small (but loud) number of them.

Your points highlight the hypocrisy of the students' union yes.

But it is easy to nitpick any group of people in this way, pointing out their inconsistencies etc..

davej

ixoy

Student unions - ah there's a good one. A lot of political-wannabe w@nkers there. I remember being at one of their tiresome meetings (I was a Class Rep., so I was meant to attend) and they started talking about spending student union meeting to go to Geneva to have some pointless protest on Third World debt (the subject matter isn't pointless - their intended actions were). Someone tried to put down the idea and one twat then got up, ranting and raving with all the worldy moral superiority that only a student could have, about how the clothes, shoes, etc. they were wearing were made in sweatshops, et cetera. Far be it from me to take away from the situation, but the purpose of the union is to look after the welfare of the students, and not engage in political crusades and tirades. The latest example is the Coca Cola ban. I know the way students operate and general student apathy to the vote allowed the more zealot-like faction to push through the ban (the rest could just go the vending machines anyway).

A lot of students do seem to be ensconced in their own world. It's an image helped by the sprawling size of some campuses. It seems to breed its own measure of greatness - the drinks thing you mentioned - and equips them with the ability to reason and argue with, generally, little life experience to back it up. Now most students are perfectly amiable, but it's the vocal minority - particularly the vociferous SU - that I find grating.

DaithiSurfer

I'm by no means attempting to say that the majority are the ones i am talking about (perhaps i should have made that clear). The majority are not like this at all, but the ones you tend to see and hear are. They are a band reflection on the student population as a whole, and somehow believe that they are the superior ones.

NedNew

I went to college in Waterford with some people who turned out to be completely gaga after a year or two of college. Some people treated it as a free holiday but had to come in to register for their grant (the sleepers at the back). The mouth pieces took the front seats so that they could argue their fruitless, irrelevent points with the lecturers. The dedicated ones sat in the second row where they could see what was written and actually try learn something. The messers took the thrid row, firing missiles and dribbling over those in front. Oh the college life, full of culture.

One guy become so hairy after drinking whiskey/Lilt mixtures that he had to leave college - I never did hear what happened to him - my one regret from college.

Anybody else got any 'fond' memories of college characters?

pork99

4- Talk about builders, carpenters etc like they are second class citizens. These guys have done their time training in their particular skill. They know a hell of a lot more than students do, even after tehy leave, about their chosen profession. Treat these people with the respect they deserve.

Yes but builders and the like make a shed load more money then a lot of students ever will so ha!

strawberry

I guess the point i am trying to ake is that at the time all students see themselve as being the moral conscience of the worl and the people who will stick up for the little people etc . they think of themselves as super heros but never ever realise that its just a few years you go through wher you are changein from child to adult but are still very much on the child side of it.

Students who think they are the moral conscience of the world are preferrable to the ones I met in my first week of college, who declared that they were joining Fianna Fail so that they would be appointed to the bench. Law students. Any kind of conscience would be nice.

pork99

Originally posted by strawberry
Students who think they are the moral conscience of the world are preferrable to the ones I met in my first week of college, who declared that they were joining Fianna Fail so that they would be appointed to the bench. Law students. Any kind of conscience would be nice.

Pass the sick bag! That is so wrong on so many levels. (Maybe there should be a law disqualifying anyone in a political party from the judiciary?)

In my experience students fall between two extremes; the politicaly correct moralistic Student Grants (as seen in Viz) and the brain dead Ross O'Carroll Kelly types. Someone should design a scale for classifying students between these two extremes (there will always be a few unclassifiable freaks though)

therecklessone

Originally posted by NedNew


One guy become so hairy after drinking whiskey/Lilt mixtures that he had to leave college - I never did hear what happened to him - my one regret from college.

Try St. Clabberts Old Folks Home, I bet you he's a least a stage 8 by now...

Stephen

pft, arts students, they always need some kind of power to fight.
I'm an IT student myself, we're far too busy with actual work to bother with all that fight the power crap.

You're dead on about students' union types though, utterly useless. They just think it'll look great on their CV's.

Raskolnikov

Originally posted by Stephen
pft, arts students, they always need some kind of power to fight.
I'm an IT student myself, we're far too busy with actual work to bother with all that fight the power crap.

