[Closed] Any tips for degree study?

Making yourself busy with lists and databases is a classic procrastination technique! As is sitting on the bog typing sarky advice on stw. Better go, supposed to be studying!

It is an excellent idea.

Is it in humanities, social science, or science?

Regardless, this can be extremely helpful: buy yourself a notebook and pen, and carry them with you everywhere, especially when you read. That way, whenever you have thoughts that relate to your academic work, you are able to write them down. Some of them will be silly and useless, but some will be excellent, and you can sort our which is which later.

Also, using the same notebook, taking notes when you read helps you process the content, and allows you to write more substantially than you would in the margins of a book. Plus, you shouldn't write in library books anyway.

Above all, try to enjoy it!

Top Tip , don't get a Playstation or a Bong

Do engineering. I did Geography. Pretty pointless in the end. Always demand for engineering graduates.

Do engineering. I did Geography

Bit late for that, i'm afraid! I'm on a Logistics BSc, which is what i do for a living anyway.

Degrees aren't inherently difficult these days, Duffer - what's challenging for your typical undergrad are mundane things like organisation, planning and time-keeping.
Most under-performing undergrads I see are almost never failing on their raw comprehension of the material, at least initially - they're failing because they don't have their shit together. You have a massive advantage here, as you're a grown-up and you're studying logistics. So keeping things squared away is what you're all about. So just take each module as it comes, don't worry if it seems too easy, and build up a pattern of good study habits.

I graduated last year with an environmental science degree at 48. I now work as a rural consultant in the sunny highlands. The previous poster got it in one about organisation. Plan, plan and plan. It removes all the stress, gives you appropriate timelines and gives your learning structure.
Be an active learner, not a passive one (no I didn't know what that meant either before I started).
I watched the kids fail time and again simply because they couldn't prioritise, so indeed keep your s**t together.
When being set assignments, read the flipping question as well. And when you are sure you know what they are asking you, read it again.
References - learn how to do it quickly and do it as you go, not at the end of a 1500 word essay ( cos I was in my flow man).
Don't read a dozen books when three will do the same thing. The biggest thing I learned was to streamline my learning.
And have faith in yourself, hard work and diligence pays off and it will make you a more rounded singletrack poster ( and of course more intelligent, better looking and attractive to impressionable Young female students)

Treat it like a job.
These are your tasks/meetings for the day, this is when you will do them and to do them at this time you need to have done this prep.

Evernote

put everything in Evernote

In the last year of my part time degree and it's been a god send. We get sent tons of stuff to read (almost all are pdfs or links to online journals) and putting them in Evernote (along with a pic of the notes I've taken if I bothered) has saved me no end of hassle.

It's also (imho) worth upgrading from the free version as it ocr's pdfs and pictures of your notes.

I have saved countless hours with this bit of software

Find out what the grading system is, and focus your efforts accordingly. No point busting your ass for 5% if something else is running simultaneously for 40%.

Also, work really hard. A good degree will be yours to cash in on forever, so a couple of years of pain is well worth it.

Treat it like a job.
These are your tasks/meetings for the day, this is when you will do them and to do them at this time you need to have done this prep.

+1

And a database of references is a good idea, as long as you've read and notated them (print them off and keep paper copies in folders organised by topic, it's a good way to cut down on the instinct to hoard unread .pdf's of papers).

I did a part time degree whilst working full time in my early 30s. It is about being able to be organised and being prepared to make sacrifices. Depending on workload, set aside one day or half day at weekends and a couple of evenings a week. Doesn't have to be the same days each week, just plan it and use it.

Getting a degree this way is hard, but employers recognise and respect that.

If there is any sort of group assessment involved, beware. You are only as good as the weakest/least commited member.

Don't get married at the end of your first year. Don't have a baby at the end of your second year.

Just trust me on that!

bookmarking this, cheers.

My top tips are try not to get stoned every day, miss all your lectures and never hand any assignments in...

