Why College Isn't for Everyone
From Bloomberg:
The number of new college graduates far exceeds the growth in the number of technical, managerial, and professional jobs where graduates traditionally have gravitated. As a consequence, we have a new phenomenon: underemployed college graduates doing jobs historically performed by those with much less education. We have, for example, more than 100,000 janitors with college degrees, and 16,000 degree-holding parking lot attendants.
Does this mean no one should go to college? Of course not. First of all, college is more than training for a career, and many might benefit from the social and non-purely academic aspects of advanced schooling, even if the rate of return on college as a financial investment is low. Second, high school students with certain attributes are far less likely to drop out of school, and are likely to equal or excel the average statistics.
----Get your plumber suits on men----
This has been going on for years. A bachelor degree is almost meaningless unless 4.0 engineer from HYSP. It has become so ubiquitous it has lost it signaling power to employers. It is like a HS degree from the 60's.
I can't agree more
I think you're exaggerating just a tad here.
I would say that about half of the people in college shouldn't even be there. So many kids put 0 effort into their education and are only there because of either family pressure or the fact that the government is paying for them. People think that a college diploma automatically gets them a job, but like what F117 said, ugrad degrees seem useless unless it's a 4.0 from HYPS.
All this article says is if you can graduate from a solid college with a solid major (engr/acct mentioned here) then you will probably get a good return on your education. I don't need an article to tell me that not graduating college after attending is not going to help that much, that is a duh statement. I don't need an article to tell me majoring in art is probably not going to get me that sweet 100k/yr. corporate job, that is a duh statement. I don't need an article to tell me that going to South Dakota State University A&M is probably not a good investment, that is a duh statement.
People who attend universities outside the top 300 (ie University of Phoenix) are expecting to make $100k just because they have a degree. HS grads in their 40's that go back to school for a degree in Art History expect to get a job afterwards. If you can't get into a decent state school, you probably shouldn't even go to college.
Okay college isn't for everyone but to suggest to all lower high school performers to seek alternatives path is retarded. I messed around too much in high school and graduated with below a 2.5 from a shitty high school. I attended a shitty four year university for one year, got a great GPA and transferred to a decent state school. I'm now starting off in the industry this year making close to 70K, well ahead of where I would be if I followed this guys advice and sought alternative training because of my HS performance. I would probably stuck on 40k salary or lower for the next few years.
Yes, my story is not of the typical HS graduate with less than a 2.5 but if they don't try they won't end up anywhere anyway. So to suggest to all that if you are from a low quality high school with a below par GPA is retarded.
My story is the same as your story. Something school doesn't tell about someone is their drive, determination and passion to succeed, that is built into one's character
Just another example of how the government can so royally fuck shit up. Wayy too many kids go to college, especially the ones that get bullshit degrees in sociology and whatnot. All thanks to the fact that the government is there to give any kid on the street a $200,000 loan to study art history. If we stopped all Federal student loan programs tuitions would plummet and those that still couldn't afford it would be forced to actually go get a real job.
I think many low performing hs kids need time to develop outside of school. Many of my friends at my school are European and older (22 as a freshman). They are extremely focused and come into school knowing what they want to study and how to do it. They have had jobs after hs and have the time to decide if they're okay working a blue collar/admin job or if they want to pursue professional career or even trade school.
On that note, trade schools are undervalued in the US and I think alot of kids would find those degrees more practical and interesting to what they want to do. A lot of kids come to school and get a History degree with no fucking clue what to do with it when they should've gotten a trade degree at a 2yr school as an electrician or plumber (who actually make decent money and are a value adding member of society).
THIS!
Connor that's a huge exaggeration. A 3.8 STEM degree at a decent state school can definitely get you a job.
I haven't done much research on the topic, but I like Germany's education system from what I've heard about it. Basically after 4th grade, you have a choice of enrolling at either the traditional liberal education style school (called Gymnasium) or the shorter and more practically-oriented schools (Hauptschule or Realschule). The former prepares you for college. The latter is shorter in duration (graduate after 9th or 10th grade) and leads to vocational schooling and apprenticeships until the age of 18.
Rather than force the less academically-oriented students to waste their time with the traditional liberal arts secondary education + 4 years of partying in college, why not allow them to attend vocational schooling early on? There's a reason German cars are so famous (BMW, Mercedes, Audi, Porsche, Maybach, Volkswagen)...
