(Hons)
 

Why do senior commanders deem it necessary to include (Hons) after their degree? What possible relevance does this have? And why do some even add (Cantab) or (Oxon) as well? I think we should be told, after all, I haven't seen any BA (Huddersfield), for example.....

Because that is the full honorific. And Huddersfield tells a whole different story. 😈

An Honours Degree is a higher qualification than a Pass degree involving a longer period of study and a higher achievement standard, so the general practice for post-nominals (not just "senior military commanders") is to include "BSc(hons)" where it's been earned. It's not really any different to using "MSc" rather than "BSc" when you have a masters degree (which involves a different kind of study, a minimum original research content and a higher academic attainment) compared to a bachelors degree. The genera; convention is also that you only include one degree (the highest or most recent depending on preference) in your post-nominals, so my BSc(hons) has given way to my MSc. You do sometimes see "MSc(dist)", but that's just pretentious wankage with no official status in which people are trying to emphasise that they achieved a distinction grade in their masters. I don't feel the need, probably because my distinction didn't come as a surprise...(;))

Graduates from Oxford, Cambridge, Exeter and Durham have degrees with the latinised style of their name incorporated into the Degree title in accordance with their charters because they are the oldest four universities in the country. Why this stopped at four is not clear, except that they were the *only* universities for quite a long time. This you get MA(Oxon), MA(Cantab), MSc(Exon) or MSc(Dunelm) respectively.

The charters of later universities do not include this provision.

Well you did ask...

PDR MSc(not cantab, oxon, exon or dunelm) C.Eng MIET

The 'Hons' bit is part of the degree title and to show what you achieved. Either one did the extra modules to get an Honours Degree or one didn't and 'only' receives an ordinary degree but I agree that adding Cantab or Oxon or whatever is simply showing off.

CS
BA (Hons) Govt, Somewhere unimportant

Could you explain please?

To quote Tom Holt: "That sounds like one of those famous oxymorons like 'Military Intelligence' or 'the University of Hull'."

ie I suggest it was a bit of good-natured banter.

PDR

It might have been intended thus but IMNSHO not terribly funny. Especially as SWMBO has just worked her rocks off to get her Masters.. at Hudds.

I'm sure no insult was intended, but it is true that a degree from oxbridge is a course which is harder to get onto and much harder to graduate with than one from most other universities in the UK.

But on the other hand "MA(cantab)" is actually a warning that the holder hasn't done a proper Masters, but merely remained alive fro two years and paid an additional fee sence graduating with a BA(cantab).

PDR

She has got rocks?

Harder to get onto, but I have never seen anything that suggests the courses at Oxbridge are actually tougher than those at a load of other high end universities. I've certainly met very few engineering graduates from either university who were as good as most Russell Group graduates in the same subjects.

I do recall the fun some years back when Oxford had played fast and loose so much with the syllabus of their engineering degrees that the Engineering Council removed them the list of accredited courses for the award of Chartered Engineer. That was entertaining to watch from the sidelines. Some of us went to university to study a subject (in my case, fairly obviously, engineering) rather than go to the "right" university!

Non honours courses are fairly common outside the UK just not here. Ireland commonly awards "plain" BEng or BSc degrees, with Honours being another year - Australia as well I believe. The differences tend to be particularly of the more advanced topics and dissertation that prove the graduate's ability to work independently.

G

CEng BEng(Hons) PhD

Such a difference, if evident, would also be a worrying commentary on standardisation. A first degree, hons or not, is a Level 6 qual. All degrees should reflect that.

CG

Aerocrat....
 

Back in 'aerocrat' :yuk: times, the RAF didn't really care what degree you were reading. We were encouraged to bail out of Towers to seek university entry. Which seemed like an excellent idea at the time when one was 'enjoying' the bull$hit of 'crowing' and living in the South Brick Lines...