For referencing I used Mendeley and it was an absolute life saver. It's a reference database that can be used within MS word to import your bibliography in whatever format you want (can setup custom formats as well)

You can also get it to look in your folders and it'll rip out the metadata from any books/papers/journals that it finds.

A really useful time saver, easy to use as well!

footflaps - you can hand them in up to a week late and still get the 40% you need.

And there's always re-sits!

I used a programme called end note for referencing. You can specify how the references are formatted (in accordance with your uni wishes) and provided you start using it at the start of your work it will automatically update your reference list.
Apply yourself like you do to your work and you will be fine

Some good stuff above - My two-penneth:

sangobegger - Member
When being set assignments, [u]read the flipping question[/u] as well. And when you are sure you know what they are asking you, read it again.

Also, keep going back to re-read the question.
It’s all too easy to ‘drift’, particularly if you’ve found source material that is interesting, good quality, but not actually answering the original question.

Correctly used, referencing should contribute validity and authority to your written work.
As an undergraduate you are not presumed to be an expert.
If I use MTBs as an example.
Your opinion on their design might be creative, interesting, even original; however, it will ‘carry more weight’ if combined with references from say Robert Egger, Gary Fisher, Keith Bontrager.

[IMG] [/IMG]
Buy this: Cite Them Right

MoreCashThanDash - Member
If there is any sort of group assessment involved, beware. You are only as good as the weakest/least committed member.

Early on our course we had the option of a ’Statistics’ module, which was pretty much: ‘How to use MS Excel to register / display / create / extrapolate data‘.
This was hugely useful throughout the course.

There is sometimes one definitive text / source regarding a particular subject.
E.g. back in the 1980s there was a book called ‘Motorcycle Chassis Design’ by Tony Foale. No competent person would have written on that particular subject without having read / referenced it.
There may be an equivalent for logistics.

If you find you are ‘word-tied’ and cannot get a start into what you want to write - a useful ‘trick’ is to draw a sketch / schematic and then describe it.

HTH

Just read as much as you can, on all aspects of your topic / course.

You can never know too much.

footflaps - you can hand them in up to a week late and still get the 40% you need.

And there's always re-sits!

How about 25 years late?

Can't you just buy the Degree off the internet?

If you're charlotte whatsherface of my geology course and you cry a lot and flutter your eyelashes then possibly.

She got the deadline for the dissertation moved back four weeks, upon recieving which news I went back to nurturing teat of the cider bottle. I missed however the rest of the year complaining (quite rightly) and getting the original deadline reinstated until 5 days before the deadline meaning I had a sleepless 100 hours of rabid typing - at the end of which I came out with just shy of a first (for that piece, desmond overall but lucky to get that in reality).

So yeah OP, cry and cheat and drink and take drugs and one day you'll be like a composite of me, charlotte and footflaps with a very ordinary qualification. HTH

So yeah OP, cry and cheat and drink and take drugs and one day you'll be like a composite of me, charlotte and footflaps with a very ordinary qualification. HTH

Exactly, I didn't get to where I am today by turning up on time sober and studying....

Learn how to use a referencing manager such as Endnote or Zotero. If your school has tutorials on stuff like that, go to it and practice.

Read in an organized and systematic way and keep notes as you go. I still use pencil and paper before typing them, but probably a tablet and something like Onenote or Evernote.

When you have an assignment, get the core reading done as fast as you can. Write a rough outline of your first draft from your notes, then refine it and write a first draft as early as you can. Put it aside and don't look at it for a week or two while you do the extension readings. Then read your first draft again and do a major rewrite. Do multiple rewrites until you're only making minor changes, then put it aside again for a week or two and go back and tidy it up. First drafts are always pretty rough, the more you rewrite it and polish it, the better the end result.

If you can't spell or punctuate, find a friend who can and ask them to proofread your work.

Cite them right is good.