Also, binary_banster your pics never cease to impress me.
It's obvious that too many people are going to college...
Personally, I think the model that certain European countries have is what should be implemented in the U.S. That said, it will never happen because Americans are all about freedom of choice, etc. Which is great and all but ends up leading to the current situation.
In a few European countries, by the time you are in h.s. you basically get put into tracks...a kid that doesn't have the perceived academic aptitude to pursue a college degree and go into the world of law, medicine, etc. gets put on an apprenticeship track where they go to a trade school and work under a master of a certain profession - whether it's an accountant, electrician, plumber, etc. These schools are still publically funded and at the end of the day you don't end up with millions of students working on bullshit art history degrees at Wichita State. But like I said above this would never happen in the U.S. because it goes against so many of the country's core values and culture. So not sure what can be done to overturn the current situation.
Edit: Basically what JDawg said. :)
It may be tough for a kid in 5th grade to decide whether or not they want to go to college ( I wanted to play professional soccer ), so I'm not totally on board with that perspective of the European system, even though it seems to work for them. I think American culture has effectively screwed up the way kids look at school (being smart is not cool, nerds, losers, etc.) while nearly all the foreign exchange students that came to my shit school were great in math and chemistry and physics while they seem to believe that they are average in their respective country.
In the end though, I really don't care. Nearly all my friends think I'm a loser bc I obsess over IB internships and jobs and market news and finance, but in the end, I'll be the one with the job (hypothetically and hopefully, who knows anymore) while they're working as an insurance salesman for Aflac or worse.
I think in short, college is over-attended. My parents never pressured me or my brother. I am in college and hoping to break into IB while he only obtained his GED and is working as a cook at various resorts in Montana and Alaska and getting by, but he likes it so who cares. Better than going to college and taking on debt, only to drop out after 2 years and end up doing what he's doing now anyways.
"Filling our young people with false hopes and unrealistic goals will end up being far more damaging to their self-esteem. We should encourage kids to explore their individual talents and develop those gifts into their future vocation." Michael Franzese, retired mob boss.
Completely agree, you dont need to have a degree in art to be an artist and some degrees, not specific but I'm sure you can think of some, are just not smart investments of time and money. Unless you have some idea of what kind of job your major will get you, realistically, then don't do it. Waste of your time, schools time, funding money, gov money, etc
Hahaha this is so true. I had this Korean exchange student in my math class in HS, it was the most advanced class the school offered and he was in it as a junior while everyone else in the class were seniors. He always talked about how he's dumb in Korea and a year behind in math there. Sure makes you feel shitty about the state of affairs in this country.
Even at top colleges, half the kids there (here) have no fucking clue what they're doing. They just get good grades and become president of everything in high school because mom and dad said to, not because they have a tangible career or life goal in sight after college. They just go to college, do the same thing they did in high school, and think about maybe getting a job after graduating their first semester of senior year. It baffles me how their parents can dish out 50k a year for their kids who are good at school but utterly fucking clueless in life.
The opinion is a bit extreme and I'd honestly rather have a janitor with a college degree that can sign up for an MSF, just as an example, than not have that option. The higher education system is far beyond bloated, it's leveraged against a massive unforgiveable debt sold to teenagers and must adapt before it threatens the entire country. I DO have a serious bone to pick with people like John Stossel, who only has his job because of his ivy league education who's desire to rape the system and who's general ignorance of how to better the system lead them to say things as stupid as 'any college that's not top 3 is worthless'. Get a clue, not everyone wants to be a GS MD, but there's plenty of room for jobs above construction worker that require education.
I really have no patience for ideological/abstract/mindless "it's the government's fault" bitching, largely because it solves nothing. A lot of problems AND good programs come from there, so let's focus on what actually works and what does not. A few ideas to start the brainstorming:
Encourage more AP classes in high school. My high school had almost none and I learned calc 2, bio, and three languages by the seventh grade. High school was torture for me because I went from some of the most advanced childhood training to being around the average idiot and I got straigh A's 9-12 without ever cracking open a book. Not everyone is like me in their desire to read an entire encyclopedia by the age of ten, but I fail to see how 50% of college freshmen fail writing 101. It's a travesty.
