The College Scam, Higher education isn't worth the cost. - John Stossel

[Nomad]

Never let school get in the way of your education.

IMO, there's way more to college or university than the classes you attend, and this can also make a big difference later on. Of course, it's a costly (and getting costlier) option, and I agree that it shouldn't be considered required for a great number of trades that would do better with apprenticeships, for instance.

 

[billc]

An aside: one of the fill in hosts on a local radio show, a lawyer and journalist by profession, discussed this topic with John Stossel. the host made the point that a PH.D student was someone who would forsake making money right now for the hope of forsaking money in the future. I thought it was funny.

 

[jks9199]

There's really a couple of things going on here.

First is a shift in the understanding and expectations of basic education here in the US. Read articles from the newspaper of 40 or 50 years ago and compare them to today's. Today's papers and magazines are much more simplistically written then they used to be. We've lost a lot of critical thinking, too. Primary ed (I'll define this as through a high school diploma) has become as much about warehousing the kids during the day, social indoctrination, meals, and incidentally passing the mandated standards. Forget actually expecting work. I graduated HS in the late 80s; I basically slept through it. I didn't bother with school. And it's gotten worse.

Second is a over-valuing of credentials, rather than learning. It doesn't matter if you actually learned anything, if you have the credentials that you did. So, it's a status symbol and an expectation that kids will go to college right out of high school. I know that, with hindsight, I wasn't socially/emotionally ready for college right out of high school; I really would have benefited from either military service or just plain work, or even something like the Peace Corps. But I wasn't really prepared for that by high school; I was on a college track.

We also started valuing things much more by name or cost than actual usefulness or worth. (Not the best phrasing...) "Massive State College" isn't as good as 3x the cost private university. So, to compete, MSC started charging more... leading the private university to do the same... and the dance began. And, of course, you aren't a good parent if you don't send your kid to college... even if he really truly just wants to put his 8 hours in on the back of a trash truck so that he can paint or teach martial arts or whatever. It's part of the same thing.

College has, in way to many ways and way too many cases, become an additional four years of adolescence. A pause before reality -- without prepping people for reality. And grade inflation, from pre-school to at least bachelor's level courses, has made a "genteman's C" a "gentleman's A." As I completed my bachelor's, working full time and part time, I was constantly amazed at how little work was often required -- and then astounded when some students still managed to not do it. (There are exceptions and courses that are exceptions.)

I'd love to see a resurgence in trade or functional schools. You don't need a bachelor's degree to be a cop. It helps IF you learned to think while acquiring a degree, but it's far from essential. I routinely field the question of "what should I study in school?" The reality is the academy teaches you the cop stuff, coupled with experience. All the credit hours in the world don't equal the simple value of seeing and handling calls. And a degree doesn't show you can learn and apply knowledge -- it only shows that you can show up, and take tests or turn papers in. (Sometimes with 12 extensions...) It doesn't say you know how to show up for work on time, or pay a bill, or apply some sound judgement to a situation. The answer I give? Study whatever interests you, because the simple truth is that, outside of a decreasingly few fields (law, medicine, SOME engineering), your college degree may not have any relation to what you do for a living, so you might as well study something you like so that you stand a better chance of getting better grades. That -- or there are a hell of a lot of historians and economists out there that nobody knows about!

 

[elder999]

When I was a kid, for the longest time, I wanted to be a marine biologist. I earned a degree in religious studies that's proven to be of use only to me. Fast forward-a year in Japan, a coupla years in the export business concurrent with two years spent going to SUNY @ Stonybrook to "wipe the cobwebs away," and a year at M.I.T. and I drop out and get married.

That's right. I'm an M.I.T. dropout.

I got a job at the nuke plant-it paid REALLY well, and had good benefits, and wasn't boring. It also offered the opportunity to continue my engineering education with hands on experience. One of those hands on experiences was rotating the intake screens for people to count fish. See, Indian Point and Con Edison negotiated an agreement about fish killed on the intake screens-they have a hatchery for striped bass, and had people regularly come and count fish caught on the screens until they replaced those screens with ones that are supposed to gently return the fish back to the Hudson. As an operator, on a weekly basis I'd go out to the intake structure and run all eight screens for 10 minutes so that the head guy and his intern could get in a pit and count fish that were washed off the screens. This was great when it was summer and sunny (in the days before they enclosed the intake structure) but pretty miserable in the cold of the Hudson Valley. One winter, the "fishmonger" had a cute girl working with him, and I chatted her up a little while watching her turn blue handling fish in hip-deep freezing . What'd you do to wind up in this line of work? I asked, to which she rather snootily replied,I have a Master's in marine biology. To which I replied that I had once wanted to be a marine biologist, and asked what counting fish paid. She said Oh, 17K a year (this was like 1984) to which I replied,Wow. I dropped out of engineering after my third year, and I made $60K last year.....If sucks to be youhad been part of the vernacular then, I'd probably have said as much. :lfao:


