Concern regarding BA

[mr_robato]

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I went to the UWS open day on Sunday. The Economics lecturer, showed us a graph showing the number of CEOs of top ten Australian companies and thier educational back grounds (in regards to their bachelors).

Economics was up top, most number of CEOs had an Economics degree (about 40 or so). Law was third on the ranking. Surprisingly, the second heighest number of CEOs had an Arts/Humanities background. My sister, knowing I am mainly interested in arts nudged me with her elbow

The bloke couldn't stress enough that Law, Economics and Arts are the true intellectual fields. I couldn't agree more. Accountancy, Commerce or Engineering graduate CEOs were is alot less supply on his table.

Originally Posted by meilz92

how about doing a combined degree? you could do like..

B commerce/B Arts
B Laws/B Arts


since you wanna work for federal agencies and all, i think it would be very beneficial for you to combine it with one of those degrees

i think im going to do B commerce/B arts and with the arts degree, major in psychology. im not sure yet but yeah... gotta go to the open days n check it out before i submit my UAC application. maybe you should do the same? not much time left tho =S

We're on the same page. I intend on filling up my electives with Law units. So if I find that my (hopefully) good BA marks aren't working in my favor I'll be able to get that B Law with 2 more years at Uni.

Originally Posted by Josie

As a BA student living with someone who is doing Law... really, seriously, consider that choice.
I personally know several BA students working in APS, and one or two for DFAT. These are all from a regional university.

I seriously advocate going for what you *want* to study. If you are studying things you enjoy, your marks will be a tonne better, you're more likely to complete your studies, and you're more likely to get into a job you love.

They don't look at your application, see a BA, and throw it out. Even majors which are considered 'fluffy' or 'unrealistic' are actually highly valued for critical thinking, especially something like philosophy, which may sound insane, but I promise, if you can get decent marks in philosophy (for example), you could excel in the APS.

Perhaps if you're so keen on adding some value to it, start a BA, and do a law elective. It'll let you know pretty quickly if it's a good idea or not.

It is so important to do something you want to do.. So many people hate their way through university only to go on to jobs they hate too (Commerce -> Accounting, I'm looking at you). You will see many of these same people in Arts degrees as mature age students. The head of the School of Social Sciences, Media and Communication is a former Accounting/HR manager who realised what he was doing was just not for him.

Words, but yeah. Go with what you want!


Edit: Part of the perceived problem with BA's is that yes, P's can definitely = degrees, lots of people cruise through on a low credit average and then find they can't get a job at DFAT, and blame the degree.

Woaw. Thanks for taking the time out to type up so much advise.

I think I'll go with the Humanities (BA/Intl stu).


I hate accounting to start with With all due respect to any aspiring or current accountants here, I think y'all are bimbos and only doing it due to the availability of Job and cash in this field

Originally Posted by moc2009

I agree with the above post. Study what you WANT to do.

DFAT don’t only look at Law and Commerce, one of my mates did a BA with a major is music and got straight into DFAT (graduate program).

Also my flat mate works as an APS 6, he did a degree in IT (his job is not IT related at all), His degree also had 3 fails on it – he applied directly to them, not through a graduate program and got straight in at a higher level than most of the the graduate program people (So it’s obviously not all based on grades). He’s also already done a posting overseas.

Government jobs are looking at the person, in a lot of cases they don’t care what degree you did, as long as you actually did a degree as it shows you can stick to a task and complete it, that you have critical thinking, good writing and communication skills.

The people they don’t want are the ones who apply because they want to be a diplomat straight out of uni and travel the world – it’s not going to happen like that. I’m doing International Relations and it’s full of these people... it’s sad, really sad.

Do the Degree that you want to do, get the best grades you can and you will get the job you want.

Also look at ASIS, no one ever knows about them... they always go on and on about wanting to work for ASIO. ASIO are the little guys, ASIS are the big ones.

Cheers dude. I've had a look-see at pretty much all the APS jobs available, from dept defence tall the way down to AUSAID/Dept-Venterens affairs.

I'm all over this APS thing.





Thanks all for the time-out and advise.

[mr_robato]

University preferences have been edited from the various Business options brown to the bottom half and the Humanities brought up to the top half.

Cheers guys.

[0bs3n3]

Hmm, wondering what you actually do in jobs at APS or any other relevant place? BA seems to be my natural calling, but I'm really concerned about where it flows to from there.

[PwarYuex]

Originally Posted by Lentern

My view is that like most stigma's there is some truth in it but is also blown out of proportion.

I completely disagree. The best universities in the world offer BAs and little else to undergrads.

If you think whatever your degree is called is important, I would suspect your inability to grasp the fundamentals of making yourself a valuable commodity will be much more of a problem than what you study.

[mr_robato]

Originally Posted by PwarYuex

I completely disagree. The best universities in the world offer BAs and little else to undergrads.

If you think whatever your degree is called is important, I would suspect your inability to grasp the fundamentals of making yourself a valuable commodity will be much more of a problem than what you study.

I realized that, totally. It's something I want to work on (:

Can't be impossible to do so.

My view isn't as grim any more, Arts is what I've punched into my preferences.