Bolster community -> 4 year degree programs. I'm from NJ and there are several very CHEAP and SUCCESSFUL programs here where kids who do well in high school get a free / at cost associates at community college and are then guided through the transfer process to full fledged four year degrees at good universities. I've seen a bunch of kids do two years at a community, two years at Kean/Rutgers/St.Peters/etc and go to BB/MM / F5000 / grad school etc....and they are functionally indistinguishable from guys like me who went straight from high school to university. The only real difference is that they graduate with 50% of the debt I did and typically don't spend as much time on the party/drinking scene (I didn't party in college, believe it or not). Leave the traditional system intact for people with resources or willing to go into debt, just build on the alternative system.
Full audit of employment stats from every program / school getting government money. While the assholes spending 9 years in ugrad to get an alchemy degree and then doing a PhD in english and ending up as a pool boy are obvious, we don't even have any clue what the whole picture looks like. Track students 1, 2, 5, and 10 years out to get an idea of what schools and programs work, which need improvement, and what ones are just a drain on the system. There's no reason to have a publicly funded system so devoid of objective data points, this isn't the CIA, it's school. Same for grad school: these aren't top sectret proprietary formulas, they're basic stats on how well a university prepares people for the real world.
End for-profit colleges immediately, as these are the biggest fraud foisted upon a young generation since allowing snake oil salesmen to roam the countryside selling cocaine. A non-degree in 'informational studies' from an online university with no accrediations or employment stats is fraud and should be shut down.
Assign college credit and accredit vocational schools, even if capping it at associates status. How in the fuck is an art history major granted more rights and access to grad schools than a guy who can build a house from nothing or take apart a train? White collar pricks hear 'vocational' and assume a bunch of momos, but I spent some time in a vocational school and was impressed by the depth and discipline of (some of) the programs. I will never be able to use that towards grad school or a degree...and that's ok for me because I also went to college, but those kids deserve better. I see it as a class system, plain and simple. Why should not a person who can maintain a 747 not be eligeable to get a masters in elecronics???
Build up grammar school. Why in the fuck were my hockey buddies learning mulitplication in seventh grade...SEVENTH!!!!.... at the public school while I was prepping for multivariable calc? I'm no genious, the systems need improvement. This isn't rocket science: pay the good teachers more, can the shitty ones, and raise the general bar.
These are just rough ideas to get people thinking. Truth be told, you can either breed + train better citizens, or you can spend that time keeping moronic ones in line. Take your pick.
Interesting...
I think in the US people think that there is this innate need to have a college degree to be anything of importance or happy. I think the internet has destroyed the value of a college degree for most people who have curiosities, since you can learn about anything, or find a reference to anything at a click. The thing is that many people don't want to spend 4 years of their lives studying esoteric principles that have very little meaning on their lives, and yet because of the huge push that every child should go to college in America, occupations that otherwise would just have been offered for people out of high school are now being usurped by folks who wasted an education on a bullshit degree being funded by federal tax dollars.
^^ I agree with you. I think that public school standards need to be raised and that these schools need to prepare each student for a realistic future, not send as many kids to college as we can. Also, teachers could definitely be improved. How, is up for debate which I'm sure everyone has a solution to.
@ UFO
I don't agree, I think forcing Janitors (or any kind of job that doesn't necessitate 12 units of humanities courses) should be allowed to begin their occupations after high school. I know many people back home that did not have an interest in going to college, yet they somehow managed to be hard working individuals, and create value to society. They have perhaps happier lives than I do at this point being relatively stable with their jobs and significant others and whatnot, while I'm here clawing for things I am still unsure of whether or not I can achieve.
I do envy that, and I'm sure many of them envy me in a way. But I don't think that they would trade the work with me, nor I with them, to change these lives. I think they will be happy productive people with happy little children, they may not be BB MDs, but that doesn't mean they need to spend the time and money that college entails.
Sorry bro, I am a couple of beers down getting ready for the holiday is Boston tomorrow.
I still question how this degree creature has mutated over the years? Idk about any of you, but my grandfather graduated hs. Went into the navy, came back and became an engineer for IBM. Consider how much schooling you would need for that same position today.
No one hates you, binary banker
agree with this: it's choking the life out of the system.My uncle was a hs dropout, went into the Navy's advanced electronics school, served during Vietnam, worked in Silicon Valley for 25 years and created his own telecom startup, sold it after 5 years and is retired. He always told me about how much he loved his work, it was contract work so he would work 2 months at a time then have a couple weeks off when he would go crazy partying, then get back to work.
