About time :)

Why should anyone be awarded a degree if they haven't spent at least three years at University EARNING it? It's a complete disgrace that celebrities, in particular actors and musicians, should be awarded a "degree" for doing nothing other than their job. This contemptuously belittles those graduates who have toiled away for years to EARN their qualification through merit and hard work. How can any Univeristy, a proclaimed bastion of excellence and achievement, award something like this to one of these self-serving pararsites who are already priviledged, some deservedly, others not quite so? This practice should be stopped altogether. What bottom dwelling University awarded Michael Douglas an honourary degree anyway?

OK, fine. An honorary degree. We just paid our ex-university president three point seven five MILLION dollars to go away. This after being caught "skimming" funds for personal reasons. Mind you, his salery was over seven hundred thousand a year, with house, auto, servents ect. Btw, they're still looking for a replacement. The job may suck, but the "exit pay" seems worth it.:-)

#2 scottishsponger, you must be joking... mustn't you?

I earned my B.Sc (Hons) Physics (Edin) in the 1970s at the remote gulag known as the King's Buildings. Nobody could confuse that with a celebrity degree of the Honorary kind. As my kids would say, take a chill pill, dad.

It is my understanding that "vocational"degrees such as science and medicine are not awarded "Honoris Causa" lest these strangely selected people chose to practice the subject

All this seems to have gone too far

There are very few people that merit being awarded honorary degrees, and the likes of Mugabe and Bob Hope are most certainly not among them. Nor should they ever be awarded to (self) serving politicians.

If universities want to avoid their honorary degrees being devalued to a level comparable with peerages and similar, they should be limited to people who have made some outstanding contribution in a particular field or area, and which has resulted in some form of benefit to the country or the world.

I am sure Robert Mugabe would be devastated at being stripped of his honorary degree.
You would have thought these folks of education would have more pressing matters to attend to.

Totally agree scottishsponger. Stop the practice altogether, pointless waste of time. If these people want degrees they can do it the old-fashioned way.

As an overseas student from Australia paying aprox. £9,000 per annum for my 3 year Ph.D. course, plus another £4,900 for accommodation, to say nothing of food, transportation and ancillary costs, I applaud the measures being taken by the university to stop the devaluing of my academic parchment, which the act of simply giving them away unearned to others inevitably produces.

#9 Didn't take long for some sponging student pikey to start on about money and cost. Away and earn some money down't' pit and stop flapping yer gums

#10 Sponging? On whom? Entirely self funded, earned by me in Austalia, brought willingly by me into this country of my mother's birth; though not from working down at the pit. My Scottish forbears however were all miners and proud of it too. I am sponging off no-one, so get your facts right The Dude, (whoever that is) before you start flapping your own gums. Get off the whiskey. Seems as though you support giving away university degrees for nothing then, since you disagree with me.

Totally agree with #2. Why do Universities need to give out these awards anyway?

Giving away degrees by universities just for a bit of free publicity devalues the achievements of those who have had to spend years working for them, usually under considerable financial duress. No more honorary degrees.

St Andrews have just announced their Honorary Degree list, chosen strictly for academic quality:

Billie Piper
Jade-From-Big-Brother's mum
Craig Brewster
Kevin Pietersen
Donald Finlay QC

I used to teach at one of Scotland's ancient universities (not Edinburgh), and found its procedures to be riddled from top to bottom with cronyism and the award of honors to their own on very dubius ground. It was a major reason why I left to become part of the Scottish brain drain. None of this surprises me. What is surprising is that Edinburgh has allowed anyone even to ask the questions. Good luck to them if they try to sort it out. The principal will need nerves of steel.

#10 why do you feel the need to be abusive to someone who is a student? Why does everyone assume students are spongers? These days students get diddly squat from the exchequer to fund their studies. If they all tried to go down t'pit as you so eloquently put it there would be horrendous unemployment and we would lose a lot of our future scientists, medics, engineers, tachers and the like. Or do you view this as a good thing????

All sounds to me like the straw man in the Wizard of Ozz.

The way that currently Scottish universities are giving away honorary degrees to the likes of Mohammad Khatami of Islamic Republic of Iran and Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, soon they will honour Osama bin Laden of Al-Qaeda and Mullah Omar of Taliban as well!! Well done! Keep up your high standards!!

well said 17
I have six children all worked their way through Uni the youngest styill doing so paying his own way!!!!!!!! By working for basic wages not the inflated salary of the Dubai set

Politicians stopped grant-aid to the majority of students ..... AFTER they had their grants of course. Any chance of THEM paying it back???