That's so true, some of us are just trying to get our degrees and get the heck out of the place.

flamingo0904

ah guys! You just ruined it for me! I'm in leaving cert and all i want to do is make it to college. i don't care what you say, i care about the issues you were talking about. the reason that people actually fight the power when they're in the students union is cos we're finaly in a position to do that. We've been in oppressive institutions that are sh~t scared of free-speech and free-thought despite all the cheap words about wanting to build the individual. I get what you're saying about the people that spend all their money on drink then complain about their grants, but surely you can just compare them to the people on the street that drink too much, stagger out of pubs, get to work in the morning late before complaing bout the government and making it their scapegoat and root of all their problems?
i can't wait to get to college cos i'm hoping to meant people who care..i don't mind what their opinions are, i'm just so sick of indifference and mediocrity...luke-warm living i guess its good to have people who care bout something,living in a grey world just doesn't do anything for me.

Boro

Never mind any of that crap about protesting and other larks. When i was a student i had a bloody great time. I didnt go to lectures, i barely visited college at all. I spent my time drinking, playing computer games, drinking, errr.. drinking, hanging out with mates, arsing around and drinking. Some of the best years of my life. Now im working and im depressed

Long live college!
Just be sure to ignore all those people too far gone on their own power trips to enjoy themselves. College is about life, not work!

*sits back and waits for the flame grilling*

simu

Originally posted by Raskolnikov
That's so true, some of us are just trying to get our degrees and get the heck out of the place.

This attitude is very common amongst students and I find it depressing - uni should be a place where you get to escape the rat race for a bit and have time to think about issues beyond money and career advancement. Or maybe I'm just being hopelessly idealistic.

Sand

i can't wait to get to college cos i'm hoping to meant people who care..i don't mind what their opinions are, i'm just so sick of indifference and mediocrity

I feel for you man because youre going to be so dissapointed when you go there and meet them. Do yourself a favour and pick up Michael Moore and Naomi Klein. That pretty much covers the average student idealogy. The students youre going to meet come from the same indifference and mediocrity so dont expect much beyond drunkeness and the established anti establishment views, along with a healthy distaste of free speech. Dont hope, youll be dissapointed less often then.

Never mind any of that crap about protesting and other larks. When i was a student i had a bloody great time. I didnt go to lectures, i barely visited college at all. I spent my time drinking, playing computer games, drinking, errr.. drinking, hanging out with mates, arsing around and drinking. Some of the best years of my life. Now im working and im depressed

Should probably develop a split personality, an imaginary friend, set up illegal boxing clubs, espouse nihilist/anarchist views and engage in a secret campaign of terror against the corporate consumer reality you find yourself in then, shouldnt you?

This attitude is very common amongst students and I find it depressing - uni should be a place where you get to escape the rat race for a bit and have time to think about issues beyond money and career advancement. Or maybe I'm just being hopelessly idealistic.

Well yes and no - realistically Uni is where you get the best degree you can so you can get the best job you can, whereas taking a "year out" is about the finding yourself and so on. In practice Uni is probably the last great refuge for people terrified of growing up. i met a couple of people in college who just wont survive in the outside world if or when they run out of courses to take.

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

DadaKopf

Wittgenstein was an engineer.

Redleslie

One of these days, Sand will grow up and realise how childish, ignorant and boring his student sectarianism really is.

Woden

Originally posted by DaithiSurfer

4- Talk about builders, carpenters etc like they are second class citizens. These guys have done their time training in their particular skill. They know a hell of a lot more than students do, even after tehy leave, about their chosen profession. Treat these people with the respect they deserve. Having said that i also hear people old enough to know better say the same things in my office about carpenters etc.

meh i don't think they're second class citizens, they'll make a shed load of money. but i don't trust most of them, i don't trust them with prices, i don't trust them to get a job done when they say they will, i don't trust them to arrive on time, there is always something thats a complication it never goes smoothly, this is my experience form most people in the trade trying to find someone ya trust to do the job and not mess ya around. you end up looking for someone you know to do the job as a result. a large number of my friends that left school went to become electricitions so for example when we needed a job done in the house we grabbed one of them

with regards to students themselves most of the ones i know aren't in to fight the power and on protests, they're science students they come in they get the work done and they go home.

some colleges still give some impression though of a degree machine and i've worked hard in college so i haven't go away from it all and i am looking forward to leaving and i'm taking a year out to bum around as i've earned the time off. i'll miss college though, not the labs or projects, i might miss some lectures and actually learning new stuff but mainly i'll miss the people the general craic.

i'm not ready for the real world though i'll probably post grad after the year out

data

Tommy Vercetti

Originally posted by Dataisgod

i'm not ready for the real world though

c'mon hurry up, you're a dodgy builder's dream cash cow

Woden

meh then i'd have to have money for to hire a builder and i'd need something built, thats not likely

simu

Originally posted by daveirl


College for me, is a place where I learn more skills enabling me to do a job I couldn't do otherwise. I'm on work placement now and as far as I can see College is more cut throat than the work place. I don't mind, I thrive on competition, but all the same three years done, and I can't wait to get to the real world.