Go Sharks!
Grades are based off who can suck up to the professor the best, you are an idiot if you believe other wise.
Example: Pre-med bitches
Interesting a thread where I am not hated
Carry on Monkeys
Two things.
Of course you should attempt to impress your professors.
Who is the idiot you appear to be trying to contradict with this somewhat off topic remark?
In general, 90% of what you do on the job is learned there. College is all about signalling and socializing.
More like 98%
I did research with a stats teacher who showed that HS GPA had no correlation with placement in college math/english. This was at CC but I think is an example of the problem. How is it that some of the students we sampled could have a 3.5+ GPA in HS and place into remedial english or algebra? at a CC! Some of my classmates were "can't read an eye chart dumb". Who told them college would be a great idea? Getting a CC degree in interpretive dance while on aid is nuts. It drives up the cost for others. But then that cost is pushed to the taxpayers so that the state can artificially keep the cost of these schools down by subsidizing every student. If they let the price rise to equilibrium no one would attend and the school would go bankrupt. They sell it to voters by claiming that they are helping students who can't afford it. The argument goes though that there is a social benefit to educating our youth. I agree that education helps everyone, but you learning dance is not beneficial to anyone even yourself. This isn't juilliard for crying out loud! Now these kids don't understand why they can't get a job when they have a degree too. They don't understand that the degree is a signal to an employer of the skills of the potential employee. These kids don't understand the risk that an employer takes when hiring. If you get a degree in art history you are demonstrating that you gained no marketable skills useful in making a profit which is what businesses do. A friend of mine recently got her MA Library Management or some shit. Now she blames Chris Christy because she can't find a job. (UFO we are neighbors).
Anyway rant over. I am ready to dodge the monkey shit.
I too know a chick with an MA in library, and another with a freaking PhD.....to put books away?? I don't get how the job requires $100K+ in education, it's not hard, you put them on the shelf. The whole library model is changing anyway, why study an obsolete system?????
LOL if Earth is some other planet's hell, New Jersey is the torture chamber. My plan is to leave this hellhole and never come back. First stop, NYC, after that, who the fuck cares....highest taxes in the country!!!!!!
I agree UFO with cost rising at schools. I meant specifically at CC and State schools (RU) where the actual tuition subsidized by the school. Should have been more specific. If the price at these schools was allowed to reach equilibrium then demand would decrease significantly. Causing all kinds of problems. They can't pay the teacher salaries as it is. RU had violate its own contract with the union and not pay salary increases. It is a mess. And tax payers are paying 65% of the tuition for a student at a state school. I used the GI bill at a public school, so I really screwed the taxpayer!
But I don't mind some kid going to a private school and paying 50,000 to take fly fishing classes. I just want them to understand that no employer should have to hire them at 60k just because they have a degree in "gender roles in french film and literature pre-industrial revolution"
My own grammar above makes my point. lol
I've seen a couple of jobs that ask for library science degrees while browsing for finance jobs. Saw one on Fidelity today for example.
i graduated from devry. i got no choice...
Tbh, I think my degree and that of most other schools is worth the money/effort/time (Engineering from Georgia Tech/UCLA, Business from UVA etc.). Though I certainly think there's a lot of room for reform in higher education.
The core at my school is composed entirely of pointless liberal arts course because, according to faculty, they are supposed to teach one to "think" (yeah, because Physics and Computer Science and Statistics courses don't teach one to "think").
Too much money is wasted on pointless research on whether Homer employed a "somber" or "vivid" tone in the Odyssey.
Advising is crap and most people don't know what they want to do with their lives and hence major in Sociology/Classics [two of the many university departments that urgently need to be scaled back] with no intention of becoming an academic.
Only about 10% of the undergrads major in STEM. 20% if you add in Economics.
The liberal arts facilities are, strangely, better-equipped than the Science ones.
The prospect of an Undergraduate Business program that prepares one for jobs in the economy is scoffed at and ridiculed but spending your entire life pointlessly analyzing two books written thousands of years ago isn't.
While we're on the topic, there's a great debate about whether "too many kids go to college". One of the debators is Peter Thiel - founder of Paypal. Quite long, but a very interesting video.
http://intelligencesquaredus.org/index.php/past-debates/too-many-kids-g…
[quote=VelCro]While we're on the topic, there's a great debate about whether "too many kids go to college". One of the debators is Peter Thiel - founder of Paypal. Quite long, but a very interesting video.
http://intelligencesquaredus.org/index.php/past-debates/too-many-kids-g…]
The founder of PayPal is leading the initiative for some kids to not go to college.