In the ensuing years, I've gotten degreed up the ***....In the ensuing years, I've picked up more education-more than I wanted, really, and my salary has increased accordingly-sometimes quite a bit. Interestingly, the simple addition of an MBA to my resume might have earned me more-still might, I guess, but I'm not working for the money. In any case, since my employer compensated me for the cost of that education all along the way, it was definitely worth it, financially.

 

[Big Don]

One degree isn't the same as another. An BA or even an MA is probably less valuable than a BS or an MS...
Bill Gates is wealthy, he never finished college... My grandpa ran the largest lemon packing house in the world, and never finished the eighth grade...
Personal drive has more, IMO, to do with where you get in life than any other factor.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

http://blogs.ubc.ca/paperball/2010/11/11/straight-as-never-made-anybody-rich-by-wess-roberts/

There are many paths to personal achievement. Often education and training lead you to the opportunity to make the most of your life.

 

[granfire]

One degree isn't the same as another. An BA or even an MA is probably less valuable than a BS or an MS...
Bill Gates is wealthy, he never finished college... My grandpa ran the largest lemon packing house in the world, and never finished the eighth grade...
Personal drive has more, IMO, to do with where you get in life than any other factor.

well, grandpa lived in a different era...and even Bill Gates is old skool by now....not sure if he could have his way in current climate.

But to counter elder's story on how to make bank without a degree...
hubby was passed over for a promotion in favor of a woman with a degree in history...
Now, mind you, they were testing gas masks and repair rubber hazmat suits for a military instalation. Hstory is good, but got not a thing to do with mustard gas - historic application not withstanding.

 

[Empty Hands]

 

[Brian R. VanCise]

Having a College/University education is no guarantee of success. However, it usually does help! Throughout my life I have known some fantastic people with little education who became incredibly wealthy. (my grandpa who was raised during the depression is a prime example) I have also known a lot more people who did not go to college who made very little money. On average all of the College/University degreed people that I know are making very good money if not great! It is not a definite as your own intellect and skills will determine how you do but.... having an education usually gives you a leg up on the competition. What you do with it then is your business!

 

[Kacey]

One degree isn't the same as another. An BA or even an MA is probably less valuable than a BS or an MS...

The only difference between a BA and BS at the university I attended for my undergraduate work was 2 years of a foreign language... which, incidentally, was required for the BS, not the BA.

Bill Gates is wealthy, he never finished college... My grandpa ran the largest lemon packing house in the world, and never finished the eighth grade...
Personal drive has more, IMO, to do with where you get in life than any other factor.[/QUOTE]

Personal drive is, indeed, important - although as I said earlier, the expectations for education have increased massively over the last 50 years; when your grandfather was a child, few people went to school past 8th grade. My grandfather - who stopped at the end of 8th grade - was a professional draftsman, which would require considerably more today than the on-the-job training Grandpa received. That same personal drive is behind all of the entrepreneurs in the news today.

The biggest difference I see is the proliferation of assistance programs - when my grandparents (all born between 1902 and 1912) were children, and young adults (during the Great Depression) you either found a way to make money or you starved. Welfare began during the Great Depression - and people did whatever they could to stay off it. I teach children who are third- and fourth-generation Welfare recipients, who are taught from the cradle that the government owes them a living. As a teacher, I do all I can to teach these kids that effort will pay off - so they can go home and sit on the couch with Mom and Grandma, listening to them complain about how food stamps just don't go as far as they used to. Few of them have the personal drive necessary to succeed in school - never mind beyond school. The problems with education today are societal, and related strongly to the 87% of the time that kids aren't in school - so let's quit telling teachers to fix it all by themselves and pull together as a society to fix this mess we, as a society, have created.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Gates dropped out of Harvard for 'lack of challenge' as he put it. It was also because he was pulled in the direction of being pioneer in the computer field, rather than rehashing what some dead guy 500 years ago came up with. (there's a quote out there that says as much. Can't find it, but I've got 5 bios on the guy to look through)
By all accounts, he was a math whiz.

or all his success, apparently he's still not a fan of college, though. Despite receiving an honorary degree from Harvard in 2007, Gates' closing speech [video] at the Techonomy 2010 conference delivered criticism of colleges today.

