Uni

This might upset either or both of my readers. If it does, then I humbly ask the offended party or parties to rethink their role in life, and to summarily fuck off, because I don't care.

Uni.

To put this in perspective, I didn't go. This was mainly because I'm thick, but on reflection I was bloody lucky. I was hankering after a place in a good university to do tonmeistry. I passed the instrumental auditions and such like, then failed the technical 'A' levels with flying colours, adding a couple of 'O' levels to my meagre total.

Most of my mates at school went to either Uni or Tech, depending on their chosen career path. I missed them for about twenty minutes but then realised that about the only thing I had in common with most of them is that we both went to school.

So I got a job, as monkey boy, and worked my way up. It was shift work so we got a good wedge in return for our efforts, and it was a small company so it was relatively easy to wriggle ones way to the middle grounds and more cash.

Everyone was encouraged to go to University if they were in a grammar school, which I was. I didn't realise at the time that my school was shit, that the English teacher was a ratbag and the headmaster was a ponce. I found that out later, and taught myself English properly.

Nowadays, a lot of people go to Uni, which devalues it. I have some experience of it from the outside, in various guises, and I have a solution to a problem which I think would make England a better and more productive place, were it to be implemented.

Here are my few stories.

Two of my daughters went to Uni. One because she is a nurse and to keep her job and gain the promotion she wanted meant having to have a degree, so she put herself through Uni whilst working shifts on a hospital ICU. Fair play, she's a fighter. She got top marks. The other has just finished and is awaiting her results, hoping for a 2:1. She might get it. She knows it won't help her much, and she spent three years on the piss, something she became very good at. My only son got a degree in Computer Science and maths and now works as a consultant in London. Good for him.

Friends of mine have a son who has spent the last couple of years at a "good" Uni doing geography. He is now going to take the path into one of the big wastes of space accountancy practices which I won't name, PwC, and will then be offered out to clients with more money than sense, such as governments, as a "consultant". He, too, spent the last few years on the piss and partly in the local casualty department of a hospital because he can't handle his ale.

A couple of years ago, we took on a graduate in electronic engineering from Queens, Belfast, which allegedly is not too shabby a place. He had an honours in EE, and we set him to work. Because of the placement, his tutors were involved and on the first review he showed them the circuit he had made. The tutor's question was "Jesus, you haven't plugged that in, have you?" and I realised that we had been sold a pup. We got rid of him, and not too soon either, as he was an activist pillock who spent most of his time working out his entitlement and moaning about smoking.

I am told, mostly by modern luvvies, that finishing a Uni course demonstrates an ability to learn. It also sets one up for life as one has to fend for oneself, do washing, ironing and such like.

And to this I say "Bollocks".

I have seen Uni courses in things I know about. They are pathetic. You don't have to spend weeks in New York to get a degree in geography. It will still be there when you leave. Also, it features in films, which you can buy or borrow, and watch. And you can get books about it. I read one once, which is why I've never been to New York.

And a good way to learn how to fend for yourself is to move out of your parents' house. Simples.

So here is my plan. Have Uni, which teaches basic things about a subject. Go on a course in a subject having at least some relevance to the career you have in mind. And do some work. What that means is sitting in a room without a stacking HiFi system, with books and the Internet, and get up in the morning (that's the thing that happens when the sun comes up), and learn stuff, and go to bed sober.

Should take about six months, unless you're going to be a doctor, and they tend to work hard anyway.  That way, you won't have a debt, and you'll be of some value.

QED