12th February 2006, 05:32 PM
Spotted on a job ad here.Just what on earth is a one of these? I would argue that there simply is no such thing. I do have issues with graduates moving straight into consultancy without any field experience as it is.This ad seems to have announced a paradigm shift in archaeology degrees..........[?]
..knowledge without action is insanity and action without knowledge is vanity..(imam ghazali,ayyuhal-walad)
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12th February 2006, 08:27 PM
yeah i saw this one and wondered the same thing!
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12th February 2006, 08:35 PM
If you read the details for this job, you'll see that it says
"We encourage applications from recent graduates in archaeology or a related discipline with a minimum of 1-2 years? relevant fieldwork experience" - seems to me that the "graduate" in the job title just means they want someone with a degree, but not a newly graduated person. Clearly they think that a BA is more important than several years experience in the field.
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12th February 2006, 09:28 PM
To be fair to Scott Wilson Inc, you only have to look at their website to see that their archaeology team has plenty of years field experience between them. My own guess is that with so many chiefs maybe they need a few indians to boss around....The archaeology 'graduates' would be a small part of 60 odd diverse graduates the company aims to take on this year (well that's what the website says anyway).
My gripe with this company is that the website chooses to display the archaeology team in one of those photographs taken from a camera mounted on the ceiling (intimate CCTV), everyone looking as if they are about to audition for a Channel 4 comedy series. What ever was wrong with grainy B&W photography with a derelict warehouse in the background. Bring back the art in archaeological photography I say.
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13th February 2006, 02:09 PM
I run a team of archaeological consultants that includes one graduate (who we did, indeed, take on as a newly qualified graduate). The rest of the team consists of highly experienced and qualified staff.
As in any job, archaeological consultancy work is not all high-level assessment, decision-making, policy-making etc. It includes basic data gathering and processing, database input, and so on, which a new graduate can be trained to do. The important thing to note is that a graduate in that position would be working under close supervision, their work would be checked, and any decisions/assessments that require more experience and knowledge would be made by more experienced staff.
As time goes by, and with plenty of on-the-job training, the graduate will become more experienced and knowledgeable about the type of work we do, and can be given more autonomy. We do recognise the need for fieldwork experience, but then we have a great deal of that within the team as it is.
1man1desk
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13th February 2006, 06:51 PM
1Man; would the graduate consultant with your company be able (or even willing) to get field experience after enjoying the bountiful salary of a consultant? Or would he/she eventually become a very experienced consultant with a very important gap in their knowledge base?
The ONE thing that annoys me most about some consultants is being asked to do the impossible by an individual posessing limited knowledge of stratigraphy or field techniques. (I also occasionally get this from managers and less often from curators, but those are separate issues.
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14th February 2006, 02:26 PM
Well, we do have another person who joined us as a graduate (albeit with a little field experience). He gained a lot of consultancy experience with us, but then left for some years to gain more field experience, ultimately running excavations. He then re-joined us and is one of the experienced, qualified people I mentioned in my previous post.
1man1desk
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14th February 2006, 05:15 PM
That is Very reassuring.
