Double or nothing

By VAL LEVESON

"I might employ a commerce graduate as a gardener but definitely not for anything that requires thinking."

The speaker is multimillionaire property tycoon and author Bob Jones, famous for, among other things, saying he is interested in employing only someone with a generalised degree.

It's a question that occupies the mind of many senior school students deciding on the best course of study - should they opt for what will guarantee them a job, or for something that fascinates them no matter how impractical?

"I want someone with a general knowledge, general interests, someone who can think," says Jones.

A commerce degree is a "ghastly thing to do", he says. And an MBA is "a confidence trick".

"Universities are dealing with people at a critical stage of life and denying them education. How about human nature, curiosity? Poor kids."

But, as Gilbert Peterson, spokesman for the Employers and Manufacturers Association says, some jobs require a particular degree: engineers need to study engineering, and accountants, lawyers and others need specific qualifications.

But if communicating at a high level will be part of your job, arts subjects may give you the edge.

"Businesspeople want employees with creativity, who can think and know where to get information," Peterson says. "Many feel specialist knowledge can be trained. They want people with broad interests."

So it may be best to do both, he says, which is what 19-year-old Anaise Irvine is doing.

In her first year at Massey University, Irvine is studying for a bachelor of business and arts conjoined - the term used for two degrees taken together.

The course will take her four years and Irvine decided on it because she enjoyed business and arts and didn't want to give one up.

"Also, one degree is not enough any more. These days, everybody has a degree. I felt having two would give me an edge."

She says business and arts complement each other and arts help her learn to think outside the square. This semester, she is studying information systems, marketing, macro-economics and reading the media. In reading the media, she is studying romance novels.

Jenny Gross, 18, has been making her own decisions after finishing school in Canada. She is looking forward to study at Auckland University next year.

She and her parents researched what was available in New Zealand. She has also decided to do a combination, a bachelor of arts and a law degree, that will take five years.

"I am interested in arts subjects and, as much as I would like to get a bachelor of arts, I don't want to end up living in a box on the highway because I've got a PhD in philosophy and can't get a job," says Gross. "I'd rather get a degree that will get me a good job that I can go anywhere with.

"But I'd also like to pursue my arts subjects, because I like them and want a more rounded education. And then I can have a job where I can make enough money and have spare time to pursue other interests."

Her mother Vicky says: "Jenny is definitely an arts type of person. However, I think you can't help becoming a rounded person these days, if you're that sort of person.

"There's access to different things, such as Discovery Channel and the internet. Of course these don't replace university study, but they are available to those who want to be more rounded.

"I don't think you need generalised university education as much as in the old days, but its nice to have some of it.

"A too rounded degree is obsolete," says Vicky. "A PhD in a remote subject just to make you a rounded person before you study a profession is not realistic any more.

"With a conjoined degree you're doing things towards your career each year. The rounding-out process with no focus can make you less employable because you don't seem to have a direction to employers."

Dale Furbish, president of Career Practitioners of New Zealand, says employers value initiative and problem solving, thinking outside the boundaries, verbal skills - things that come from generalised study.

"The conjoined degree is a good compromise," she says. "But even people who are doing focused qualifications should be involved in other activities, not just academic.

"Get involved in leadership programmes, develop interests outside what's being studied. Use what's available to you, whatever you're studying and come out as a rounded person, even if you have chosen a focused degree."