More interest in Chipmunking than Aero Eng at QMC (which seemed to have very little to do with aircraft - just hard sums and taking down copious notes from professors who were useless teachers) meant that I had to repeat a year, but this had the benefit of coinciding with a point in history when the overwhelming majority of graduates from the JP course were streamed Fast Jet, rather than just the top 2 or 3 from a course of about a dozen. Otherwise I'm sure I would never have had the fun of flying the Gnat and Hunter!

BEagle BSc(Eng) (Lon) (just scraped a pass!)

I can put three letters and a star after my name, but never have and never will.

It reflects something professional and betters an Hons in underwater basket weaving.

If I want to impress someone with my academic record, I truthfully tell them that I was in the top 99 percent of my class.

Fortunately, most people can't figure out that this just means that I wasn't in the bottom one percent. :D

Which is about on par with me telling people that, on, average my brother my sister and I have two degrees each, but omitting to mention that they each got three. However, I do occasionally tell Americans that I went to Dartmouth, and they seem quite impressed that I attended an Ivy League school....

Which inevitably reminds me of the young officer who proudly announced that he had a degree in marine biology and was promptly put in charge of underwater hull cleaning!

Jack
BA (Hons)(Failed) in Applied Psychology at the University of HK**

** No, not Hong Kong - the University of Hard Knocks

What was the name of that dog in "The Perishers"? Friend of Boot. "BA, Calcutta (failed)"

My view?
 

I think that if you get annoyed by someone putting Cantab or Oxon after their name it says more about you than them. Good luck to them I say. I hope one or all of my kids will one day get to do the same. If they don’t I’ll still be just as proud.

FWIW, I have a very average degree (with Hons) from a very average educational institution.

Why live life being negative? It doesn’t make you any happier to disparage others.

BV

And regarding Hull, which my daughter didn't go to, they were the moderator for my daughter's modern history degree and a dissertation on air policing in the inter-war years.

When you do, don't forget to to tell the Cousins that you live in *Old* Jersey!

Jack

Ghengis...
I was a Chartered Engineer once (not deserved), gave it up when I retired, fees too high for me.
My BSC was 'ordinary' (girl friend), my MSC the best of it's year according to Prof "L".
Nothing matters once you are established in your career.
Just my opinion, of course.

There are so many slight variations that they are almost impossible to keep a track of. When I did my first degree it was at a college (formerly RAF Padgate), which was overseen by the University of Manchester. All the BA degrees were Ordinary because they all entailed joint studies and the University of Manchester (more correctly titled the Victoria University of Manchester) would not issue Hons to joint studies. As such, my degree was issued as a pure BA without any possibility of Honours. It was all a bit odd at a time when many Higher Ed establishments were offering Joint Honours degrees.

Having completed the degree I applied to undertake an MSc in one of the subjects and was accepted subject to achieving the appropriate grade - a Distinction. This was equivalent, they felt, to a 2:1 or better in an Hons degree. I have to say that I didn't ever feel that others on the MSc, who had come from 'proper' universities had enjoyed a better standard of preparation than I had.

There are people starting to come through the system now with MSci degrees but no Bachelor credentials - these are 4-yr courses where the end result is an MSc, but by skipping the BSc bit, it allows the courses to be funded (by loan) for the full period; the extra 'i' is the tell-tale.

Having been in the mob now for 29 years, there are still times when I fall back on things I learned (especially stats!) and I do use the post nominals on business cards and the like. In my view it's the correct thing to do.

Incidentally, I still hold the view that the post noms act as a form of warning to others of how much professional knowledge can be expected as from a particular JO. As a very new flt lt 'Green Shielder', the fg offs around me were often a lot more professionally experienced than me.

STH MSc BA RAF

What annoys me is the fact that my 2:1 degree which I got at the advanced age of 47 in 1993, and which I was congratulated on at the time now seems to be the norm, with a fair proportion of graduates getting firsts. On our year, out of 19 of us doing Russian degrees, only one got a first, and even he had to do a viva to confirm it. Of the remainder the split between 2:1s and 2:2s was about 40/60. Universities will tell you there has been no dilution of standards, but the figures speak for themselves

Not that it matters much to me, it's many years since I signed myself

TTN, BA (Exon) ;)

Amen to that. A very proud day for us was attending our daughter's degree ceremony at the Sheldonian in Oxford, where she got her M.Litt. She quite shamelessly puts M.Litt (Oxon) after her name, with her MA and BA from Nottingham. It has impressed a few employers, even though nobody has a clue what an M.Litt is!

