Education by Degrees

I was recently invited to a doctoral thesis presentation, the third such in 18 months.  This is a big deal for a Romanian PhD student who after completing the doctoral thesis, is expected to present a summary to a board of professorial examiners, listen to their comments, and then wait while the board withdraws to pronounce on whether or not the doctorate may be approved.  This ordeal is hard enough in itself but in Romania this is all done in front of a roomful of family and friends, other teachers, and fellow students. 

Of course the student has no idea what comments to expect from the professors, nor for that matter how long they might speak. How many of the board, apart from the supervising academic, do actually read the entire thesis and don’t rely simply on the written abstract which the student has so obligingly distributed in writing, along with a bound copy of the full thesis? And how long do they spend preparing their remarks?  I was witness to one performance where the comments were scrawled in manuscript on a scruffy piece of paper and were full of grammar mistakes, so many in fact that he was obliged to apologise.  On the other hand, it is not uncommon for an examining academic to re-explain at great length what the student has already attempted to explain in the thesis.  Does this mean he thinks it is not clear enough already?  Or is it because he wants to impress upon the assembled audience that he has actually read the thesis and, even better, has understood it?  And is anyone listening anyway?

As far as I know, no-one undergoing this doctoral trial has ever been failed.  Once the supervising professor has given approval for the thesis to be presented, it is understood that the board will concur.  Which begs the question why does the board bother to withdraw at all?  Perhaps they just want a drink and a quick cigarette? My personal take is that it’s designed to add to the drama of the occasion which is after all to celebrate the end of many hard months of research and writing.  To top off the experience, there’s always a party, in true Romanian style, plenty of food and drink and congratulations.  This I find very endearing, this custom of celebrating one’s good news with one’s friends, and I always feel honoured to be included.

Now I am full of admiration with people who study for Masters or PhDs almost entirely in their own time while holding full-time and demanding jobs.  At the end of the day, I come home to slump on the couch and snooze in front of the TV. I’m incapable of reading anything more taxing than the newspaper.  The thought of having to go on to the library, a lecture, even worse, an exam, or simply to a different computer screen would fill me with despair.  I simply don’t have the self discipline or the energy for that sort of effort.  So what is it that drives so many Romanians to put themselves through this intellectual torture?

There is an unhealthy obsession in this country with post-graduate qualifications which compels otherwise normal people to put their personal lives on hold until they notch up another degree or two.  I was advised that I couldn’t employ my driver because he hadn’t got his High School Baccalaureat. He had instead a vocational qualification that apparently disqualified him from driving a private vehicle (a saloon, not an articulated truck) for a living.   Clearly driving here is a skilled occupation requiring the equivalent of several ‘A’ levels.  Is it any wonder so many Romanians want to work elsewhere in the EU where such stupidities don’t apply?

In Britain I know a handful of people with a PhD, or even a Masters.  In Romania, with my Bachelor’s degree, and only one of them at that, I’m in a minority. If you’re applying for a job in Romania, experience is not considered nearly as valuable as a string of letters after your name.  I sense an undercurrent of condescension from some of the youngsters who work for me because they have or will have a masters degree and I don’t.  But too much of the education here is still almost entirely knowledge-based.  Exams are set to test how well you memorise and re-present the lectures they dictate or the books they have instructed you to read. If you were to place some of the product of the universities in a job which demands common sense, judgement, a bit of imagination, they would be lost. Original thought is not expected, in fact in some cases, it is actively discouraged.  After all, this threatens the present teaching establishment, much of which is largely unchanged since pre-1989 or created in the same mould.  

Andrei Postelnicu’s article (in Romanian) in a Romanian business weekly, Capital, (http://www.capital.ro/articole/dictatura-diplomei/107017) makes the point that qualifications from a specific faculty are not sufficient as an indication of potential.  He refers primarily to France but mentions a similar phenomenon in Romania.  He’s right. A political science or a law degree is viewed, at least by students, as a pre-requisite for anyone wanting to go into politics.  I would be surprised if there is anyone in Parliament today without a degree or two.  How can they claim to represent the mass of people in the country who have no university education?   Or is this irrelevant? Are political leaders supposed to be on a higher intellectual plane than their followers?

One of the hopes for Romania’s future is the growing number of young people who are being educated and employed in Western Europe and the US. If they can only be attracted back to Romania, they could be a real force for a more modern approach to education.  But would they even get through the door for an interview at the moment without a Bachelors degree, one or two Masters, and halfway through their PhD?  In the meantime, I’ll continue to admire the perseverance of my friends who give up so much of their private time to pursue their education,  gladly accept their invitations to the Trial by Professor and raise a glass or two to them afterwards.  Cheers!