Graduate sues University for £1m because he didn't get a First

YOU > SEA.

On the face of it, I'd chuck the case out. The only bit worthy of mentioning is:



Which is fine - the college is at fault and should remedy the situation. But action should have been taken 16 years ago! Not now! He may well have achieved a 1st class degree but still ended up in the same situation. Even to come out from Oxford with a 2:1 was impressive.

Interestingly, I recall students taking action against universities when lecturers don't happen. This is largely driven by the fact that students are paying a lot more in tuition fees. In this day and age, had Siddiqui and his co-hort found the lecturers were absent, they would have quite rightfully taken action.

Thing is, there's absolutely no way anyone can definitely show he would have got a first if those lecturers had been there. To be honest, I doubt you can even show it 'on the balance of probabilities'. Most students at most Universities don't get a first in their subjects - if they did it would be worth much less than it is. The sense of entitlement - "if you'd done your job properly I WOULD have got a first and therefore I WOULD have had a much better career!" is just.. wretched.


Well, we were discussing this over lunch and it's an interesting - and I believe, somewhat unresolved - question. To whit 'when you pay a University 9 grand a year, what are you actually paying for?' I don't think this is strictly defined anywhere. Part of what you're paying for is the active part of your education - lectures, seminars, whatever - but it's also paying for the upkeep of the buildings those events take place in. It's the use of computer, library and laboratory facilities. It's paying for the development of new and better services to you. It's the provision of all the other bits of 'university life' which are part of having a degree but which aren't listed on the certificate you get at the end.

It's like that website that says 'Oh, this new phone costs 600 quid but the parts only cost 250!'. Yeah, well, you're not just paying for a box full of components, are you?

There's certainly no stipulation that 'If you pay us this much per year and do this, you'll get a first'. No university of any calibre on Earth is going to promise that.

Completely agree that paying money or even going to university is not going to guarantee that you get a first, or even a degree for that matter. I'm going to mention a couple of things.

At medical school, one of the lecturers didn't turn up. It was in the middle of a day full of lectures. A couple of students decided to find out what happened. He was nowhere to be found. The following week, the same lecturer didn't turn up. It was at the end of a day of lectures so most (included me) buggered off home. However, some students went and complained. Rumour has it the lecturer had a nervous breakdown and just went AWOL.

Now firstly, when the lecturer didn't turn up, some students actually bothered to find out why. Everybody else was just sitting around. Secondly, the medical school found out what happened and the lectures were (eventually) covered by someone else. It's been fourteen years since it occurred and as I recall, no one has bothered to argue about it. I can't remember whether there were any psychology questions in the exam.

Whilst I was at medical school, I also did an intercalated degree. This is where they basically lump you in with the third year science students. I had no idea what, say, western blotting was, or how an ELISA was carried out. There was a massive difference in lectures - whereas we had eight a day at medical school on a typical day, we had eight in a week in the intercalated year. There was so much free time, I'd no idea what to do. But one thing I did do was sit in the library and work out what the hell the lecturers were talking about. I had to do background reading on stuff that other science students probably learnt in their first year as well as did the practicals for it. Of my cohort of intercalated students, half got a first and the other half got 2:1. One person got 2:2 (and I gather was the only medical student to ever do so).

Compare this to some of the science students we were with who would revise certain topics, banking on the fact that you'd have a choice of essay questions. One, IIRC, said she revised A and D on the basis that the questions always came up Q1. answer a question on topic A or B, and Q2. answer a question on C or D. There was me revising topics A, B, C and D. The exam paper had Q1 answer question A or D, Q2 answer B or C. My fellow student couldn't answer the second question. It dragged down her mark and she went from being on target for 2:1 to getting a 2:2.

Which is a longwinded way of saying you have to put the effort in if you want a first.

I'm not going to dispute that an individual has to put in the effort if they want to get a good degree result.

However there is I think an issue brought about by fee charging. Universities have gone from providing an education to providing a service where the customer, not unreasonably, expects certain things in exchange for what they are paying. One of those things is an adequate number of teaching staff with the time to actually do the teaching.
Would any of us be particularly happy about signing up for something that had an agreed timetable of work with a qualified person to deliver it and then the qualified person not turning up half of the time? There would be a not unreasonable case for breach of contract there. If the service provider meets all their obligations and you get a [LIFTED] result because you couldn't be bothered to do your bit that's one thing. On the other hand, if you do all your bits but the service provider fails to deliver what they promised then why shouldn't you expect to be compensated when you've paid a significant amount of money for the service?