Gates calls college education "increasingly hard to get" and says that "place-based" traditional college studies will be "five times less important than it is today."

He argues, "The self-motivated learner will be on the web. And there will be far less place-based [college] things...College -- except for the parties -- needs to be less place based."

http://www.dailytech.com/Bill+Gates...tion+When+You+ Have+the+Web/article19294.htm

Gates got where he is by something that most people today lack.
Hard work, and a willingness to do what it takes.

He used to (don't know if he still does) take 'reading vacations', where he'd litterally curl up somewhere away from the daily grind for a few days and hammer a topic to death. "Light" reading like Physics, or Astronomy or the latest programming languages.
Not comics and reality shows.

Follow his path, you'll probably do ok. You might also drop dead of exhaustion as 48 hr days were normal for him.

 

[billc]

So he was successful because he could alter the time space continuum by putting 48 hours in a 24 hour day. Kind of like ground hog day. I wish I could do that.

 

[Buka]

If every college education was free, would that matter?

 

[Bob Hubbard]

It can never be free. Someone has to pay for the ivory towers and reality distortion fields those professors exist under.

 

[granfire]

It can never be free. Someone has to pay for the ivory towers and reality distortion fields those professors exist under.

Well, when it was still assumed that having graduates of those ivory towers, the assumption of free education was not too far fetched.

However, as the institutions of higher learning are flooded and in turn release a deluge of graduates onto a market not equipped to absorb them....

We need to rethink this.
(FWIW, students in Germany are UPSET about having to pay something like 500 Euro a semester....)

 

[hongkongfooey]

Bob said..

"It can never be free. Someone has to pay for the ivory towers and reality distortion fields those professors exist under"


That is right. Especially when the basketball coach makes $1,000,000 a year.

 

[Bob Hubbard]

Now, some years back the city of Niagara Falls built a new state of the art high school, funding was provided to a good extent (I want to say fully, but may be wrong) by private backers. All students received laptops as part of the deal. No idea if they are still doing that. Also, from my understanding that took care of the build. Daily operations comes from the tax base however.

My local community college lists these rates:

Full-time (per academic year) $7,200.00 (commuter)
Part-time (per credit hour) $300.00/cr. hr.

Harvard lists $52,650 / yr (includes board)

D'youville is about $20-30k depending on commuter/boarder status.

• At about $16,000 for a 2 yr associates degree, Assuming it generates an additional $5/hr pay rise, full time employment gained at graduation, the break even point is about a year and a half from graduation.
• A 4 year degree from D'Youville will run you about $120,000.
• Assuming a $10/hr pay rise, full time employment gained at graduation, the break even point is about 6 years after graduation.
• A 4 year degree from Harvard runs about $212,000.
• Assuming a $15/hr pay rise, full time employment gained at graduation, the break even point is about 14 years after graduation.

Note that I did increase the earning potential to reflect the expected greater earning potential as the degree and 'desirability' increased.

• Slightly above Min wage high school grad, full time, some experience: $10/hr. Gross Income Pre Tax $21,000
• 2 year degree, 50% pay rise. $15/hr Gross Income Pre Tax - $31,000
• Same rate for entry to mid level skilled trade.
• 4 yr degree. 2x high schooler rate. $20/hr gross income pre-tax $42,000
• 4 yr degree, prestige factor 1.5. $30/hr gross income pre tax $ $62,000

(I am aware the numbers in the 2 blocks do not sync up.)

See also http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2000/05/01/278924/index.htm

 

[Makalakumu]

Is this a function of some other aspect of schooling or is this an actual demonstration of the worth of a degree? Formal education isn't necessarily about learning. There are other aspects of school that train a person to function in our society. Whilst this graph seems to show a correlation between degree and income, reality is FAR more complicated then that conclusion.

 

[elder999]

Is this a function of some other aspect of schooling or is this an actual demonstration of the worth of a degree? Formal education isn't necessarily about learning. There are other aspects of school that train a person to function in our society. Whilst this graph seems to show a correlation between degree and income, reality is FAR more complicated then that conclusion.

You're right. Clearly the graph demonstrates the outcome of the Nubirian conspiracy to make us all falsely believe that a college degree leads to a higher paying job, by ensuring that a college education leads to a higher paying job.:lfao:

In other words, just how is reality FAR more complicated than that conclusion?

 

[Bob Hubbard]

I hit $50k back in 2002-2003.
High school diploma, no college degree.
Right place, right creds, right ability, etc.

I know a few people who passed that chart.
I know people who should be higher who are stuck lower too.

A degree -can- help.
But hard work, demonstrated ability, experience and opportunity grabbed gets you further, in my opinion.