http://www.popecenter.org/clarion_call/a....


"How Much Work "Requires" College Education?"

Quote:

In summary, for all its heft, “Help Wanted” doesn’t come close to making a persuasive case that the economy is changing so dramatically that we must increase the amount of formal education workers have.

I could be oversimplifying here, but could this be the result of the overall decline in public education?

We're churning out imbeciles who can barely read at a 6th grade level, let alone write coherently, when they graduate high school. Karl laid it out brilliantly in a recent Ticker: http://market-ticker.org/archives/2590-F....

We look at these jobs that now require a B.A. and think, "Hell, I had all those skills when I graduated, there's no reason for a college education to work as an admin assistant!"

Maybe the reason for it is that today's "entry level" class doesn't have the reading, writing, science, arithmetic, or critical thinking skills to perform even a simple office drone job effectively.

In my opinion, it's not the economy that's changing - it's the education.

IMO people with a college education work better with others as a team member and seem more well rounded.

The attitude of people I work with that have virtually no education is disgusting and they seem to have the "You owe me" attitude more than others.

I am basing this on my own observations over the years.

Considering that it takes 2 years of college to achieve a high school education these days , a college education probably is necessary.

OR....

What Chellie said.

Is that title grammatically correct?

I think collij iz overaided.

2+2=16

You qualify to work in the Obama administration.

Oh! Oh! OH! Pick Me! I want to be the math czar.

How about this in the U.K. -

Quote:

Universities expect surge in part-time studying with potential relaxing of student loan rules

A landmark review into university finance is expected to recommend that student loans, now only available to those on full-time courses, are extended to part-time students to cover the fees they must currently pay upfront, the Guardian has learned. Such a move would pave the way for a major change in the way university education is viewed, with a three-year stint in a new city no longer a given.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2010....

I was in Washington DC in August and had dinner with 3 young adults 30-32. I asked them each if they would be able to do their job without having gone to college - not could they get the job, but could they do it. All three had been required to have a degree to get hired at the job they had. One who worked for homeland security said what he learned in college didn't help him in any way, one said without having gone to college and learning what she did there, she wouldn't have been able to learn her job - she works in PR, and one said she couldn't do her job without what she learned in college. I wonder how representative this is in general but found it interesting.

The other thing about degrees being required...when I worked at a major corporation, jobs were graded (pay scale) on criteria such as if a degree was required, how much superivision is required or if you work independently, if you worked with people only in your department, outside your department, or the public, the amount of decision making, if you supervise people, etc.

Supervisory jobs were graded on the expertise and level of education etc of the people who they supervise. It was obvious that supervisers and management purposefully inflated the jobs under them in order to inflate their own job grade and pay. It was very common to have someone leave/retire and the supervisers would rewrite their job description knowing how to write it to get it graded higher and down the road get their own job upgraded. I saw more jobs than I can count that were mostly clerical in nature that had been done for decades by someone without a degree and when they offered early retirement, ALL of those job requirements changed to needing a degree. I can't think of one that didn't get upgraded. This was in the mid 80's.

I remember an article once (long time ago) about how college graduates generally undervalue their college education because they don't realize how they changed. What they learned substantively may not be of use to them in their current positions (e.g., an art major who goes into business), but they did change cognitively and just don't realize it. I didn't realize until my first job as a college professor just how much law school had changed my thought processes. Until then I had dealt mostly with other legal professionals. When I started teaching undergraduate legal studies I realized that we approached things in entirely different ways. That change in cognitive style happened without me even realizing it. That's what happens in college. While the substantive classes you took may not be of use in your eventual career, the cognitive style, and the skills you obtain (or improve) in speaking, reading, writing and interpersonal relations are.

Employers know this, and while the major you completed in college may not matter to them, it's those other skills that are important to them. If our K-12 system still functioned properly, they wouldn't have to require the college degree for many jobs just to have some chance that you acquired those skills. Nowadays, of course, more are even starting to require a master's degree because they can't rely on students acquiring those skills in their undergraduate educations.

@Briar: The problem is that graduate school can't replace an inadequate undergraduate education because the two levels of education are fundamentally different. Undergraduate education provides a broad understanding of a variety of fields. Graduate education generally is intense focus on a single area. Thus, graduate school cannot replace the cognitive benefits provided by undergraduate education.

I agree with you about the cognitive changes resulting from university. But it's not a binary thing. Instead, the quality and type of education make a big difference as well.

It's important for education to actually be well-rounded in nature. For example, I could have graduated from a Computer Science program which was highly ranked but which molded its students into being one-sided techies. Instead, I started at a community college with good general education courses. Then, after trying the highly ranked program, I transferred to a relatively unknown liberal arts college with a CS program. Partly as a result of having a broad education, I can understand the non-technical and business aspects of a problem. I can also communicate with clients, which has been greatly helpful in finding work while many head-down coders are taking menial jobs to survive.

Also, the top universities really are providing a more advanced education than average universities, let alone mediocre ones. I've attended a genuinely solid university, namely McGill. It was noticeably more rigorous than any of the US universities I attended, none of which are top-tier overall. And the people I've known from McGill and other top schools, notably Columbia, Barnard, Yale, the University of Chicago and NYU, usually have another level to their thinking which the average person on the street just doesn't have. By contrast, I'm surprised how cognitively unevolved people who graduated from mediocre schools tend to be. Then again, this is to be expected when academic standards are very low and the culture revolves around getting drunk. If you can't attend a quality school, I honestly think you're better off not attending university at all.