Didn't he offer some reward?
If you watch the video, he supports students going to college to study STEM subjects. So many kids nowadays are concentrated on going to college because everyone's doing it and they feel pressured by the society. He's not necessarily supporting that some kids should not go to college, but they better have a damn good reason why. Something along the lines of that....it's been a while since I watched the video.
I think much of the belief that a college degree guarantees employment stems from the PARENTS, who still hold that mentality from their era.
I think that once this generation gets older and has kids, and more importantly, after they've experience the job market, their notions of how helpful just any old college degree is will align more with reality.
There should be a degree for Stripperology. The quality of strippers in Vegas is plummeting.
College isnt for everyone. However there are plenty of kids from my hometown who didn't go to college and believe me they are not killing it.
College is a consumption good, not an investment good, to 60%+ of the college poplution.
yes, way too many people go to college. the problem is when i mention this to my friends and family, they get downright pissed off, as if i were some sort of nazi or something. the right to a higher education is so ingrained into the modern american dream that questioning it openly can get you ostracized.
aside from the clear mismatch of supply of college-educated folks and the demand for their labor, i think there's another reason for the high underemployment of college graduates... the unaligned goals of college students, professors, and employers. at your average state school liberal arts program, college professors have the goal of producing graduates who will advance the study of liberal arts (as they should be...). employers, on the other hand, are looking for college graduates with the practical skills necessary to excel in a corporate role. students at these schools, however, are mostly looking for the social experience of college and living away from their parents. nothing is wrong with these three goals in and of themselves, but the american university system tries to do all three and ultimately does them very inefficiently.
as a nation, we need to step back, put emotion aside, and ask ourselves "is sending so many kids to college nowadays accomplishing what we thought it would accomplish?". if this ever happens, i hope the nation realizes that the answer is a resounding "NO!".
+1. It also creates an unnecessary burden upon people who do not wish to have a college degree, but necessitate one because of the inability to find alternative occupations that do not implicitly utilize any skills gained by the college experience. It acts as a huge tax upon society and individuals who must fork over large amounts of money for the opportunity, not to receive one, but to be able to compete for a living wage.
Completely right febreeze: many of our parents grew up in an era when it was right degree --> right job. The world is increasingly evolving (rightfully so I believe) into provable skills --> opportunities.
No one is going to pay for academic knowledge because that can be found on google - in a way, the problem is actually that there are too many smart people that with the right tools (computers) can do basically any job. You need to have a differentiated value proposition, i.e:
+1
Interesting way of putting it
Much of the college money goes to Faculty and admin, who think they deserve that money partially because of all the money they shelled out for their degrees - self perpetuating system.
I did some work for a private college - they have been increasing tuition by 5% annually for 2 decades - just because they can. They can because the government subsidizes them with loans.
While I do agree college is about much more than simply the curriculum, there is a major flaw in the system... As coco cola said, roughly 90% of what you do on the job is learned there. I am fed up taking a bunch of bullshit gen ed courses. I know what I want to do now, and I can't express enough how annoying it is for me to take countless university requirements that aren't applicable to my degree in order to graduate. Instead of being able to load up my schedule with Finance/Econ courses, I am forced into learning about Mexican culture in the 18th century? No wonder there is still so much to learn when one lands their first job.
I agree, even though I am all for a better informed/more intelligent America, many of my current req's are stupid. The fact is, to me, I don't need a class to learn about history. I'll read a book on my own time, as I'm naturally inclined to learn things because I want to. Those who will learn will, and those who won't won't. It's not grammar school anymore, I don't need to learn every facet of academia. On that note, I'm a BA (a for arts). Perhaps I should've taken a BS, but at the time of choosing, I had no idea what the difference was.
I think there are major problems with all levels of the US education system. I agree that the bachelors degree is becoming more and more worthless every day.
However, I still think that college tuition costs should be drastically lowered. The reason tuition rates were able to rise to these exorbitant levels is because the federal student loan program gave colleges the opportunity to slowly, but steadily, raise tuition rates over the last few decades. I think the only way for this problem to be solved is for the federal government to completely take over public higher ed, because state governments have proven their inability to manage this tuition crisis. But that's a bit of a tangent.
