Lets talk about college...

[Midswat]

I'm not talking about the drinking, the girls, the sports, etc. I'm talking about the functionality of a college degree.

Is it worth it? Is it needed? Would you encourage your children to go?

What prompts this question?

Well... I'm a supervisor at my company, and I'm in charge of reviewing resumes, interviewing and hiring candidates to work under me in my office. It's a "temp" position. The pay is $10.50 and hour. No benefits.

I called the Temp Agency today and solicited resumes to hire a couple new candidates for administrative positions, and I received 9 resumes. All of these individuals have at least a Bachelors Degree. Two have their Masters.

And these aren't from podunk, fly by night colleges like DeVry or University of Phoenix. Nor are these ridiculous degrees like Philosophy or English. Well, not all of them are.


Think about that: young professionals graduating with "functional" degrees from respectable universities (Old Dominion, Virginia State University, Clemson, West Virginia) having to resort to applying for positions that offer wages not significantly higher than minimum wage. Certainly not enough to allow them to live on their own.


Now, I'm starting this thread without looking too much into the subject myself. As in, I've yet to research if what I see when I hire is the norm. I.E. are most college graduates struggling to find work.

If so, what does that say about college itself? Still functional? Still relevant?

 

[peplaw06]

Everyone has a degree now, so it means less than it used to. Still, you're at a huge disadvantage if you are looking for a job and don't have one.

That said, if you know what field you want to be in, it may be best to just start that right out of high school and start working your way up the ladder. The problem is most 18 year olds don't know what they want to be.... well that and there are many jobs that you can't "work up to" if you don't have the degree. You can go to school while you're working in the field, and you'll have the degree and experience, but that generally takes longer to do.

I think the cost to get a degree is outrageous. But the disadvantage to not getting one is so big that colleges know that and jack up the costs.

 

[superpunk]

It's kind of part of the lie or illusion baby boomers came up with to sell the idea of the American dream. Their whole life has been spent borrowing against our future, telling everyone that hey all you have to do is go to college when you get out you'll have the nice job, little house little family etc.

Then in the meantime, they inflated the cost of college by about 300-500%, tanked the economy and destroyed all the jobs.

Once there were no jobs, they sold more college as a way to enhance your value in the potential market.

I think the next fiasco will start there - student loans. You're going to have alot of pissed off people riddled with debt who were sold a bill of goods and never got what they were "promised".

That said, college is what it is - a place to further education. It's not prep school for the real world or w/e, and alot of well educated people come out of college with no idea how to get a job, be appealing to an employer, etc. Plus there's no market for them anyhow. There are plenty of unemployed people with tons of experience that companies would way rather hire than a recent college graduate. At the job I got before this one they hired me to replace a chick with a masters from Princeton because she just had no idea wtf she was doing and she couldn't get by on her own. I'm sure she could write a great paper but ask her to design a shopping center and she's lost. She'd end up bawling in my boss's office because she couldn't handle the pressure. College isn't prep-school for work, it's just a place to learn more stuff and get a better rounded education.

I think college is a great thing to have if you're already a smart, resourceful person who is going to succeed anyhow. It is a calling card to get your foot in the door. It's not going to make stupid people smarter. Once the recovery gets a little more steam it might actually get you a job though.

I think we have to start rethinking the entire education model, but when talking about this, the first thing that has to change is this idea that a kid has to pick out a major and have the next 20 years of his life planned out before he graduates. That's broken for sure. Very few people are ready to make that decision at 18.

 

[Midswat]

It's kind of part of the lie or illusion baby boomers came up with to sell the idea of the American dream. Their whole life has been spent borrowing against our future, telling everyone that hey all you have to do is go to college when you get out you'll have the nice job, little house little family etc.

Then in the meantime, they inflated the cost of college by about 300-500%, tanked the economy and destroyed all the jobs.

Once there were no jobs, they sold more college as a way to enhance your value in the potential market.

Great points.

 

[ThoughtExperiment]

Absolutely everyone who can should go to college. Not even for the degree so much as for the personal growth. And I don't mean the parties, etc., but just how the courses challenge you.

 

[Jon88]

It's kind of part of the lie or illusion baby boomers came up with to sell the idea of the American dream. Their whole life has been spent borrowing against our future, telling everyone that hey all you have to do is go to college when you get out you'll have the nice job, little house little family etc.

Then in the meantime, they inflated the cost of college by about 300-500%, tanked the economy and destroyed all the jobs.

Once there were no jobs, they sold more college as a way to enhance your value in the potential market.

I think the next fiasco will start there - student loans. You're going to have alot of pissed off people riddled with debt who were sold a bill of goods and never got what they were "promised".

That said, college is what it is - a place to further education. It's not prep school for the real world or w/e, and alot of well educated people come out of college with no idea how to get a job, be appealing to an employer, etc. Plus there's no market for them anyhow. There are plenty of unemployed people with tons of experience that companies would way rather hire than a recent college graduate. At the job I got before this one they hired me to replace a chick with a masters from Princeton because she just had no idea wtf she was doing and she couldn't get by on her own. I'm sure she could write a great paper but ask her to design a shopping center and she's lost. She'd end up bawling in my boss's office because she couldn't handle the pressure. College isn't prep-school for work, it's just a place to learn more stuff and get a better rounded education.

I think college is a great thing to have if you're already a smart, resourceful person who is going to succeed anyhow. It is a calling card to get your foot in the door. It's not going to make stupid people smarter. Once the recovery gets a little more steam it might actually get you a job though.

