📕 Part 1: Universities

This episode's vocabulary

Particularly (adverb) - especially, or more than usual.

Overqualified (adj.) - having more knowledge, skill, and/or experience than is needed (for a particular job).

Qualification (noun) - an official record showing that you have finished a training course or have the necessary skills, etc.

To aim at/towards something (phrasal verb) - to plan, hope, or intend to achieve something.

Assignment (noun) - a piece of work given to someone, typically as part of their studies or job.

Hindsight (noun) - the ability to understand an event or situation only after it has happened.

CPD (noun) - continuing professional development.

Master's degree (noun) - an advanced college or university degree.

PhD (noun) - abbreviation for doctor of philosophy: the highest college or university degree, or someone who has this.

Questions and Answers

M: Have you ever attended a university or college?

R: Several times, actually. Although, I wouldn't say that makes me particularly smart, to be honest, probably just highly overqualified.

M: Did you like or dislike it?

R: Well, looking back, I think I could have managed it better, really. It was fun, but I think I might have liked it better if I'd picked more relevant qualifications and had something to aim towards, rather than just making it up as I went along.

M: What was easy and difficult there?

R: Well, first of all, it's it was equal parts easy and hard. I didn't mind going to lectures and meeting deadlines for essays and assignments, but it wasn't particularly easy to see how a career or a life could be made out of it, at least at the time. It seems easier in hindsight, now I've gone through everything.

M: Will you study more in the future?

R: Yeah, I do ongoing CPD for my work, so I imagine so. But nothing like taking on things like a Master's or a PhD. It doesn't seem necessary for me to do something like that.

Discussion

M: Hey! University. So with university, we say I went to university. Right, Rory? University, we mean higher education. So you go to school, then you may go to college and then University. All right? So if now you're studying, you say, I'm, I'm studying, and what do I say? Like, I'm a first-year student, I'm a second-year student?

R: I'm about to be a student.

M: In the future. If it's your first degree... So it's your first university education, you can say I'm studying for my bachelor's degree, the first degree, the second degree, I'm studying for my master's degree, and the highest level is PhD. So I'm a PhD student.

R: Is there something beyond a PhD? Post-doctoral studies?

M: Buddha level.

R: Like, yeah, crazy levels of...

M: I'm a scientist.

R: Of studying.

M: Yeah, I'm teaching scientists. No, like, some people have two dissertations.

R: That's crazy PhD.

M: So, like a PhD and then, like post PhD, so the second dissertation. Yeah, crazy, huh? So you can say I've attended a university, so I went to university. More formal, a more formal word would be attend a university. Actually, it's good for essays. So people, a lot of people attend university. And if you've attended a university several times, you say, yes, I have many degrees. I have two degrees or three degrees. So you've attended a university twice or three times. And if you have a lot of degrees, you say, I'm overqualified. So Rory is super educated, so he can say that I'm highly overqualified. What is it to be overqualified?

R: Well, to be overqualified is to have too many qualifications that are almost detrimental to your application. So I'm able to say that, but probably most people would say, I'm going to university to become a qualified and then whatever the job is, a qualified doctor, if you study medicine, a qualified nurse, if you study nursing.

M: Yeah. And if you are a qualified doctor and you start working as a taxi driver, well, you are overqualified for this job. So the word overqualified is negative, dear listener, it means having more knowledge, skill or experience than is needed for a particular job. So if Rory, with all his qualifications being a super educated native speaker, goes and works in McDonald's, so he is overqualified for this particular job, and they may not accept him, because, like, oh, whoa, whoa, you are too cool for school. Like, we need somebody you know, like, without any experience, without any knowledge, you know too much. So, yeah, this is one of the reasons. And also such people are expensive. They kind of expect a higher salary, and many companies say you are overqualified for this position. We can't offer you this much money. I disliked my university studies, or I liked them. I couldn't stand them, like I hated them. Or I was really into studying. I enjoyed my university, for example. And you can say, like, looking back, if it was in the past, looking back, I really enjoyed it, or I'm studying now, so I'm not enjoying it.

R: Yeah. This is another way to think about talking about the past. Instead of just saying I liked it or I disliked it. We can say, looking back, to say we're talking about the past, and then we make a comment. And here I said I could have managed it better. So here, if it's could have, then it's, again, a modal verb for the past. Oh, so advanced.

M: Yeah. If, for example, you think that now you made a wrong choice. So you don't like your university. Can I say I could have chosen another university?

R: I think so, yeah, um, or I could have chosen a better university.

M: I could have chosen a better university. I didn't do it. Now, I'm studying at this university. I don't like it, so looking back, I could have chosen a better university. I could have chosen Oxford, actually, yeah, that would be nice.

R: Well, I couldn't have chosen Oxford. Other people, perhaps could have.