Having led a non-academic life, I have long ceased to worry about such things and have never signed off as a degree holder; nor, to my knowledge, have my children. Indeed, in such circumstances, I can't think why anyone would.

Isn't that on omelette in New Zealand? :p

Treadders BA (Bugger All)

it was the alliterative similarity to Hell, Hull and . . .

Yorkshire is fair game for banter in Lincolnshire. Apologies to Mrs CS should she have been offended. As an aside, we once congratulated a French waiter on his perfectly idiomatic English, he proudly told us he had learnt it at 'alifax.

We were once asked to sell our orchard to a 'developer' who wanted to reserve the right to buy a section of land at the back of 6 houses. His letter head included irrelevant alphabet soup. I replied in kind and enjoyed trumping his.

His bid failed as the 7th house was owned by Clr . . . MBE :)

As one of Beags's compatriots, I took the RAF option of "any degree subject" from the Towers and realising that a medical degree was obviously out of the question, dived in to Human Biology -quite apposite as it was at Chelsea College London in the late "swinging" 60's. :) One of our number went and did "Hotel Management"(obviously with dreams of being a PMC) another ,who went on to Air Rank , later intimated that he got a First (he didn't even get a Second) .
Unusually, I subsequently found myself back in London (City University) doing a Post-Grad.year M.Phil. in Visual Perception, a.k.a. Psycho-physics ( courtesy of the RAF) which I later suspected was a device to head me off from going to another "five eyes'" Air Force, with whom I was in informal discussion.
Was my degree useful?
For personal progression in the R.A.F., at the time , in my adopted Branch: No (far from it -we were seen as "Threats" by many one rank up): "We have to stop them Gary, they are catching us up fast!" (overheard). The thus ensuing apparently anomalous 1369's being discussed among some of our ilk.
Barnwood was clueless: "Nobody tells us what you do. We don't know ". Certain Branch "Walts" , it later transpired, had gone down and given them their self-inflated versions of proceedings!. (two of whom (at least) were later "tumbled" and quietly eased out of the business)
For the purposes of the R.A.F.:
Yes (for example in the Human Factors aspects of aircraft accident investigation).*Although of course the justification for the Degree programme was to merely indicate intellectual capability.
For personal development,
Inestimable.
As a postscript, in the mid 70's I worked out an application for a special fit on a Puma which ,with a slightly bold mission, would be of great interest to some in the Int Community. After some trials, I was dispatched to Odiham and then summoned to brief the Station Commander.
;"Thank you your briefing Haraka, which is the only one I have understood and tend to believe. I have had four so far this week from officers claiming it as their own idea-and yours is by far from the most Junior."
As for the Falklands and the first Gulf War.......

About 15 years ago, we stopped at the 13thC Masons Arms, Knowstone, when it was a fine old Devonshire country pub (it's now a Michelin-starred gastropub). Mine host (since moved on) was something of a character and he gave me his card when we left. He had some intriguing post-nominals - UAA and CRAFT.
UAA decoded as Unencumbered by Academic Achievement and CRAFT was Can't Remember A Flippin' Thing.

KS, you should have awarded him a CDM and Bar

My niece (-in law age 24), just by having a very bright idea is now worth a million & probably much more to come.
Does have a degree.

Boot was the dog, owned, after a fashion, by Wellington, who was the main character. Marlon was as thick as mince and Maise made up the rest of the core crew.

Agreed, airpolice, but there was a very doleful bloodhound that appeared at time, as "BA Calcutta (failed)". I believe it was a reference, in those un-PC times, to the fact that getting to university was an achievement in the sub-Continent, even if you didn't graduate.

Herod BA (hon) UoL