Well, it comes down to the question of what role universities ought to play in society. Are they to be training centres that provide for the needs of business and industy? Or should they be independent institutions that encourage their students to question, analyse, to seek knowledge and understanding? Or is it possible to do both? Is it desirable to do both?

Whatever people may say, universities are in the real world and while they proclaim to adhere to the latter set of ideals, unis are coming under increasing pressure to teach courses that are "relevant" to industry and to prove that their performance justifies the money being spent on them. (In the final year of my degree we were constantly being asked to fill in questionnaires to indicate our level of satisfaction with the courses we had taken. So, in the case of a particularly tricky subject, if everybody is disatisfied with how hard it was to grasp and how much work they had to put in, does that mean it shouldn't be on the curriculum anymore? )

As far as I see, students are increasingly* seeing uni as a place you go to to party and prepare for your future career for a few years. I've met many students who refuse to use their brain unless it's absolutely necessary i.e. in order to pass exams and assessments. For example, you have people studying French who learn to speak well enough to pass their oral exams but who look at you like you're insane when you show signs of wanting to speak the language just for fun and when you make the effort of learning non-commercially useful parts of the language like slang and informal French. Or people who go to lectures on, say, surrealism or social conformity and learn just enough about such topics to write the end-of-term essay but never seem to think of applying any of the ideas to which they have been exposed to their own lives and surroundings.

I'm not saying I'd expect everybody to start writing poetry and declaring they want to destroy all social convention and start a new society after a few lectures but some people seem to place everything they learn at uni into a little box in their heads that they only open at exam time and destroy once their course is finished (OK, with more vocational courses, they keep it for work situations too). I don't understand it. What's the point of going to uni at all if you're unwilling to entertain new ideas? Why not just set up training schools for those who prefer to be spoonfed facts and to regurgitate them later in an examhall? (Most likely reason: It sounds much more impressive and glamorous at dinnerparties to say you studied French at uni even though, in reality, you couldn't carry out a conversation in the language if your life depended on it:().

*It's problematic, I know, to refer to a supposed golden age in the past when education was seen as an end in itself as this education was intended exclusively for white, wealthy males. The sort of "creating a Renaissance woman or man"-type ideals of universities only ever seem to have worked with individuals rather than whole groups. At least, things do get a bit better at post-grad level as there's a certain "idiot-filter", for want of a better word. People tend not to bother going past degree level with a subject unless they have at least some interest in it.

So, to answer the original poster, even though I'm a student myself, most students I find very annoying indeed.

minority

When you leave uni you all of a sudden discover that your degree and how hard you worked isnt worth ****.
5 years of actual work experience - not student work placement - is what makes worth employing. until you get that you are just another ones of those people who did a degree. nothing more.

Pity you have to wait til you are long finished uni to discover this though. Then you would spend more time having fun and barely passing

But of course the students of today will not and cannot realise this, so they'll give everyone the 'oh my god i work so hard line'

Wait til your sent away on a job to a foreign country with a garage and a cross roads for a town and have to work 18 hours a day for 3 months with no days off at all. Then you'll know what hard work really is. Reading and studying is definietly not hard.

I got a 1.1 and ****ed if i know what good it is. Nobody wants to know what mark i got, just that i went to uni.
The guy i work with got dropped out of the same course (CA at DCU) the year before me and now gets paid more than me because he's there a year longer - scumbag .

Woden

Originally posted by minority


Wait til your sent away on a job to a foreign country with a garage and a cross roads for a town and have to work 18 hours a day for 3 months with no days off at all. Then you'll know what hard work really is. Reading and studying is definietly not hard.

eh most of us won't have to do that, i expect to work for a company that doesn't require things like that from me.

i've done project work for big companies, work experience whatever, the same type of job and position, responsibility etc. that i would have if was to go into that job after college and i still think that job is easier then college. the ability to go home at 5 in the evening and not take out a book, or having weekends off instead of working or studying and all that jazz

pork99

Originally posted by minority
When you leave uni you all of a sudden discover that your degree and how hard you worked isnt worth ****.
5 years of actual work experience - not student work placement - is what makes worth employing. until you get that you are just another ones of those people who did a degree. nothing more.

Anyone see "30 Minutes" on Channel 4 last Saturday?