I went from A Levels aged 18 to MSc aged 38. Yup, steeeeep learning curve. I personally used Zotero for my on line research management. It is very good.

RTFQ is essential. Write early, leave it, come back to it, read it again, edit it like holst said.

Are you doing this course through Lincoln Uni?

You and lots of people have mentioned references - I'd recommend finding out if your university has a group licence for [url= https://www.refworks.com/refworks2/ ]Refworks [/url]or a smiler reference manager, if they don't [url= https://www.mendeley.com/ ]Mendeley[/url] is free.

Both Refworks and Mendeley integrate with Word and will let you insert a reference in the correct format and then automatically build a table of references in the correct format. If you do this managing references is trivial

Learn how to do the references right at the start, I found it best to add everything I read straight into Refworks

I'll be more philosophical, rather than the excitingly-practically-minded data-reference-management-focussed advice that my fellow STWers appear to err on the side of..

Pretend to [i]think[/i] like a professor of your chosen subject. Don't just try to be an undergraduate student. [i]Think[/i] like an academic. Be inquiring [i]like an academic[/i]. Research each module, paper, assignment, as if you were an academic expert in that field.

Your grades - and enthusiasm - even for the most potentially boring parts of your course will improve greatly as a result.

Your assessors will want to grade highly people who are trying to think like them.

Thank you for the input, all. Especially the points about note taking; i know from experience that I very rarely make note of things, i simply rely on my brain to remember everything. It always lets me down... it's a habbit i will need to learn.

I'd never heard of EverNote. A little googling tells me it's broadly similar to OneNote. I've been given Office365 for free, which has OneNote included, so i'll certainly have a play with that. Thanks.

Treat it like a second job, be prepared to have a minimal social life for a while, especially at the start while you're feeling your way to how much work is required. If you can do an hour most evenings after work, that way you should have at least one full day free at weekends. Also you may be eligible to use local universities' libraries, there's a scheme you can apply for which will get you access (sconul, possibly?) via whoever you're studying with. Don't dismiss the local library as a quiet place to work free from distractions (partners, children, TV, Internet...)

I found the program Mindmap really useful at uni.

Get a job in a bike shop for £.

loddrik - Member
Do engineering. I did Geography. Pretty pointless in the end. Always demand for engineering graduates.

Don't do engineering

I did, and now everyone I know, even friends who were always in the bottom set, earn far more than me

Also you may be eligible to use local universities' libraries, there's a scheme you can apply for which will get you access (sconul, possibly?) via whoever you're studying with.

Yeah, we recieved a handout at the induction day about that scheme. Ironically, the University running my distance learning programme is also the closest to me geographically. I'll probably be moving to Oxfordshire sometime this year, so it could be something to make use of in the future.

Don't do engineering

I did,

What type?

Last year I studied for some professional exams and the following are things I found handy after ten years away from exams and nearly twenty years since my degree.

Simplemind app. It's a couple of quid on Android/Apple and about twenty quid for PC. It's a mind map making tool, very intuitive to use and with cloud storage portable between platforms.

Assuming you need to learn content for for exams you can Use images and diagrams and visual associations and review them by recreating them to commit stuff to memory. For example I learned some convoluted regulatory requirements by linking landmarks on a journey i do regularly to a key word or words from the requirements. Coloured pens and plain white paper are good I used to use right up to flip chart size.

Figure out a routine that works for you to get your hours in. I worked the same pattern week in week out.

If you have to travel for work take some books and a pad along. If I stopped for a coffee I'd do some reading or a quick review of something for ten minutes.

footflaps - Member
Don't do engineering
I did,

What type?

Civil/Structural, HNC level

I'll be more philosophical, rather than the excitingly-practically-minded data-reference-management-focussed advice that my fellow STWers appear to err on the side of..

There'splenty of time for that free thinking once he's got the basic admin sorted. I loved learning, but getting the basics nailed early is a few less things to worry about and give that latitude for more edumacation.