As long as you can afford college to begin with, there is nothing stopping you from going to a local state school, majoring in something useful, and landing a $30k+ job upon graduation. Even if you don't get any job offers upon graduation, you can still join the military as an officer, and I believe the starting salaries for them hovers around $31-$32k not counting benefits. There are just simply so many people going to college who have no plan, no direction in their lives. They're doing it because they see it as the next phase in their life that they are expected to complete. These are the people who end up in shitty jobs after graduation, the people who go to college just because it's what everyone else is doing.
lol i love this website. Anyone who goes to a target is pretentious and only there because of legacy or bc they donated to the school. Only non-target people work hard and they go there because they couldn't afford to go to a good school.
And now this shit. "Grades are only based on who sucks up and doesn't prove how smart you are"
this site is so sad. Grow up and accept that you didn't try hard in high school or you just don't have the drive, intelligence, or initiative to get high grades.
Will, first of all, I don't think most people on this site actually say the things you just claimed. Perhaps there are a few posters that do, but most of us try not to make such blanket statements.
I think the reason people say those things is out of insecurity. For some reason, everyone is leading their life the "right" way, and when someone challenges that, they lash out. At the same time, there is no reason for you to add any more fuel to the fire, although I do understand where you are coming from.
There are many reasons why people choose to attend a certain institution or obtain poor grades, and to call them lazy and unintelligent would also be a vast generalization. My point is that your claims are no better than the posters you are frustrated with, as both of you are simply generalizing.
Having "drive, intelligence, or initiative" is not one-dimensional. If, for you, that means obtaining a sky high GPA, being at a target, having a STEM major, then by all means, continue your great work and be confident that those will get you to where you want. For someone else, getting an offer may mean -- non-target, average GPA, great networking abilities, incredible interviewing skills, etc. I'm just saying there are an infinite number of ways to demonstrate those qualities you mentioned in which grades/institution are just one (albeit important ones).
Very good post. I have no rebuttal or anything to add. +1
blastoise is a troll, take anything he says with at most a grain of salt
The real reason college isnt for everyone is simple. Not everyone is ok seeing two dudes pounding each other in the ass
@ heister, I am crying right now. And the sad fact is that most people don't realize college isn't for them until they're already done two years. One of my friends at school actually only has a major bc of my school's policy at the beginning of sophomore year. He chose English (presumably bc he likes reading?) without even an Education ad-on. This is what I mean, he's my friend, but what the fuck is he going to do with that after school? Work at the library?
STEM degrees will always continue to be well compensated relative to average because the degrees are about value creation.
If you can create value you'll always have a job.
I think it is a little hypocritical for us (each college-educated and full of wall street aspirations), to sit atop an ivory tower and argue that 40% of Americans shouldn't go to college and that they simply be content with blue-collar jobs. It is easy to say there are too many Americans in college when this is only a number. Nonetheless, I challenge you - would any of you be willing to have your children forego college?
I doubt it.
I think that is a problem though, my parent don't care and never pressured me. I'm in college on this site and an aspiring IB analyst, while my brother graduated last year and is essentially a snowboard bum living in AK doing fine for himself. He cooks so there's no reason for schooling. Everything works fine
and shot of penicillin
Yeah I believe a lot of high school performance comes down to your parents. I have great parents. They put me in a private school, but as a freshman in high school I had no idea the importance of a high GPA. They also were content with my grades as long as I "gave it everything I had." The only thing I am bitter about is while I am currently busting my ass n college and paying for it myself, my friends that did well in high school are wasting the opportunity given to them, because the government is footing the bill. I understand I fucked up in high school (3.5), but the state needs to rethink its scholarship program. I mean honestly, what 15 year old kid is thinking more about studying than pussy?
^ yes, very well done!
Great post above from Aragorn.
To touch on a previously mentioned point regarding bachelor degrees. In Europe it's becoming more and more "obligatory" to have graduated with a masters degree before you enter the job market. Hell, sometimes companies only look at people with 2 masters.
Besides the (double) master "requirements" employers want to see leadership experience (leader in a fraternity or something), experience abroad and (multiple) internships.
I absolutely would encourage anyone to get educated, but it's getting harder to get a decent job as a graduate. Plus I think there's a lot of concentration of career goals.