Dumbed Down Degrees

They were saying that the rush to cram as many students as possible into 3rd level in the UK has affected standards leaving a lot of graduates with useless degrees and in a lot of debt. They compared some vocational degrees unfavourably to apprenticeships were you learn as much on the job and do not end up in debt.

minority

Originally posted by Dataisgod
eh most of us won't have to do that, i expect to work for a company that doesn't require things like that from me.

i've done project work for big companies, work experience whatever, the same type of job and position, responsibility etc. that i would have if was to go into that job after college and i still think that job is easier then college. the ability to go home at 5 in the evening and not take out a book, or having weekends off instead of working or studying and all that jazz

This is what every student thinks after their work placement.
I thought that myself too until i experienced what real work is. I'm sure anyone else here who is out of uni for a year or 2 will tell you so too.
The reason a work placement student is getting paid crap is because they are crap - no matter what opinion they have of themselves or others 'tell' them. Think about it. How could a student be any good compared to a person with a few years full time experience. Thats 8+ hours a day 5 days a week over a few years - AFTER getting their degree.

Any decent job you wont be going home at 5pm, you'll find that one out the hard way too . Companies expect more than 100% from you. Not fair, i know but thats the market these days.

Woden

Originally posted by minority
This is what every student thinks after their work placement.
I thought that myself too until i experienced what real work is. I'm sure anyone else here who is out of uni for a year or 2 will tell you so too.
The reason a work placement student is getting paid crap is because they are crap - no matter what opinion they have of themselves or others 'tell' them. Think about it. How could a student be any good compared to a person with a few years full time experience. Thats 8+ hours a day 5 days a week over a few years - AFTER getting their degree.

Any decent job you wont be going home at 5pm, you'll find that one out the hard way too . Companies expect more than 100% from you. Not fair, i know but thats the market these days.

thats not necessairly true though, on my work placement i was payed well, real well all things considered and was working for a large company and yes i did have to stay back late to get the job done and i found out exactly what that job would entail if i was to stay on with them after college.

with regards to work as well i've greater then 5 years experience in retail, where i work as a part time manager, this job entails the exact same functions as the full time manager except i do less hours, however during a few summers i went full-time and performed the same job as the regular managers doing what they do and working the evening shifts and weekends and what not and despite the fact that its retail i still find it easier aspects of it easier then being in college

simu

Originally posted by pork99
Anyone see "30 Minutes" on Channel 4 last Saturday?

Dumbed Down Degrees

They were saying that the rush to cram as many students as possible into 3rd level in the UK has affected standards leaving a lot of graduates with useless degrees and in a lot of debt. They compared some vocational degrees unfavourably to apprenticeships were you learn as much on the job and do not end up in debt.

My father studied one of the subjects I did for my degree and my aunt my other subject at uni about 20 years ago and from looking at the textbooks they had and talking to them about it, their courses were definitely a lot harder! But that's just an anecdote. Has anyone done a similar investigation into Irish unis?

Sarky

You know what the latest piece of "art" to appear in Nui Galway is? A statue of a graduate, sitting down, with its degree in hand. I say "its degree", because the robes are empty. A faceless, sexless shape with robes, a mortarboard and a roll of paper.

I find that very, very depressing. That, and the supposed way the college authorities refer to students as "units".

Incidentally, I went to college primarily to learn about science. I didn't give a thought to job prospects. Right now I work in security. Not exactly relevent to a 2.1 marine microbiology degree, is it? And you know what? I don't care. I got to learn fascinating things about science, the sea, and microorganisms. I got a better idea of how to think for myself. I grew. I experienced some amazing things, both horrible and wonderful. I learned a subject purely for the sake of learning it, and the enjoyment that brings.

I think I got exactly the right things out of college.

simu

You know what the latest piece of "art" to appear in Nui Galway is? A statue of a graduate, sitting down, with its degree in hand. I say "its degree", because the robes are empty. A faceless, sexless shape with robes, a mortarboard and a roll of paper.

I haven't noticed that. Where is it?

pork99

Originally posted by Sarky
Right now I work in security. Not exactly relevent to a 2.1 marine microbiology degree, is it? And you know what? I don't care. I got to learn fascinating things about science, the sea, and microorganisms. I got a better idea of how to think for myself. I grew. I experienced some amazing things, both horrible and wonderful. I learned a subject purely for the sake of learning it, and the enjoyment that brings.

Don't you want to work in research or biotechnology or similiar? It seems an awful waste of the resources the taxpayer has invested in you and what you have invested in yourself. I can understand someone with an arts degree being in that situation. Still as long as you are happy that the most important thing.