Most students are studying AND working to support themselves, which is why so many drop out! It's a damn shame! Not many have Daddy and Mummy supporting them financially any more!

I did my three years at Uni for my degree while working in a pub and as a petrol attendant for my keep and it was hard enough. I strongly object to celebs, politicians and non-students getting the honorifics virtually handed to them!

So yes, let's see an end to these FREE DEGREES and let the buggers EARN them like students have to!

I was disappointed not to see ex-Iranian president Khatami's name in this article as one of those who received such inappropriate degrees from Edinburgh university.

During Khatami's presidency, peaceful student protests were brutally crushed. Thousands of students were arrested, some like Ahmad Batebi, the former NUS honorary vice-president, received 15 years prison sentences, and yet a British academic institution choses to award such an anti-student figure. Surely Edinburgh academics come close to Tom Sharpe's characters in Porterhouse Blues!

I always thought that honorary degrees were given to people of outstanding merit - I doubt many people would disagree with David Attenborough being given such a degree, for example (and the Kermit the Frog one was a bit of fun - lighten up!!!). They should be stripping the likes of Mugabe of his though, and thinking a bit harder about who should be getting them at all. The more people getting honorary degrees, the less valuable they are.

Degrees are I thought for academic achievent or honorary ones possibly to someone in late life (preferably an alumni) who has achieved signifance in business or the courts and other professions, but not for sport and entertainment - let them strive for the MBE, OBE etc. and as for politicians surely a big fat pension is honour enough!, and an honorary degree only for very exceptional and significant benefits to the nation - certainly not for bankrupting it like Brown or killing off the forces liike Blair! Enough of cash for honours.

#18 - Midge Ure's nomination was primarily for his services to charity - y'know, those little events such as Band Aid, live Aid, Live 8, work with Save the Children... Whatever you may think of his music, my feeling is that this was a well-deserved honorary degree. And I say this as someone who did indeed spend 4 years slogging away for theirs.

Let us hope the "doctor of letters" Catherine Lockerbie is to "receive" won't be Mugabe!

Wonder how many honoury degree's our "freedom loving" Universities hasve awarded to Winnie Mandela, Pol Pot, Joe Stalin etc????

No 23 - Khatami was St. Andrews, not Embra.

http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?khatawrd

Of course, the one exception will be St Tony of Downing Street, for services to humanity!!!!. Let's see the new liebour lickspittle univerisities queuing up to award him an honoury degree when he is booted out of government.

Welcome news, but this has been going on for years. It is little different from the awarding of Queen's honours to various characters for questionable reasons. Remember the England rugby and crickets teams. Now giving rise to a good deal of amusement given recent results.

Cronyism, nepotism and I suspect a fair degree of rather nauseating celebrity worship are at the heart of the matter and I doubt much will change despite the university's efforts. Especially as it is now possible to be a celebrity for no apparent reason, without any discernible talent or achievement. Unless large breasts, a big mouth or the ability to make an absolute arse of yourself in public can be counted as talents.

#32 thesmallerhalf
Which brings us back to the acceptance of mediocrity people seem to have now. I saw a "voxpop" on TV recently where kids were asked what they wanted to be when they grew up. There were the usual replies of "fireman" "astronaut" or "policeman" but most wanted to be "famous". Famous? Like Jade Goody? Or that other idiot who won BB or something. Maybe Essex University will give Jade a degree in something - a Doctor of Opportunity?

Surely Edinburgh Uni can take an honorary degree if needed in teh case of criminal activity such as Robert Mugabe.

I feel sad sometime when academics make the mistates similar to politicians'. It is a shame dishing out Hon. Degrees to such characters that have brought untold hardship to his/her people, wheras, such characters who has geniuely contributed positively to minkind are hardly remembered. I do not object to Such award but the right individuals should get it. I had suffered to obtain my degrees. Robert Mugabe and the likes have had theirs, but if the system beleve there is a good reason for such to be taken away from them, then scrip them. If a law could be repealed if no longer serving its purpose, i don't see any reason, hon. degrees can't be revoked. I believe, Universities need to learn from past mistakes and be very careful who and how to award such degrees. I guess there should be clauses written into such awards that makes it easy to withdral. If not, i won't be surprised in the near future having some universities awarding post humous award to Sadam Husien for his contribution in the history of the 21st century and people like Gorge Bush and Tony Blair in the near future. A word is enough for the wise.

This cringe-worthy practice is probably the brain-child of the Human Resource/Public Relation/Marketing - guff departments, only recently imposed by politically correct political management, upon our once erudite 'stone-built' establishments of learning and research.
Tragic that some non-entity who has become 'famous' through a medium of transient interest and of no significance to society claims 30 seconds of newstime, whereas the authentic graduands had, at least, turned up for their final examinations?