Someone mentioned the difference in Hauptschulde and University. Where I live we work with the same system; about 12% of HS students end up going to University (theoretical) and maybe 60% go to "Hauptschule" (practical). I have heard from a few recruiters and people working in large companies that when you go to Hauptschule you won't get accepted (unless you maybe have graduated suma cum laude and tick all the other previously mentioned boxes) since there's such large difference between the two methods. I decided to go to university but I much prefer the practical way of getting educated, of which you hardly have any at university.
France same thing, in the Grand Ecoles (or at least where I studied some time), it is obligatory to do a minimum of 1,5 years of internships. They combine theoretical approach in class with practical. I think this is a good way to get educated and prepared for a career.
I'm at pretty good undergrad business school and I feel obligated to double major in something STEM related (prob comp sci) just because I feel like I'd be wasting my parents money if I didn't.
Yeah, what's the ruling on double majors? Do employers care? What about minors?
College. Two theories.
College educations are a mechanism by which society sorts people into different careers, trades, professions etc. (BBAs, engineering, journalism, architecture, hospitality management, nursing, pre-med/law)
College educations are an end in and of themselves. (art history, economics, english, linguistics, music, dance)
And the graduate school answer is... it's both.
Yes to many kids go to college. Yes too many of them major in disciplines like sociology, art history, and whatnot.
But a lot of what's been posted here really isn't relavent or helpful.
Yes, Europe has a gushing oh so fabulous apprenticeship system that sets kids on to financial success for life, according to many of the thread posters. European countries also have youth employment rates that are off the charts compared to those in the United States. That's because the European welfare state has a tangled mess of legal regulations that prohibit these newly "apprenticed" youth from working and "displacing" older workers who've been there more often. Who is to say if you implement this "apprenticeship" style of learning in America - you won't have serious conflicts between kids coming out en masse armed with vocational skills and unions who are fighting to keep their current workers employed? Manufacturing is already on the decline here - so pumping out legions of students armed with apprentice vocational skills seems like it'd create a glut of workers. Yes, Germany is a highly developed nation based on manufacturing, but they lag highly in services which accounts for 2/3 of the average developed nations' jobs.
Sure, it'd be easy to tell every student out there to ditch sociology and art history, and go major in STEM. You think they'll do it? The average dropout rate in America for engineers is 50 percent. Engineering and associated STEM fields are damn hard. I've taken plenty of liberal arts courses to fulfill my distribution requirements - those classes are dead easy - where you write papers that can take any position as long as you provide evidence and where participation and discussion are huge percentages of the grade. You can't take any position on a problem in vector calculus. It requires work - a lot of it. You can still have a social life in STEM, but I guarantee you work a helluva lot harder, and you definitely stay in the library some weekends.
While there aren't many solutions - a start would be to fix primary education in this country. It would also be good if we helped glamorize STEM a bit. Barack Obama, George Bush, and probably every president before him has called for an increase in America's STEM professions.
Yet what profession are the majority of America's leaders? Lawyers - who are in oversupply at the moment. Students in China and Korea work harder because the leaders of their countries all have STEM degrees. STEM is glamorized and legitimized. So long as our leaders never take college physics or calculus, we're not going to have students go into STEM. You're going to have plenty of sociology majors who are unemployed and in debt, or go to law school and are still unemployed and in even more debt.
Agree about the majority except youth employment in Europe. Not sure what you're referring to, but employment in Europe (specifically Sweden as far as I know), is dismal. Hovering a little over 20% while America is a little under. Granted there are better performing nations (Germany, Holland, Norway), but for the Euro area as a whole, youth have a harder time finding a job and I believe it will continue to become harder.
That was a mistype on my part. What I meant to say is that youth UNemployment is off the charts - not employment. The rest of my post follows accordingly if you see that I meant to say unemployment.
Good post on the majoring in accounting. I agree. Yes demand for engineering is low across the board but that's for entry level engineering. The problem with engineering is that you study really hard in college, get into an entry level engineering job, and then twenty years later you get laid off - either replaced by a cheaper hire here or a cheaper hire in India/China. In most professions - finance included - the more you work, the more expertise you develop, and the more valuable you are. It's the reverse in STEM/engineering fields - new technologies are constantly coming out, so if you fail to keep up with them and you don't move into management - you will lose your job. Why work hard to lose your job, when you can major in something that leads to a career where age and expertise are considered valuable, not a liability?
