having been a strawberry mivvy for just over a year now and a non-graduate (supplementary list shag), I would contend, from my limited experience, that what counts most is professional experience (Pilot, Nav, ATC,Engineer) backed up with something else. That something else, in my very humble opinion, should be a language. If you are able to speak, French, German, Italian, Spanish etc, then the world is your oyster. Being a native English speaker, you already have an advantage in that most aviation regulations etc are written in English.

Forget Shriv, Stafford or Pompey. Get yourself an exchange, learn a European language and you will never regret it!

I would have thought that, as a general principle, students should treat anything given a "hard sell" by DIOT staff with a large degree of skepticism!

I never thought I'd drag this moniker out of retirement, but here goes....

There is only one reason why KCL will not be providing the academic input into IOT - the so-called (and self confessed/obsessed) 'Dean'.

The rest of the KCL lecturers were a wonderful bunch of well-read, enthusiastic and engaging people who is was apleasure to work alongside; however, the 'Dean'! Well, I'm sure you can all read between the lines and smell a rant.

I hope that (as others have suggested) they are all able to cross-deck to the new Uni. As for his 'Deanship'........

I really looked forward to all the KCL segments of the IOT course, they were well thoughtout, well delivered and [almost] all of the lecturers were very engaging. Would be a shame for future studes to miss out on that. IOT shouldn't solely be about beastings by the PTIs and jumping around in the mud with the Reg.

The ones who want to cross-deck are cross-decking. A couple are thinking about staying with 'mother'. The Dean to whom you refer is no longer the Dean; hasn't been since before Christmas & isn't anything to do with KCL any more.

It's good to hear that at least some of the talent will be staying, but it doesn't change the fact that KCL was still a world leading institution, with access right at the heart of London and it's various think tanks and Whitehall. But Portsmouth is still an ex-Polytechnic and as many of these ex-Polys are probably more suited to practical subjects than rigorous academic debate and study. And like it or not, but that background and associated institutional policies and ways of doing things will eventually filter through to the output regardless of how many academics come across.

There are MBAs and there are MBAs, just are there are for BSc or BA - depends on what they are in and where you studied them. However, having a degree or Masters is better than nothing at all - it might be the thing that gets you to interview when not having one won't! So don't get all priggish about ex-Polytechnics and establishments with a lower reputation than the normal "red brick" Universities. Be happy that these schemes recognise some of our efforts and make it easier for military types to get a qualification that will attract an interview - you could be an Oxbridge Professor but still come over as a d!ck in the interview and be useless at work because you have no common sense!!! :eek:

However, I do believe that academia is a bit of a self licking lollypop in certain areas; almost as bad as some of the "management speak" exhibited here. So being a graduate of the "University of Service Life" should not be over looked.

iRaven