Having earned a couple of degees myself I don't have a problem with honorary degrees if the person has done something worthwhile to humanity or to enhance a discipline in some way. Someone like Richard Attenborough has helped bring natural history to millions of people. Likewise, people like Ewan MacColl did a tremendous amount of work in fields of folk-music etc and were influential to many across the world.

Musicians? Well, where do we draw the line? Would a composer, someone like John Williams be exempt because he's a musician?

I think the honorary degree when I graduated was for a nun who had done a lot of work on US death-row. A lot more deserved, I'd say, than for having a number one record or getting drunk on Big Brother.

Those who are famous for being famous... well...

Parnell had the freedom of Edinburgh taken off him after the Kitty O'Shea scandal, don't see why Mrugabe can't be stripped of a UoE honorary degree.

It is about time and I am so pleased to hear this is the case for him. these degrees are awarded to deserving individuals who have made a positive and lasting contribution on behalf and to the betterment of their fellow man. However, the Robert Mugabee is a tyrant and a criminal he has committed crimes against Humanity, by saying that he has robbed many of his citizens of there land and rights. If I am not mistaken, wasn't his status as a Commonwealth Nation member supposed to be revoked. if not it should be and immediately. or he should be overthrown and physically removed from the office of President.

While they are doing it, they could also get rid of visiting "professors" of invented subjects like media studies, transport economics and local goverment administration.

Whilst we are criticising these false honorary degrees that weren't earned but given due to influence, what about the Prince of Wales, who when in military uniform is positively dripping in medals.
What did he do to earn these medals?
It is an insult to ordinary soldiers who risked their lives to earn a medal.

As I am unclear on this issue..what is the point of
Honorary degrees? Is there any money invloved?
Is it true that Sean Connery has been given a degree and if so, what for or why ?

Blame the left wing establishment in Scottish Universities for handing out degrees to Marxist despots like Mugabe.

This article reeks of jealousy. Why don't we award an honarary degree to Murdo McLeod? After all he was one of Celtic's greatest players...

An honarary degree really means nothing. Either you study your way to a degree or you don't.

Q: Do you have a degree?
A: Yes an honarary degree.
R: Next.

#47

Spot on. You could just imagine all those varsity lefties drooling and brown-nosing the odious murderer Mugabe. I wonder what arch-leftist McCrone had to say about that? He'd be up there with the best of them, bowing and scraping to his anti-imperialist champion...

Can anyone shed some light on why these degrees are awarded? They realy annoy me! Is it cheap publicity and maybe backhanders? I earned mine, but no-ones ever given me an oscar or a football winning medal! Maybe its dull principals & senior academics buying into the cult of the celebrity.

#22 Messalina: You're right. Free Degrees did nuffin wurf boverrin' abaht aftah Wen Will I See You Agin.
Bladdy Mugabe an' 'is dustbowl. String im up that's wot I say.

Yes why? What purpose do they serve?
What was Edinburgh University thinking giving the well know mass murderer Mugabe honours? It's just about expected that labour politicians would want to help place a mass murderer in charge of Zimbabwe, but University staff are meant to be above licking the floor for nasty little tyrants.

What is the cost of a good college or university in Scotland?

"I've taken some soundings about the possibility of adding a (preferably female and non-white) nomination."

what is happening here! discrimination. sounds just as bad as no blacks or women, would that be acceptable?
why not for those who deserve it most?

Yes, plord is quite correct, this rancid tokenism or affirmative bias is deplorable, but merit too is open to argument.
Glasgow has dished out some odd degrees to time-servers and lackeys, and re Edinburgh, frankly I wouldn't rate George Reid much higher than that. As for the President of Eire,no doubt she's a clever wee thing, but let her first swear to stop pontification on Ulster's British internal affairs before she gets any awards in the U.K.

Usually, measures such as the one Edinburgh University is mooting are reactionary rather than pro-actionary, as it were. As has been mentioned frequently, honorary degrees have been awarded to people of dubious repute for the most dubious of reasons, even if a lot of them are also awarded to leading academics in their field.

I am sure that many such academics who hold honorary degrees are just as peeved as many of the respondents on this thread that people who have not earned their degrees are being awarded them, almost as if they were free theatre tickets just to get bums on seats.

As for "serial degree collectors", the fact is that, if one college or university believes that a certain somebody deserves an honorary degree, a lot of others might as well, although I must admit not to knowing what the king of Thailand must have done to have been awarded 136 of them!