'll be more philosophical, rather than the excitingly-practically-minded data-reference-management-focussed advice that my fellow STWers appear to err on the side of..

I started out in engineering, ended up with an undergraduate degree in philosophy of science/political philosophy, then an MA in an interdisciplinary field which got me a job that is generally interesting. To succeed in any academic field, you need to read a lot, organize those ideas, and then link them to the bigger picture. The philosophical side is useless if you don't do your basic readings and organize your ideas. The information is useless if you don't think about it and restructure your existing knowledge.

As an undergrad, I basically did all my readings as fast as I could, wrote notes, then went on epic benders to loosen my synapses up a bit. That gave me time to ponder how the new information fitted into a bigger picture of the world and make connections between different areas of knowledge. That approach does not work if you don't do the readings first and organize your ideas. Just going on a bender will not help with your assignments, you must put in the grunt work first.

Are you doing this course through Lincoln Uni?

TooTall - i certainly am. You and i work for the same company, so you'll know the course i mean. Have you done it?

What are you going to do with your degree? 50% of graduates are under-employed/don't use their qualifications. Too many people with degrees chasing too few jobs and some employers are switching to direct hires / vocational training - degrees aren't necessarily a passport to higher employment these days. Make sure your qualification makes you more employable - try and blend your existing experience with your new knowledge to gain professional affiliations too

I'm contemplating starting a degree with th OU later in the year so this thread could be very helpful for me! I'm a mechanical technician by trade but looking at doing Environmental Science as it interests me a lot more than an engineering degree. I'm not too arsed if it gets me rich, I'm doing it to prove to myself that I can more than anything else. I also have no idea what I actually want to do with the rest if my life (I'm 30 at the mo) as in about 6 months I'm leaving my current job (contract ending) and have no idea what I want to do...

With that in mind, am I wasting my time and money?

I'm leaving my current job (contract ending) and have no idea what I want to do...

Give university a try. University isn't primarily a vocational school, it's about getting a broader education so that you can understand how the technical fields fit into a broader view of the world (i.e. "university" = universal knowledge). University gives you a lot of chances to take classes that interest you, for example philosophy, literature, history. If you decide your course of study is not what you expected, you can change to a different course or school and take your existing credits with you. I started out thinking I wanted to be an engineer but got bored with that, meandered around studying different things, and finally ended up working in a field that is almost totally unrelated to where I started. If you're bored with what you're doing and can afford to not work for a year or two, give it a try and don't be afraid to just ditch any courses you think are rubbish and try something else that sounds interesting.

Andy: if youre looking at Environmental Science, have a look at Birlbeck: they offer both part-time and/or distance learning courses,coupled with superb facilities and a great reputation in the field of Earth and Planetary Sciences.
I'm doing geology there now. I'm 41 at the moment and not sure where it'll lead. I've started off with a Certificate of Higher Ed. But I can upgrade to the degree if I want.

I would recommend Mendeley for referencing. It's brilliant! I also recommend teaching yourself to read on screen rather than printing out papers and highlighting. With Mendeley you can highlight the PDF. You don't then lose the paper on the floor at 2am.

I also recommend staying well away from Endnote. It will ruin you life by crashing at 3am the day of your deadline. Then Endnote demand £200 for the latest version to fix the problem. Especially true if you're on Office 365. Endnote seems to always be behind the current version of Word

Other than that an undergrad is about discipline. If you go out and get wrecked in the student bars every night you'll get a carp result. Get organised and do the work an you'll get a good mark.

** that should say [b]Birkbeck[/b] above.

@andypandy85
I would suggest also looking at an apprenticeship if you are looking at paying tuition fees. In my field (Marine Biology) a BSc. will get you a job at pretty much apprenticeship level. The difference being you get paid (a pitance) rather than having scary amounts of debt to pay off. A good enrionmental science company will often pay for promising employees to do a degree/masters/PhD at a later date.