I think we have to start rethinking the entire education model, but when talking about this, the first thing that has to change is this idea that a kid has to pick out a major and have the next 20 years of his life planned out before he graduates. That's broken for sure. Very few people are ready to make that decision at 18.

#Real talk

 

[bbgun]

Too many people these days are credentialed, not necessarily educated. The real fools are kids going into debt to the tune of $100K for a literature or history degree. We even have newly minted law students who can't find steady work. Unless you're a high-achieving STEM student, you don't necessarily emerge from a university with any particular skills, other than proving that you can rouse yourself out of bed and finish something. A lot of undergrads would be better off in trade school.

 

[iceberg]

It's kind of part of the lie or illusion baby boomers came up with to sell the idea of the American dream. Their whole life has been spent borrowing against our future, telling everyone that hey all you have to do is go to college when you get out you'll have the nice job, little house little family etc.

baby boomers have nothing to do with it, just an evolution that's run it's course. as for "borrowing against the future", our government does that daily without any goals of actual production and you encourage it. you want to give things away so people don't have to produce things.

i'm sorry, but without production your value is seriously limited. the american dream - you have no idea what it is.

The American Dream is a national ethos of the United States, a set of ideals in which freedom includes the opportunity for prosperity and success, and an upward social mobility achieved through hard work. In the definition of the American Dream by James Truslow Adams in 1931, "life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement" regardless of social class or circumstances of birth.

The idea of the American Dream is rooted in the United States Declaration of Independence which proclaims that "all men are created equal" and that they are "endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights" including "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

-----

you see, telling people they'll have to WORK for a living got difficult as things yes, got easier.

 

[iceberg]

a college education is nice, don't get me wrong. but without a "skill" to sell, you're pretty much worthless.

 

[bbgun]

Everyone has a degree now, so it means less than it used to. Still, you're at a huge disadvantage if you are looking for a job and don't have one.

Yeah, it's a tool for employers to weed out candidates. By law, they can't give IQ tests, so the GPA acts as a substitute.

 

[iceberg]

Yeah, it's a tool for employers to weed out candidates. By law, they can't give IQ tests, so the GPA acts as a substitute.

i graduated in 1988. i've only been asked about my gpa a small handfull of times.

 

[bbgun]

i graduated in 1988. i've only been asked about my gpa a small handfull of times.

well sure, after a certain number of years, your work history trumps your academic achievements. but they still want you to have a degree.

 

[iceberg]

well sure, after a certain number of years, your work history trumps your academic achievements. but they still want you to have a degree.

they want to be sure you can do the job. even after college when job hunting, they wanted to find out what i could do, not what my education was. can i operate corel draw? ventura publisher? write? they want proven skills. college really doesn't provide proven skills but theory that varies from one instructor to another. i majored in business admin with a minor in journalism. but what can i do that the company/business can make money off of is the question.

develop business opportunities?
create content / value to sell?
sell something?
grunt labor?

college does show an advanced education but it doesn't really show proven skills.

 

[ScipioCowboy]

Too many people these days are credentialed, not necessarily educated. The real fools are kids going into debt to the tune of $100K for a literature or history degree. We even have newly minted law students who can't find steady work. Unless you're a high-achieving STEM student, you don't necessarily emerge from a university with any particular skills, other than proving that you can rouse yourself out of bed and finish something. A lot of undergrads would be better off in trade school.

This. This. This.

Education is nice, but you must have a marketable skill.

It's highly possible much of our current unemployment is structural in nature -- i.e. there are jobs, but few people have the skills or the willingness to do them. Consequently, an influx of immigrants could provide a boon to the economy. I made the opposite argument to Junk a few weeks ago, but I keeping going back and forth on the issue.

 

[iceberg]

This. This. This.

Education is nice, but you must have a marketable skill.

It's highly possible much of our current unemployment is structural in nature -- i.e. there are jobs, but few people have the skills or the willingness to do them. Consequently, an influx of immigrants could provide a boon to the economy. I made the opposite argument to Junk a few weeks ago, but I keeping going back and forth on the issue.

we may be taking different roads, but i think many of us are saying the same thing.

 

[superpunk]

Too many people these days are credentialed, not necessarily educated. The real fools are kids going into debt to the tune of $100K for a literature or history degree. We even have newly minted law students who can't find steady work. Unless you're a high-achieving STEM student, you don't necessarily emerge from a university with any particular skills, other than proving that you can rouse yourself out of bed and finish something. A lot of undergrads would be better off in trade school.

Just have to erase the stigma.

Or work towards a system like other first world nations have where going to college isn't something you must do AND is going to get you into a fuckton of debt, but university is just something that's done after high school, it's affordable or completely paid for and is just looked at as further education not prep for the work force. Kids picking their "career" at 18 has to stop. Especially when that choice comes with a mountain of debt that forces you into something you may hate just because you owe it to your degree at that point.

 

[marionbarberthe4th]

Humans are weird

 

[Theebs]

All I know is I am paying back a student loan on an education or degree anyway I do not use.

I am one of the idiots that didn't know what they wanted to do at 17,18,19 etc......I changed majors 4 times and graduated with like 40 credits that basically were not even part of my bachelor's.

It's awesome paying every month! Thank god I backed out last minute on getting an MBA.

 

[Jon88]

I'm glad I got my degree, but I never want to do it again. I graduated without debt because I went to an inexpensive school and had a partial scholarship. I worked and paid for the other part.

I don't even want to think about how I'll pay for my son's tuition in 18 years. Tuition at my school was only $5,000 a year, but I've heard it's a lot more at bigger universities. There's no way I'm paying $20,000 a year for him to go to school.

 

[superpunk]

100% theebs was an art history major