How about awarding an honorary degree for services to higher education to a "serial degree collector" if he or she has actually STUDIED for at least five degrees AND paid for them out of his or her own pocket? (That means that partial or whole sponsorship by external persons or organizations would automatically disqualify a candidate.)

Some might say that is an "impossible" idea, but I am sure that, years ago, academics would have dismissed the idea of awarding honorary degrees to celebrities and the like as "impossible" - only look at what has happened now!

And whose bright idea was it to suggest that a rugby player be awarded a "doctor of education" degree? I expect to EARN my own degree with exactly the same title in a few years' time (all being well, I intend starting it next year after earning my master's in education), so I had better not run into anybody who has been awarded an honorary doctor of education lest I be tempted to ask him or her about his or her opinion regarding the latest pedagogical theories on teachi

Honorifics are doled out oftentimes to reflect honour on the educational establishment by association with the rich and famous.

But we might as well give a posthumous degree to Adolph Hitler and Benito Mussolini and Ceacesceau as to give on to butcher M'Gabe.

Not everyone who has been awarded an honorific doctorate deserves to be confronted by an angry earned degree holder to be tested on the subject in which the honorific was awarded. To do that is to completely misunderstand the purpose and nature of honorifics, and is conduct unbecoming an academician.

I fully expect that cross Chris Cross will come to that conclusion somewhere in the middle of his striving for a master's degree, for which I wish him well.

Embra might take the lead here and rescind EVERY honoris causa degree it has awarded and thus restore some prestige to the thousands of deserving grads who got theirs the honest way.

It's high time that all honorary degrees that have been awarded be looked at clearly and properly and those that are unsuitable or ridiculous be taken away from the recipients immediately?

Worthy recipients like David Attenborough and Desmond Tutu or people like Mother Theresa should keep theirs.

It's daft of people to compare anything like this in terms of their CVs or applications for a job. Most of this kind of awards are at 'Doctor' level and it's not likely that people starting work would have 'Doctor' in front of their name unless they're MDs. If you've got an honorary Doctor of Music degree you're not likely to be applying for an engineering or clerical position. You would only mention such an award in the 'other' or 'hobbies' part of any application form, and mebbe not even then. Most of the people who get these would be quite well known and any HR person or possible boss should know the 'value' of an honorary degree.

Edinburgh University should have reviewed its policy long before this furore broke out. It should not waste any time in stripping Mugabe of his 'honorary' doctorate.

I, too, earned my Degree the hard way, funding it myself. What annoys me is those people who are awarded an Honorary Degree (of Letters or some such) by giving large amounts of money to the University. Let us face it - Universities are now out to make as much money as possible, they are now run as businesses. A recent Honorary Degree was awarded for a substantial donation to the University - this practice should stop as it appears to be 'cash for honours' (which may also be interpreted as a 'tax write-off scheme'). There are many worthy people who have earned an accolade for services to humanity etc. and no-one would argue with this - but the Honorary Degree should say just this, 'Honorary Doctorate of Services to Humanity' and if there isn't one, create one! They invent 'Personal Chairs' (Professorships) in all sorts of weird subjects (attracting a salary of ca. £75,000 per annum), so why not do it for Honorary Doctorates. In this way, folk cannot use the title 'Dr' (PhD) without having earned it in the usual way - i.e. by earning it through innovative academic study. By the way - some PhD students are awarded their Doctorates by studying something so obscure that no-one knows anything about the subject anyway and are, therefore, not in a position to challenge it - the secret is to choose a very obscure, unknown topic and write 100,0000 words about it. If it reads well, then you get your PhD ('tongue in cheek here'! ;) I'm sure if I could write 100,000 words on 'Why the Moon is higher at its zenith in Winter than in Summer' then I'm sure I would earn my own PhD!

I went to Vanderbilt University in the United States. They abolished the honorary doctorate system decades ago for the very reasons mentioned here. In terms of good publicity and money, it does very well (Muhammad Yunus, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in December, recieved his PhD in economics from there). I think that all serious research institutions should consider doing the same, as there is an exceptional record of people, celebrities and the like, with doctors behind their name undeserved and over-emphasised. It's interesting that, though Mugabe has no earned doctorate (a bunch of bachelors degrees), it is said that among his many titles he perfers to be called "doctor Mugabe". Such nonesense should be stopped, as it would lighten the load of ego-tripping among the already arrogant.

#55

The "preferably female and non-white nomination" guff came from arch-*rse David McCrone.

How about Winnie Mandela, Davie? Just your kind of person I suppose...