Quote:

I remember an article once (long time ago) about how college graduates generally undervalue their college education because they don't realize how they changed. What they learned substantively may not be of use to them in their current positions (e.g., an art major who goes into business), but they did change cognitively and just don't realize it. I didn't realize until my first job as a college professor just how much law school had changed my thought processes. Until then I had dealt mostly with other legal professionals. When I started teaching undergraduate legal studies I realized that we approached things in entirely different ways. That change in cognitive style happened without me even realizing it. That's what happens in college. While the substantive classes you took may not be of use in your eventual career, the cognitive style, and the skills you obtain (or improve) in speaking, reading, writing and interpersonal relations are.

Employers know this, and while the major you completed in college may not matter to them, it's those other skills that are important to them.

THIS x 1000.

Yes. College taught you, by example of your professors, that life is 99% bull**** and you better learn to shut up and not say anything if you want to get by.

I agree Boz. I had some good professors, one I remember saying often; this is how you pass the test, but it won't work in real life. You could always tell the ones that never had real jobs.

I was threatened once that if I didn't show up to a protest I would not pass the final. I fought it, failed, and re-took the class. Total BS.

The US DOL estimates that only 20% of jobs in the US require a college education to actually perform the work.

Of course, since K-12 education now leaves the teaching of reading and arithmetic skills, formerly mastered by the 4th grade, up to the first 2 years of college, maybe the DOL should change that % to 100.

Quote:

Yes. College taught you, by example of your professors, that life is 99% bull**** and you better learn to shut up and not say anything if you want to get by.

When it comes time to hang out with people I'd much rather prefer someone who went to grad school over someone who only has a HS diploma. The range of topics and the depth at which you can discuss them is very different. So is the level of thinking.

I volunteered to teach a freshman "first year experience" class one year. I decided that for their final paper, I would give them an "intellectual curiosity" assignment. They could pick any topic they wanted, as long as it was something they didn't already know a lot about. Every week when we met, we'd spend a few minutes having the students tell me what they'd learned about their topic that week.

About 1/4 of the class got genuinely excited about the assignment. They'd say things like "I've always wanted to know about X" or "I've always been curious about Y." Each week you could tell by the excitement in their voices when they'd tell the class about some tidbit they'd picked up. Their papers were wonderful to read.

The other 3/4 acted like I'd just hit them over the head with a mallet. Oh my god, I expected them to show some curiosity and learn something! The horror! Most of them waited to the last minute to start. They never offered anything during our weekly "what did you learn this week" sessions. The boys mostly wrote about some athlete and the girls mostly wrote about some celebrity. Stuff they were able to get off the web the day before the paper was due.

In the future I declined to teach that class again. I don't know how to deal with students who can't even summon up enough curiosity to learn something about any topic they want. I can understand not being interested in some topic that is picked for you, and I could understand if it was an additional paper they wouldn't ordinarily have to do, but they had to do a paper in this class and I was probably the only one teaching it that let them pick anything they wanted. And by paper I don't mean a term paper. I mean more like a long essay. Five page limit, no footnotes, just a bibliography.

So did you fail the uncurious ones ? You should have.

I was talking with my 16 year old about this just the other night. I explained to her that the way things are headed (economically) that there is a chance I will not be able to afford to send her to college and that if she couldn't show me some real goal, the best I'd do for her is community college.

We started talking about what "jobs" don't need college and I was kind of stumped. She actually said to me "well if I don't go to college, what else is there?" This was hard to answer. I told her she had to examine what she is interested in and how she could make a living doing that. She is in college prep courses in school and I wonder if that is a mistake.

I tried to get her to go to BOCES and take the LPN courses, go to work where there is tuition assitance and get her RN throught that, but the "stigma" schools put on kids (OK maybe her friends) made her not attend the introductory class... because none of her friends were going.

Anyway, she is all over the compass with what she wants to do with her life. One month she wants to be a dentsit, the next month a pastry chef - she has no idea.

I guess I'm asking for ideas/advice on how anyone else handled this with their kids...

Binney,
I don't have kids but I was a college professor for a long time. Expecting teenagers to know what they want to do is asking way too much of them. Part of the purpose of college is so they can figure out what they want to do. Unfortunately, college is now too expensive for most families to let their kids have the time to figure it out.

One thing you might do is every time she shows interest in something, arrange for her to shadow someone in that field for a few days or weeks. I know I wanted to be a veterinarian when I was a kid. As a senior Girl Scout I did one of my specialty pins (think badges, but for older kids) at a veterinarian's office. The pin required 50 hours of volunteer time. After working 5 hours each of ten Saturdays, I knew I wasn't going to be a veterinarian. Since she's only 16, you have time for her to experience a lot of different careers. Even if she just spends one day at each career, she'll get a flavor.

@Binney: One often overlooked way to get an education is to start with a career which pays reasonably well but doesn't require an education. Then, if so inclined, one can attend university part-time while earning enough money to pay for tuition and living expenses.

Nursing sounds like one way to do this. Other areas I can think of which might work include IT, the trades or starting a business. I'm actually investigating attending university part-time while working in IT. It should be possible to work 30 hours per week and earn enough money to attend a private university part-time with no financial aid and no loans.

Just be glad you're in New York State, where your daughter has many choices for where to attend next which are both excellent and affordable.

Could your daughter commute to Stony Brook? The cost of living on campus is the real killer financially. But in NYS, the difference in tuition between community colleges and four-year universities isn't that bad. She'd need a car, but she'll probably need that to get to the nearest community college anyway, right?

Binny, why not look at what local community colleges offer. All the gen ed requirements do give a well rounded education. And it gives her time to mature and figure out what sounds good.

Also I recommend something like 'what color is your parachute' to get an idea what she might like as a career.

I tend to tell kids that the odds of ONE career is slim...might work for a few but many will change careers a few times. So make the first one you learn able to pay enough to pay for the new training later in life as your career changes.

We are so screwed.