I have decided that my previous education ( educated to the degree of a professional doctorate) really was not a "good" education. My PhD research plunges off into other related fields in the social sciences, but I often find myself thinking that if I had not loved to read, lived in a totally boring place ( prior to moving to Bleak Towers) and had a huge love of learning and curiousity, I would be so out of my league on the PhD that it would be scary. I have read around topics in social sciences and humanities because I enjoy them, but not because I got educated about them or even exposed to them.

A lot of the theoretical literature can also wax philosophical--literally as well as metaphorically--on writers/academics such as Foucalt, Said, Bhabha, Satre, and Beavoir ( I cannot even spell it). I remember reading some of this once I completed my first bout of degrees ( before the PhD) wondering why I had never been exposed to it in my broadly social sciences degrees.

I have challenged myself to go into related social sciences in pursuit of my PhD research ( sociology, anthropology and some international relations) and have managed to bring myself up to a reasonable degree of knowledge...but some of that knowledge my supervisor seems to accept as something anyone would have.

My American education seems to have left huge knowledge gaps in what

I was exposed to. Maybe this is a feature of education everywhere--but it seems a weakness of American education. Most Americans are mono-lingual ( I am, I dare not count my Spanglish as a second language) but in most European countries, people speak at least another language fluently and sometimes several more.

What do people think of the foundation their own education gave them in the pursuit of their PhD, whatever field?

I went to a very average British secondary school and because contemporary secondary school is essentially 'crowd control' I had to stay after school to do work that had been either deleted by other students in lessons - or to get help from teachers whose energies in class were spent on the rowdy kids. I had to read widely then, and whilst at university (undergraduate)to try and squeeze more 'value' out of my education.

I would always be incredulous at undergrad when others had failed to do the bar minimum seminar readings, yet alone anything else.

I don't think that my education has prepared me that well for my PhD. I am having plug my linguistic gaps by learning two languages (of which only one I really enjoy) at this stage, which is depressing in an office of able and fluent bilingual students.

I guess I am pleased with some of the use I can put my wide reading to today, but when all is said, I do worry that my pretty mediocre education and abilities will never really engender a good PhD..

That is interesting to hear, Chris--and something somewhat surprising as it would seem in comparison that the UK has a much stronger education system than the US. I have no idea what the functional literacy rate is in one country v the other, but would be worth finding out, if for nothing else than curiousity's sake. I had degreed professionals in the US ask me what language was spoken in England!!!

I think you'll find that the english education system varies from county to county and school to school. I personally went to a single-sex school. I was in classes that were streamed from the beginning, meaning I was always in classes with people of the same abilities as me. I did also find that there were people at uni at undergrad level just doing the bare minimum to pass. I luckily managed to go straight from my undergrad degree to my PhD, without a Masters, as my undergrad degree was already fairly specalist. However, I have never done a thesis before and so my supervisors have taken a bit of a risk with me!

Hi olivia! I was actually blogging about this very thing this morning. I maintain that nothing could have prepared me for the PhD. I undertook an MA beforehand, and I find that it has contributed very little to my PhD work. In fact, much of what I learned on the MA has been disputed. Even the expectations upon the writing at doctorate level, for instance, are so different from anything we will have experienced before. Our minds are very selective in what they will retain anyway, so whatever education we've had will be simmered down to particular tidbits that our brains have chosen to retain, and that can be so random! Even as we sit doing our reading for the PhD, we will end up holding on to very little comparatively. It's such a random process, the things our mind decides to latch onto.

Hi Olivia - interesting question! At secondary school I was quite average but it was a grammar school which specialised in maths and science - the two things I am worst at!!Needless to say, they didn't really nurture the pupils who preferred the arts and humanities. I felt hugely inadequate at the start of my undergrad degree as I didn't do the a-levels that fully equipped me for the subject matter, however, as time went on and I read more and got more interested I did get a lot out of my first degree. Saying that, I did all learning off my own back as my degree programme was very badly run and fellow undergrads wouldn't do the expected amount of work (as chrisrolinski also noted!) which lead to poor quality seminars etc.

I think my MA equipped me to some extent for this PhD - it was different to the area of my first degree and so I had to do some quick learning! However, I think the way it was run did contribute some skills towards what I'm doing now (organisation, research, presentation wise & subject wise etc.). It was also the first time I learnt with students who had a true interest in the subject matter (as opposed to some of the undergrads I knew) and that was amazing. The MA was the educational experience I most contribute to my still being here!!

p.s. I have come from the other direction - from those waxing philosophical into broader social science!

Hi there. I am not doing a PhD... yet (-that'll come soon, hopefully), but I can totally relate to what you guys say anyway, especially you Xeno on our minds being selective.

Theories of people like Sartre, de Beauvoir or Foucault ( Olivia) are, among lots of Greeks and Germans, on the philosophy curriculum for French A-levels - compulsory for all. I actually had a really good teacher, so I blame it all on myself now as, almost ten years later, I need to know a minimum about them for my current job and remember virtually... nothing.

The same goes for languages: I took English, German, Latin and Spanish at school, but was only ever willing to practice my English. The result is I can't utter a word of German today (though I studied it for 7 years and got good grades!), can hardly ask for directions in Spanish, and I don't even want to talk about my Latin

Same thing went on at University when I was an UG, to a lesser extent. I mean I don't feel like I made the most of it. The course was good though. I studied English (language+literature+history - UK and US). It was about 12-15 hours of teaching a week... quite a bit more than what you get in the UK! On top of that, halfway through my degree, I took a prep class for a year, which was extremely challenging.

All in all, I still feel very ignorant, but the one thing I got out of my education in France is that I never find anything very daunting, in particular because I've always had to deal with things I had not chosen (- be it at school or at University, I never had a choice of options, modules etc: you sign up for a whole course or you don't sign up at all).

However I do find that the MA in English studies I got in the UK remains the most useful piece of paper I ever got! But this is perhaps mainly because I am foreign. First, the MA shows I have a good command of English, so I've never been asked to produce (expensive) IELTS or TOEFL results. Most importantly, I feel it was the best preparation for the PhD I want to apply for because it taught me a lot about English academic requirements and procedures, and also because I SO enjoyed writing that dissertation that it somehow confirmed I could go ahead and try and apply...

I'm not sure that a taught education gives you the best background for any research, what you need is to be able to do things under your own steam. I spent most of my time at school and beyond studying science subjects, but I have read widely since I was quite small - and still do. My house is full of books, one room is lined with bookcases and they are full, and there are bookcases in every room - except the bathrooms and kitchen (well maybe a few cookbooks there)Have you read Illich's Deschooling society? you can download it from the web, he was an interesting character, not sure I hold with all his views especial;ly those of other works of his, but he has some good points - Can't get on with Foucault though. however what I do find is that the more I read the more I realise how little I know - but that is a good reason for another visit to the bookshop