I've got a BSc. and and MSc. It cost me £9k in fees plus 4.5 hrs living costs (MSc was funded by EU). The fees would now cost £18k+ With the numbers I paid it just about works out. With todays numbers I wouldn't do it. You'll never get rich doing environmental science. But you also need to be careful to make sure you don't get poor!

Just signed up for an MEd distance, so have book marked this with interest.

I'm told I will need around 19 hours per week to study - My mind says well that is just 3 hours per day, reality is there goes Saturday and Sunday.

OP - i'm an academic and i love mature students. Use that work ethic you have picked up doing a job and, as others have said, treat your degree as a job. If you're full time that means 37ish hours a week on uni work. Those gaps between lectures/seminars are for doing the reading, working on assignments, looking up those words you didn't understand.

When you get feedback on an assignment, re-read the work and make your own notes. Read someone else's and see what they did well/not well. Make a list of the things you got marks for and things you lost them on - in the next assignment make sure you keep doing the good stuff, and address the bad.

If you go to see a member of staff, make sure you have prepared. It is so annoying when someone asks about an assignment but has clearly given it no thought themselves.

Read - you'll never have a chance to explore a topic in as much freedom as while you're at university.

Start thinking about your assignments as soon as they are set.

dovebiker - Member
What are you going to do with your degree? 50% of graduates are under-employed/don't use their qualifications.

I don't understand what this means. A degree is what you learn, not the qualification. Even if you aren't using the discipline-specific knowledge learnt on a degree, in all likelihood graduates will be using the skills practiced and developed while at university. Moreover, learning how to learn is pretty crucial.

If you're full time that means 37ish hours a week on uni work. Those gaps between lectures/seminars are for doing the reading, working on assignments, looking up those words you didn't understand.

This package is a distance-learning degree. I'm working full time in a Logistics role and doing the degree on the side (when I'm not looking after the children!).

Thanks for the input! It's all pretty new at the minute.

What are you going to do with your degree?

I'm not really planning anything with it. It was a great opportunity i took / was given for some personal and professional development. That, and it might open some more doors when it comes to career-change time.

I spent a long time at uni (BA, Masters, and PhD). I never worked more than 35 hours a week, I'd say I averaged 5 hours a day at postgrad level, and probably 4 hours a day as an undergrad.
The only people I knew who worked "full time" hours at uni were the science PhDs.
When it came to writing up, I started to use EndNote, but as others have said, it was buggy and crashed a lot. Using some sort of citation software will certainly save you a lot of time in the long run.

I'm contemplating starting a degree with th OU later in the year so this thread could be very helpful for me! I'm a mechanical technician by trade but looking at doing Environmental Science as it interests me a lot more than an engineering degree.

This could be a good choice, as there is going to be a lot of opportunity in AgriTech over the next 20 years, for which an environmental science degree would be beneficial. Check out AgriTech East, they are bringing a lot of info together, it's an area I am looking to work in at some point in the future.

^ When I looked at OU it said for the masters level, I could use the term MA(open) but not MA, after my name, is that the case with all OU qualification?

Mendeley for your reference database.

^ When I looked at OU it said for the masters level, I could use the term MA(open) but not MA, after my name, is that the case with all OU qualification?

You can use whatever term you like. If people are that interested, you tell them it was OU. 99.999999% of folk won't be interested.

Update time:

Chipping away at the first module, and loads of the suggestions on here have been a great help already, so i owe you a debt of gratitude. I'll buy you all a virtual pint at some point.

I've been using OneNote as the portal into all of my study, and i think i'd be a little lost without it. So to those who suggested it (or EverNote, et cetera) i'll buy you two virtual pints.

Degree distance course? Does this mean you have to sleep with your hand every night? Going to get dull.

I have a wife too, if that counts?

