University or not university? Is there an alternative

[Dinosaur]

Are you saying though that the leader of the county unit has no formal qualifications...that he or she has attained their post based solely on experience that began with an MSC scheme and without attending university?

Running joke at the time that when I started at Durham Uni in 1980 none of the lecturers had an archaeology degree (they had to give Prof Cramp one retrospectively after she retired, for instance)......so what? I certainly didn't learn anything much from my course that has had even remote relevence to my subsequent career hitting things with a mattock

[Jack]

Degrees these days are worthless.........every bugger has one ! ..............and those with archaeology degrees are useless at most things.particularly digging xx(

I would disagree with this.

You get out what you put in. My degree and masters course were really useful. I learn't lots..............some of it to do with archaeology, research and writing. I did even learn a little about digging too. Learned alot about universities and how they operate too.

But, in essence your right............an archaeologist doesn't start learning how much they still have to learn until they do the job. Bit like learning to drive.

[CARTOON REALITY]

I'm all for the unis on this one. Many years digging now and I often regret not having spent longer in my alma mater . . .

And not just because the sex and drugs were dandy!

[kevin wooldridge]

Running joke at the time that when I started at Durham Uni in 1980 none of the lecturers had an archaeology degree (they had to give Prof Cramp one retrospectively after she retired, for instance)......so what? I certainly didn't learn anything much from my course that has had even remote relevence to my subsequent career hitting things with a mattock

I wasn't necessarily querying the quality of a degree, but the fact is that you do have one and as such can write it on your CV. Likewise the staff at Durham in 1980 may have been lacking archaeology degrees, but I am guessing that they had degrees in other subjects.....I should profess a long standing interest in the subject of degree or non-degree archaeologists, dating back to my earliest days in the profession. I had the opportunity to meet Basil Brown and was told the story of how he had discovered the Sutton Hoo ship but was sidelined from the excavation because he had no formal education in the subject. I thought at the time that didn't seem right and then of course MSC happened and it seemed to offer opportunities for a greater involvement in archaeology by non-degree educated folk, but I am not sure that wasn't just a small blip in the space-time continuum and really archaeology always was a reserve of the university educated. My query here was really to find out whether those who had entered the profession through a non-academic background had managed to survive or whether they had gained formal qualifications later in life.

The aim wasn't to suggest that one or other way is the better or whether a degree is any use, just as to whether people jumped through the academic hoops or not. I am guessing Dinosaur that you started in archaeology as a 'non-academician', so why did you initially/eventually take the trip to Durham?

[Dinosaur]

'swat you did after A-levels? (suppose that kind of thinking is responsible for a lot of MAs/PhDs too). Oh, and neither Oxbridge Unis did a course I wanted, and Southampton didn't want me. Did inconvenience my digging 'career' though - of course in those days digging wasn't a career, more a lifestyle (where you got a lot more of what Cartoon seems to have missed out on a Uni, albeit in a tent), so 'career trajectory' wasn't really an issue and I've never really bothered with one, people just seem to want to pay me more occasionally :face-approve: