DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Everything Else... Hopefully some of this will put colleges on notice

Ernst & Young Removes University Degree Classification From Entry Criteria As There's 'No Evidence' It Equals Success
Lucy Sherriff
The Huffington Post UK


Ernst & Young, one of the UK's biggest graduate recruiters, has announced it will be removing the degree classification from its entry criteria, saying there is "no evidence" success at university correlates with achievement in later life.

In an unprecedented move, the accountancy firm is scrapping its policy of requiring a 2:1 and the equivalent of three B grades at A-level in order to open opportunities for talented individuals "regardless of their background".

Maggie Stilwell, EY’s managing partner for talent, said the company would use online assessments to judge the potential of applicants.

"Academic qualifications will still be taken into account and indeed remain an important consideration when assessing candidates as a whole, but will no longer act as a barrier to getting a foot in the door," she said.

"Our own internal research of over 400 graduates found that screening students based on academic performance alone was too blunt an approach to recruitment.

"It found no evidence to conclude that previous success in higher education correlated with future success in subsequent professional qualifications undertaken."

The company offers 200 graduate-level jobs each year, making it the fifth largest recruiter of graduates in the UK. The changes will come into force in 2016.

Earlier this year, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) scrapped using UCAS points as entry criteria for its graduate scheme. The audit firm believes placing too much emphasis on the scores will mean employers may miss out on key talent from disadvantaged backgrounds, who can perform less well at school.

A report published last week revealed wealthy kids are 35% more likely to become high earners than clever, disadvantaged young people, even if they are not academically gifted.

HuffPo

If they dumb down college any further, even people who can't spell will be able to get degrees.

wut u meane kaint speeled?

Worthless "announcement" from a large auditing firm.

This is nothing new:



Of course it is.

Just because you took 4 years of accounting and got good grades doesn't mean you'll be a good auditor. (or even a good accountant)(or even a good ditch digger)

This has always been the case. Auditors not only need advanced accounting knowledge, they need strong analytical and people skills.

And they gotta know how to comyunikate good.

Just like any good worker in any field.

It's interesting how this is the same "issue" as 50 years ago. The partners at this firm sound like idiots. There is a huge deficiency in liberal arts education (for instance, history, sociology, politics, communication...)

I suspect this press release was simply "free advertising". ("Look how progressive our firm is.")

An Ernst & Young audit team:

I'll take years of experience over a degree any day of the week. Neither of my employees (both analysts) have degrees and I'd put them up against anyone any day.

College degree may mean something in certain areas, but not as many as I think people want to believe. And for someone 22-25 years old (ish) maybe it is more important than someone without a degree at the same age - but once people hit their late 20s experience is much more important IMHO.

Pretty sure we're already beyond that point.

Exactly. I've been saying this for years. For some reason we've been conditioned as a society that you HAVE to go to college (and the more expensive the better) if you want to be successful in life. Meanwhile, colleges just keep raising their tuition and fees and seem to offer less and less in way of an actual education for what you'll be using in the workforce.

I have a Comp Sci degree, which arguably is a degree that "needs" college and will actually land you a job when you get out. I would still say that maybe only 3 or 4 of my classes in college taught me information that applied directly to the work I've done since then. I probably learned more in 4 months at my job than I did in 4 years in college. The things I did learn in college, I could have probably learned by picking up a few books or taking maybe a years worth of community college courses.

And honestly, once you get over a year's worth of experience, employers don't even care about the college degree anymore. I know of foreign nationals that got their degrees overseas at colleges that probably are less accredited than Trump Online University, but they can get jobs no problem because they have the working experience and the know-how to actually breeze through an interview.

I think years ago, college used to be a good method for companies to pick the smart and dedicated people from the herd because those that could make it through all 4+ years with passing grades had to show some form of intelligence and perseverance. Now, if a company has a choice between a guy that self taught himself the job skills needed to succeed at a certain position, and a guy that ran up $80k in student loans to listen to people that likely never worked in the field talk about those same skills, who's the smarter one?

I think that's the point, talented kids weren't getting the years of experience without the degree to start.

Most college degrees only have about 1 years worth of classes that even matter. They say that you need to be well rounded but that is just an excuse to make you take years of extra classes and scam you for all they money they can.

AT the most you need about 1 year of classes on how to research information and create presentations as part of building up communication skills. All jobs require you to be able to communicate your ideas and your understanding of what they are telling you to do.

Then you just need a year of job specific training. Teaching you technical skills and knowledge that you will actually use for the field your going into.

Then do a one year internship while you learn on the job from people who know what they are doing and are current in your industry.

Now for technical degrees like doctors,engineers, and scientist there is far more that you need to know than the average job before you get started.

But to teach kindergarten do you really need to calculus, history, etc? No. You just need to learn child psychology and classroom management skills. Not much different for Jr. High either. I mean you already graduated High school so you should be familiar with the material already and it's not like when your taking college English classes that they teach you how to teach high school level books but instead are focused on materials you will NEVER teach in public school.

I mean I love to learn. I am ALWAYS learning new things all the time. Yet college costs a lot of money and having 2 years of classes be about things that have zero to do with your job field that you are studying for is stupid. I mean why does someone becoming an English teacher required to learn college algebra that they will NEVER use? Because it lines the pockets of colleges hell bent on sucking students and their parents dry.

IMHO the college system in general needs a major overhaul to force it to become more efficient and get kids to work earlier in life instead of higher in debt.

Very interesting. In regards to Accountants in particular, there is now a requirement that a person must have 150 credit hours of college before they can sit for the CPA exam. 150 credit hours is conveniently the number of hours a typical accounting student will have after achieving their undergrad AND masters degrees. One can also test-out of the additional hour requirement (above-and-beyond their undergrad) by achieving a certain score on the GMAT.

So while the students' future-employer is seeing the light, academia is doubling-down on the amount of "education" you "need" before you can even take a test that basically tests your ability to take a test.

We teach our kids more about things that simply don't matter or that they will never need (as stated numerous times in this thread) and less about how to use the info and knowledge that is already out there.

j/c:

SATs will now contain secret 'adversity scores': Students will be rated on deprivation and crime in effort to level playing field for poor and minority teens - but nobody will be told the numbers

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article...d.html#comments

I am one of those folks you seem to be an expert on, and what you are criticizing is OK to a point. It worked for me. There are changes and improvements that can be made in every job.

I did fine, I did well, and I prefer to reject some criticism public schools come under. Not all of it is research and presentations. But I appreciate the concern