Distance Learning isn't my field so the only real suggestion I can make is, find out what support there is and use it to the full. It varies a lot, some are very hands off but some institutions are now offering more support- web chats, named academic mentors and the like. We only do it for a few courses but those areas have seen a big improvement in completions and grades, I think we'll see more of it over hte coming years

Interested in this point in particular:

Don't read a dozen books when three will do the same thing. The biggest thing I learned was to streamline my learning.

I gather that i will add more credibility to my work by drawing from a wide range of sources. How far am i expected to go with this? For example; if i was to write:

[i]"We know cycling is great because Smith (2010) tells us [a], [b] and [c]." [/i]

Is this a credible statement? Or am i expected to say:

[i]"We know cycling is great because Smith (2010) tells us [a], Jones (2005) tells us [b], and Williams (2013) tells us [c]."[/i]

It feels like i'm scratching around for loads of different authors to re-state something that the first one has already covered...

See what your first set of marks tells you! Your marks and your tutor will guide you.
Saying that, I did my course to learn, and learn I did. I read voraciously and, at times, did find it hard to re-focus on writing the essays. But I learned and I'm happy with what I learned.

Treat it like a job.
These are your tasks/meetings for the day, this is when you will do them and to do them at this time you need to have done this prep.

This 100%

I went back to Uni at 31, and did a BSc in Design Technology/Engineering.
I just treated it as a 9-5 job - never really did much work in the evenings, and only looked at it at weekends over the last few weeks before my final stuff needed to be in.

make sure you get a copy of the mark scheme for every major piece of work - you usually get 10% just for presentation etc.

Oh, and I got a first.

Most of my classmates would miss lectures due to all night Playstation sessions/ getting wasted/ etc.. the only ones I missed were due to illness or doing paid work.

TooTall - Are you referring to the same course i'm doing? Or was this pre-employment?

I did a degree as a mature student at Bangor, as has been said treat it as a job, turn up, do the work get a degree.

Did my second year in Finland, the best part of the experience.

I didn't find it too taxing to be honest, 3rd year was fun and did my dissertation in the easter holidays, went to the computer room every day for a few hours and taadaa it was done. Got a 2:1 which I am proud of.

I enjoyed the experience, good luck to the OP.

Hijack!

I'm nearly 28, got a HND (construction), got a half decent job, but progression to a senior role, or elsewhere is very likely to be limited without a degree, as well as making membership of professional bodies more difficult to achieve.

I've been pondering studying for a degree, I could get one (RICS accredited BSc (Hons) building surveying) in 2yrs part time, or possibly 1 year on not quite such a good course.

Work might fund/part fund it, but I would pay to do it myself if they won't.

BUT, I'm the worst person at doing academic work in the world, so lazy, negative, leave everything til the last minute, just generally crap. Content, presentation, quality, quantity never an issue, I just never get anything done. Any advice for me? School report was always "lacks application".

Could you pick modules that are more / mostly exam based? I suffer badly from last-minute-itis, quite happy to do loads of reading and studying but sitting down to do a piece of coursework was something else entirely.

TooTall - Are you referring to the same course i'm doing? Or was this pre-employment?

Duffer - I did my A Levels and, other than work-based education, didn't step back into academia until I did a Masters which I started aged 39, still working full time (military), dad of a 1 year old.
Most of my classmates were very comfortable with the academic side of things. I had a great tutor who told me I might 'have trouble' because I was there to learn rather than just to do the minimum and get the pass.
She was right. I loved the learning and read lots. It was then tough to wind myself back in and get a focused-enough essay. I did learn a huge amount tho!
The 1st essay was the benchmark. The feedback was solid, it pointed to where I wasn't detailed enough, showed me where I was hitting the target. I refined it next time, got better marks having taken the guidance provided. Asking my tutor for further guidance as the course progressed was also helpful.
I did nearly 18 years in Logs but felt a MSc was better value for me in the end.

Ah ok, so you're talking about DLSC i presume. I might look into doing that in the future. One step at a time!