• Question: Presently I'm looking for a degree apprenticeship, with doing university as my second choice. I view university as continuing my education for another 4 years, whilst a degree apprenticeship I feel looks more useful in the long run- am I wrong in this assumption?

    Asked by anon-329181 on 14 Jun 2022.
    • Photo: Zahra Massoud

      Zahra Massoud answered on 14 Jun 2022:

      I think this is a very wise decision! As someone in a very academia-focussed bubble, I’d actually never heard of a degree apprenticeship until right now!

      The answer depends a lot on the field you want to go in to. For some people, university is definitely the right step – for me, I wanted to be a doctor (and actually became a scientist) so getting a uni degree was a necessary pre-requisite for my career as there’s a lot more education you really need past school to do those things. For a lot of people though, I think they see uni as something they are supposed to do, rather than something they really want or need to do. As great as uni is for so many reasons, there’s definitely other career paths out there where you don’t need it!

      I think it’s very sensible for you to consider a degree apprenticeship as a way into a specific field, and it sounds like it might give you the best of both worlds. Ultimately it’s up to you and the jobs you might like to do later, but I’d say go for it!

    • Photo: Karin Purshouse

      Karin Purshouse answered on 15 Jun 2022:

      I think it really depends what you want to do! For me, because I wanted to be a doctor and later a scientist, University was the way to do that (you can’t be a doctor any other route) but in a way it was an apprenticeship because I learned the skills I needed to do the job that I do. For example, during my science degree I did a three month lab project, where I collected blood samples from patients and did experiments in the lab – very practical, and an apprenticeship of sorts. I don’t know much about degree apprenticeships but overall I think it’s great to think about what you’ll do with your degree afterwards and choose a course that will get you closest to teaching you the skills you need.
      I would say that many degrees are much more work oriented now, and often have a sandwich year or year in industry. So have a good look at what courses involve and talk to people doing the courses if you can, and that should help make your decision!

    • Photo: Rachel Harris

      Rachel Harris answered on 15 Jun 2022:

      It’s definitely important to consider all your options when making decisions like this. I definitely wanted to go to university, since I knew I wanted to work in research. But there were a lot of people around me who would have benefitted from doing further education other than university. For a lot of careers, experience is more useful than education. I think it’s great that you’re looking into other options – it really shows initiative!

    • Photo: Sophie Richardson

      Sophie Richardson answered on 15 Jun 2022:

      As others have said, it depends what you want to do and where you want to do it. It’s great that you’ve explored all your options and decided on a degree apprenticeship with university as a back up option. I know degree apprenticeships are a big thing in engineering, and are great because you get everything paid for by the company while you study at university and also get to learn on the job.

      However, some career paths, unfortunately, won’t have a degree apprenticeship route available. They’re not really common for research science careers as the path is a BSc degree then postgraduate study by Masters and/or PhD. However, a quick google shows me that companies like GSK do degree apprenticeships, if that’s what you’d like to do!

      It definitely sounds like you’ve thought about this a lot though. It’s probably not the answer you wanted, but ultimately you know what’s best for you and what career you will enjoy!

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