why can't I just find some work?

[Oxbeast]

Thants an interesting link, Kevin, thanks. Presumably the archaeology graduates who go to work in archaeology are concealed somewhere within:

Almost 9% work in other professional or technical occupations while 8% work as commercial, industrial and public sector managers.

To my mind, the most interesting statistic on the page is :

Average graduate salary: £17,675
Average non-graduate salary: £13,884

Not really worth spending 50K on a degree for that difference in salary, really.

However, the page does continue

Although some of the jobs listed here might not be first jobs for many graduates, they are among the many realistic possibilities with your degree, provided you can demonstrate you have the attributes employers are looking for. Bear in mind that it's not just your degree discipline that determines your options. Remember that many graduate vacancies don't specify particular degree disciplines, so don't restrict your thinking to the jobs listed here.

Which makes the point that it is not the intention of universities to train field archaeologists for the commercial sector, and it would be unfair to judge them on that basis. Its probably only 5% that go into archaeology, 1% that are still in after 8 years, just as 1% of English graduates become playwrights. I don't see how anyone would be helped by getting those percentages up.

[Bonesgirl]

hi guys, sorry for the late reply was away for a few days sorting a few things out. Lots of really useful advice here, the website is quite good at first glance, contains useful stats and links. I'm currently looking at two avenues. Mainly either a masters in conservation or just jumping straight in or looking for work straight off.

Thank you to everyone who replied and have given me plenty of things to look over and think about.

[Unitof1]

Am I to take it from your name that you want to do bone remains work. If so, have you thought about a price and a charging structure and apply locally or to anybody excavating near you. Obviously you would have to set a price that would undercut the establishment and you would have to satisfy the curators that you were qualified enough. In fact possibly you should go straight to the curators and find out what the standard is. They may possibly tell you who the current people are that are doing the bone work are. You could try and find out what they charge.

[P Prentice]

i get unsolicited applications and cv's all the time. they are mostly interchangeable because they all look the same. the ones i answer are different. they are the ones that demonstrate passion, committment and determination. they want to be archaeologists and, mostly, they are now. they range from oxbridge don's, EH inspectors, unit directors, specialist and the entire range of professional site workers. i am not being rude bonesgirl, i am just saying that if you are not sure, you might better look elsewhere. and to all archaeology undergraduates i would say, enjoy your degree, enjoy your time at uni, but you probably wont become an archaeologist unless you already are one

[Bonesgirl]

P Prentice, am I right from reading your post that what your basically saying is unless we are archaeologists before we embark on a long, hard degree we're never going to be archaeologists??? Cause I'm sorry but I beg to differ, if that was the case then why would there be such degrees, if not to train future archaeologists??? I know a few of my fellow students who before the degree had barely any digging experience and are now working on digs and doing just fine.

And its not a case of I'm not sure what I want to do or be, its a case of there is so I could and want to do that I'm like a kid in a candy store trying to decide which sweet I want when they all look so good.

To Unitof1: I did at one point want to do some bone work, however, museums and conservation work has now taken my interest hence the conservation masters I'm looking at.

[thalinor]

P Prentice, am I right from reading your post that what your basically saying is unless we are archaeologists before we embark on a long, hard degree we're never going to be archaeologists??? Cause I'm sorry but I beg to differ, if that was the case then why would there be such degrees, if not to train future archaeologists??? I know a few of my fellow students who before the degree had barely any digging experience and are now working on digs and doing just fine.

And its not a case of I'm not sure what I want to do or be, its a case of there is so I could and want to do that I'm like a kid in a candy store trying to decide which sweet I want when they all look so good.

To Unitof1: I did at one point want to do some bone work, however, museums and conservation work has now taken my interest hence the conservation masters I'm looking at.

Hello

Quick comment from me having very, very briefly read the the posts.

A degree in archaeology IS NOT training.
The degree in archaeology is seen as a general humanities degree.
If your fellow students are working with very little prior experience then they may have shown other talents that came across in the CV and any phone or face-to ace interview. EG passion, the ability and willingness to move anywhere in the country. Maybe send CVs off and ask for feedback. Is your experience relevant? It may seem like a daft question but you need to be aware of what will be asked of you in the 'profession'

Congrats on your forthcoming nuptials but you need to assess what it is you want, why you want it and are you going to achieve it by doing a higher degree.

thalinor

[Doug]

P Prentice, am I right from reading your post that what your basically saying is unless we are archaeologists before we embark on a long, hard degree we're never going to be archaeologists??? Cause I'm sorry but I beg to differ, if that was the case then why would there be such degrees, if not to train future archaeologists???

This is going to sound snide but to answer your question, to employ professors }. Ask most "academic" archaeologists who teach and their response about training is %#*(% that, we don't train practical skills we "teach people how to think". They don't do that very well in my opinion but that is beside the point.

I just ran the numbers (forth coming PP report) and with dropout rates of archaeologists there are only about 200-300 new openings a year with thousands of new graduates each year. You are actually looking at 5-10% might get an archaeology job (note I am not saying become an archaeologists as diggers are out after less than 5 years and that is mainly how you get new entrants). Now this is bad because in the last five years we have lost about 1/3 of the workforce. However, even before that with pretty spectacular growth in the decade before, almost doubling numbers, there were still more new students than jobs by wide margins. In defense to universities the vast majority of their archaeology students will never have an archaeology job. Prince Charles has an archaeology degree that he has never used. To be fair to universities by teaching general fluff the universities are actually training you for what you're most likely going to be doing (I will leave it to others to insert comments about that), although at a very high price.

What archaeology needs is a person or organization (not necessarily a university) to actually take the time to train those 200-300 new archaeologists (with actually training that number would probably drop to 100) how to be an archaeologist in all the possible choices- not just how to dig, archaeology offers so many other possibilities too.

The problem that you, and most new archaeologists have, is a disconnect between reality and expectations. The people you paid, or depending when and where you went to school the government paid, to tell you these things failed. In all honesty they don't really know anyways but some of it is 'seeing, speaking, hearing no evil' especially when you are keeping them employed. The system failed you in that it led you to believe that university = archaeology when university = general fluff.

Does this mean you won't be an archaeologists, absolutely not. You are going the right thing by posting here and asking questions that = archaeology. Keep it up and at some point you will be employed as an archaeologist.

[David G]

I've only briefly skimmed through a lot of replies, so I don't know if I'm just repeating what someone else has already said, but, are you looking specifically at Archeaology work? Perhaps looking into other areas of work, where your degree would still be valued, which is probably all areas; cosidering the percentage of people that go on to work in the field they studied at University is fairly low. It doesn't have to be permenant.

[BAJR]

Does this mean you won't be an archaeologists, absolutely not. You are going the right thing by posting here and asking questions that = archaeology. Keep it up and at some point you will be an archaeologist.

Good post Doug... and look... you can be honest , critical and positive all in one go

[P Prentice]

sorry but posting on here does not equal archaeology nor does it make you an archaeologist - any more than obtaining a degree in archaeology does either