In this particular case too much time has passed IMO (and were they even charging fees at that moment in time?).
If he wasn't happy about the poor staff provision then he should have complained at the time. Leaving it 16 years and them making some claim based on an imaginary career he may or may not have actually achieved if he'd gotten a first is balls and should indeed be thrown out of court.

In other news, intermittent loss of all my work datashares. That's not annoying or disruptive at all

Completely agree. It was the point I was trying to make - complain at the time, not weeks, months or years later.


This is one of the main reasons I'm opposed to charging patients at the point of care. At the moment, if I see a patient with a sore throat that they've had for one day and I feel it's viral, I can say so and the patient will (usually) go on their way. Adding a charge to a GP appointment changes that into a "transaction" where the patient will demand they want xyz because they've paid for it.

Yet another "Tale of Fail" from Yodel. Yes, I know it's like shooting fish in a bucket, but when they seem to be unable to get the simplest thing right then they completely and utterly deserve it.

Waiting for delivery of a new SIM for my phone last week. I waited all day with no sign of it, and from where I sit to do my work I can see every single vehicle that comes along my street (which is also a cup-de-sac). Check the Yodel web site late in the afternoon and it says my parcel has been delivered, which is obviously wrong. Check with my neighbours either side and across the road, just in case some ninja delivery driver has managed to sneak past me. None of them have had a parcel addressed to me.

Phone up Virgin Mobile to find out what is going on, and they confirm that according to the tracking information my SIM has been delivered. Tell them that it hasn't, otherwise I'd not be phoning them up. They put me through to Yodel who have a complex voice-activated menu system that hangs up on me when I choose the option to talk to a human being. Phone Virgin Mobile again and get the missing SIM cancelled and arrange to pick up a replacement from their shop in town.

The following day I try Yodel's on-line chat to see if they have any answers. They tell me the package has been delivered, I tell them that it hasn't otherwise I wouldn't be using their on-line chat service. We check that the address in their system for the parcel is actually my address. It is. They then tell me that they will check with the driver and let me know what they find out. This may take up to 48 hours to do. Later that afternoon I get an email from them saying that my parcel has been delivered to the right address - a doctor's surgery.

Now I know what has happened. The parcel has been delivered to an address with the same street name and house number as mine, but with a completely different postcode and in a completely different part of Nottingham.

I have to use just my house number and postcode for this very reason.
There is a very similar named street about half a mile away and I do not trust the people there to be honest if the goods are desirable.

It doesn't happen with the post because THEY go by the name as well and INSIST on a correct signature.

Bought an Innocent " super smoothie" as a treat ( I don't normally drink juice due to sugar content)
Tiny 360 ml bottle has 46.8g of sugar! How are they even allowed to advertise themselves as healthy food!

That works out to about 13 g/100mL. That's less than a ripe banana (~17g/100g) but more than regular coke (~10.5 g/100mL).
Provided they haven't haven't added any additional sugar over and above what's come from the fruit they've used then their drink is made from fruit and everyone knows fruit is good for you and healthy.
Also, don't forget the small print - it's healthy as part of a balanced diet which is a nice get out clause. There's nothing particularly bad about eating pretty much anything if it's part of a balanced diet - it's the balancing part that eludes a lot of people.

A can of coke had 35g of sugar. I think very few people would pick it out as the healthier option ( from a pure sugar perspective)

Well, yes. Although I'd still say it's a better choice from a health perspective than a can of coke despite the sugar content provided that's not all that you look at.

Obviously, there's the vitamins etc in a smoothie. From a sugar point of view, Im not sure the body makes a difference about the source once it's been blended smooth and I'm not sure it's a great breakfast item

Well there's fibre I guess as well as the vitamins. As far as the sugar is concerned I guess it really depends on how easy it is for the body to get it - if it has to break down the plant cells to access it then it might be slightly slower release than if it's just already in solution.
It would be enlightening to compare the blood sugar level over time of an individual after consuming a smoothie compared with them eating the equivalent amount of fruit (fruit salad say). I'd be slightly surprised if that research hasn't been done somewhere.