M: You can say, like, I could have picked more relevant qualifications. Picked? Like choose. Choose - pick. More relevant qualifications, like more relevant subjects, studies. My studies are easy or difficult or challenging. I struggle with exams, for example. It is difficult for me to take exams.

R: Do you struggle with exams?

M: Well, no, not really. No. They were okay, annoying. I struggled with French because, like, we had French classes, and then, for some reason, everybody in my group spoke French, but I, like, spoke zero French, like, you know, like Chinese, like zero Chinese, zero French, but everybody else kind of was. And the teacher assumed that everybody in our group knew French. So the exam was to read an article from a magazine, Rory, translate it, and then, kind of like, deliver a monologue about the article, and I couldn't read in French.

R: Well, that's not great.

M: Yeah. And she wanted us to become so fluent in French in, like, what, six months.

R: Well, that's not going to happen. So like, come on. Come on,

M: Yeah, dear listener. So you can say I struggled with French, I struggled with biology, the teachers were a bit crazy. You can say I didn't mind going to lectures. So going to lectures were okay. Like, I didn't mind studying Latin, like it was okay. Um, meeting deadlines was a bit challenging. So you meet deadlines for essays, for your kind of assignments. Assignment? Like tasks or projects, and then when you look back at something in the past, you can use this word in hindsight, a very good word. What does it mean? Hindsight?

R: That just means looking back again. Sorry. Lots of things for talking about the past. In hindsight, or easier in hindsight, better in hindsight and looking back. So all of these things are for talking about considering the past or thinking about it.

M: Usually we say in hindsight, dear listener, so we don't change it. In hindsight, I could have picked a better university. So looking back, I could have done something else, but I didn't. If you are studying at university now, you can again look at the past like, ooh, in hindsight, after school I didn't do this, right? Or in hindsight, the final days at school were... And then I chose the University. So still you can think about the past, like before entering the university, right after school. So still you can speak about the past, okay? Or just lie, dear listener, lie. ust to use it. You know? If you are a first-year student, you can say like, well, I am a second-year student, or I'm a third-year student, just lie. And then, in hindsight, I could have chosen a better university. Even if you're happy with your university, just say it, okay? It's a nice phrase, dear listener.

R: Or you could say, well, even if you're not thinking about regretting, you could just say in hindsight, and in hindsight, that was the right choice as well. So it's not just for talking about regrets.

M: Actually, yes, yeah. Yeah, I'm a first-year student. In hindsight, that was the right choice, because now I'm happy. I'm good at meeting deadlines. I write all my essays. I'm a super student. My teachers are the best. It's pretty much a dream university. Hey! I pay a lot of money for this. Ooh, Rory, you paid for your education, right?

R: Uh, well, I paid for the things associated with it. Um. But I didn't pay for the actual course. That's funded by the government in my country.

M: Ooh, okay, but you paid for your food, for the flat, for transport, right? Yeah, because in many countries you have to pay.

R: Yes, you do. In some countries you have to pay a lot.

M: Yeah. And what can we say, if our listeners are paying for education. So what do you call it?

R: They pay tuition fees. Well, that's what it's called in my country. I don't know what it's called in other countries.

M: Yeah, but you can use tuition fees. So the sum of money you pay for your education, so I pay my tuition fees. I always study, you can say. In the future, I'm planning to enter a university, or I'm planning to do this course. Rory said that I do ongoing CPD.

R: Yes, which I just realized was a mistake, because if you do CPD, that means continuous professional development. So of course, it's ongoing.

M: Yeah, yeah, continuous professional development, meaning, like you do different courses, you learn different things, acquire new skills, maybe a new profession. Or you can say that I'm planning to do a master's in biology, or I'm planning to do a PhD in physics. Or I'm not planning, yeah? Or I just, I'm planning to learn how to drive, for example. So new skills, like learn how to cook, learn dancing could also be there. It's all like studying. So my studying process is ongoing. So it's like, it continues. Yeah, now I'm learning meditation techniques, mindfulness. Ooh, I'm learning design and different kinds of mirrors, dear listener. You've just asked me about mirrors. Yeah. And you go again about mirrors. Rory, so if you were to choose something new to study, what would it be? Like something which is not connected to your profession. So let's choose something like, absolutely different.

R: Probably a course in joinery, so that I could do the repairs or make the repairs to my house myself.

M: Aw... Rory the plumber, Rory a carpenter.

R: Very practical, I know.

M: Yeah, really practical, yeah. And plumbers in England actually get a lot of money, as far as I know. Thank you very much for listening! And we'll get back to you in our next episode, dear listener. Okay? Bye!

R: Bye!

Make sure to subscribe to our social media to see some of the “behind the scenes” stuff:

Our Instagram: bit.ly/instagramswi

Our Telegram: bit.ly/telegramswi