CEO's honorary doctorate unfair!

Guinevere is 31, married with no kids, and sacrificed five years of her life - expending a small fortune - to gain a masters degree. She's very angry that the CEO of her company gained an honorary doctorate without the sacrifices she made.

"I was considering doing a doctorate when I heard that the company CEO had been conferred with an honorary doctorate," explains Guinevere, "and now I've lost interest."

"Honorary doctorates devalue education, it's as simple as that," says Guinevere. "Why should I sacrifice another two years or more of my life doing painstaking research in order to gain a doctorate when someone like my CEO can get one for just doing his everyday job?"

"The CEO is a smart businessman, but he lacks everything that an academic education requires," explains Guinevere. "Since when has academic excellence been related to the ability to climb corporate ladders and make money?"

"It doesn't make sense and the whole practice of giving honorary doctorates to corporate climbers and tycoons should stop."

"My husband studied as hard as I did," says Guinevere, "and he is as mad as I am about my CEO assuming a superior academic status over us."

"The guy just doesn't deserve a bachelor's degree let alone a doctorate," laughs Guinevere, "and it's ludicrous that he now expects us to call him Dr Smith rather than plain old Mr Smith."

"I refuse to call him 'Dr' and I've advised my staff to do likewise," says Guinevere. "Naturally, the guy is going to get mad with my attitude - and may even demote me - but I don't care. This is a matter of principle."

"Education involves not just intelligence, commitment and sacrifice," says Guinevere. "It involves a whole raft of learning and character building experiences that only a tertiary institution - being part of a group of aspiring and inspirational students - can give you."

"You can't gain that sort of education in the cut and thrust of the business world where money, not knowledge, is king."

"If we must honor our businessmen and women then give them a special award," says Guinevere. "Don't give them the same qualification that research students gain at university."

"I realize that our universities are getting into financial trouble and are relying more and more upon financial grants to operate - meaning that guys like my CEO can buy a degree," says Guinevere, "but the end result of all this is a lowering of academic standards and a devaluation of the qualifications of previous students."

"If this trend to confer honorary doctorates on the rich and well-connected continues," says Guinevere, "then why would anyone in their right mind want to support this system by becoming a paying student?"

"If I were starting out," says Guinevere, "I'd make enquiries at the universities I apply to whether or not they confer honorary degrees. I wouldn't waste my time and money studying for a degree at a university that has no standards."

"Would you?"