Why bother majoring in STEM if some Indian from Mumbai will take your job and do it for half price? It's not worth the effort. The government says they want more STEM majors and yet they let foreigners come and take technical jobs.
unemployed ppl make $0 an hour...just saying. ppl gotta stop chasing the $ and start chasing the demand.
"Oh, i wanna do IB because it's the best paying job for a recent grad" yea you and hundreds of thousands of other recent grads, get that shit outta here. The discrepancy between supply and demand of IB analysts rit now has got to be one of the bigger ones
when i was in UG i literally asked myself in pretty much every class i took "why are half these kids even here?". I didn't get it, like you could be partying and shit for $0 a year if you didnt come here. Better yet, you could have been working so it would be even more than that. Like wtf? If my parents r paying 50k a year (awful fuckin decision btw) my damn am i gonna strive to learn and take something from this. Then again i went to a non-target, and i figure the experience would prob b different at a target
I was fortunate enough to spend a couple of years of my life in The Middle East and North Africa where in certain countries, education both baffled and fascinated me. On one hand, in a country like Egypt, mandatory and primary education is up until 7th grade, at the end of the 7th grade, if you'd shown enough promise and brightness your collective average scores (think 7 years of school) you can move to secondary education if you want to; if not, you move to a vocational/trade education
Vocational/trade education is divided into 2 subsections 1- Engineering Related (mechanical, electrical, automotive, etc) 2- Accounting Related
After 2 or 4 years of this type of education, you can choose to higher education or stop and get a job.
If you move on to secondary education you have 1 year to study everything under the rainbow from social studies to history to theoretical and applied physics and biological engineering. At the end of the year, your advisers (yourself, parents, family, mentors, teachers etc) tell you which way to go
1- Humanitarian Studies (art, history, language, philosophy, etc) 2- Science studies which is split into 2 sections: A- Science ideal for engineering careers B- Science ideal for Medical field careers
Based on this choice, you have limited your options of programs you can apply to at the end of your high school. Engineering/Medicine/Business schools require the highest scores or GPA, so, if you have a low GPA you're fucked.
If you score high enough (most people who go into this high school major end up having at least a 3.8 GPA), congratulations you are now on your way to fulfill your parents fantasies, and make lots and lots of money.
All state education is free, from kindergarten to PhD, however private schools (frowned upon and most of them are still not accredited) cost lots of money (you basically buy your degree with whatever sorry ass GPA you accumulated)
My point is kids there get a chance to see what they like to study, they see how concentrated it is and discover early on if they have to potential and desire to put that much work into a program or a study subject or not, while here...they get a college education because it's the right thing to do, not giving any weigh on consideration to how they might benefit from their field of study.
Compared to the intensity of the courses they go through before college, USA AP classes are a joke and a 5th grader there can do a better job on them than most "talented" kids here.
How I dream of cultivating their intelligence and talent into a big giant ball and keep it in my closet.
that sounds like a bunch of bullshit to me. our elite can compete with anyone in the world.
True, the elite can compete with the average kid there.
So, some generic MENA country has a better K-12 education system than the US? Uhh, prove it. MENA countries aren't even in the PISA dataset that would be used to make a comparison like this.
Only plausible country would be Israel.
well, by "average" he means average student in these countries, which makes sense. i know in a lot of countries they don't bother educating the lower achievers beyond a certain grade level (China and Mexico come to mind here). their "average" student is already cream of the crop, so they are at about the same level as our AP students.
in these counties, not only is college not an option for everyone... they take HIGH SCHOOL out of the picture if you're a low performer.
im sure im in the minority here but ive never thought intelligence was an ability thing as much as it was a "drive" thing. I did really well in high school and college and never for a moment thought i did something anyone else coudn't do. I just worked wayyyyyyy harder. I have some friends that are great examples. In UG they all did terrible cuz they were always partying and wud then claim they just weren't "gifted" like the kids that did well. Couple years later they do a PG somewhere with no friends (i.e. temptations) and absolutely kill it. The whole "talent" thing is horse shit imo. It's what lazy people use to justify themselves sucking
That is nearly completely untrue. Most studies on geniuses have shown that in the aggregate they have incredible difficulty conforming to societal norms, and thus have a tendency to have higher suicide rates and difficulty working in a productive manner.
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