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> offering an exploratory period of life that is college (socially and intellectually) That is exactly what college is, and is supposed to be. Many people mak

• pirocks 9y ago
  Sorry for being edgy, but please tell me where I can get jobs training for being a doctor, lawyer, etc. that isn't college. Regardless of what you think college is, college currently is primarily jobs training.
  • Hydraulix989 9y ago
    You're conflating college with professional school.
    • PhasmaFelis 9y ago
      Colleges conflate college with professional school. The first time I visited my alma mater as a high school senior, I told them I wanted to be a programmer when I grew up, and they said "You'll want our computer science program, then." Nobody ever recommended me to a technical school instead, or told me that the CS program would teach me very basic programming, lots of academically interesting stuff about operating systems and electronics and math, and practically nothing that prepared me for a career. They were perfectly happy to take my money and let me believe that I was learning professional skills.
      • khedoros1 9y ago
        Classes taught me in one area. Student-organized study groups, living with classmates, taking part in on and off-campus programming competitions, and working on side projects with the people I met at school taught me in other areas. Both were part of "college", to me; I wouldn't have done all the campus-life stuff if I hadn't been there. CS itself was always presented to me as the science that acts as a basis for the more practical engineering side of things. It was supposed to be the theory underlying the practice. That's what I paid for, and that's what I think I got (with the remainder of my experience being what I made of it). So, college could've been useless crap. For me, it wasn't.
        • PhasmaFelis 9y ago
          Sure, and some of my classmates did the same. I didn't, because I foolishly assumed that going to classes and doing homework would teach me the things I needed to know and I could relax the rest of the time, and no one ever told me otherwise until it was too late. I thought I was paying for an education. I was actually paying to hang out in the vicinity of an education, while being distracted with useless busywork.
          • khedoros1 9y ago
            My GEs included a lot of critical thinking courses. Maybe they influenced me more than I realized at the time. Without the classes from my degree, my practical knowledge would be built on sand. I feel like the things I learned in class provide a solid foundation for building upon, but just a foundation. The nature of what I was learning became clear as I was doing it, and I could see the delta between what I was doing and the future I wanted to aim for. As I went on, I could also see how the theory could be leveraged to get me where I wanted to be.
      • pmiller2 9y ago
        Did you expect them to recommend something they don't offer?
        • 9y ago
  • stale2002 9y ago
    That is a small percentage of the population. Most people who went to college are not now working in an industry where a degree is literally required by law.
    • watwut 9y ago
      Required by employers tho.
    • Jtsummers 9y ago
      Or they're working in a field where any degree will do and none are actually going to prepare the worker for the job. Many office jobs qualify here. You need to be literate and numerate to be an insurance adjuster. But no degree will prepare them for that job, generally speaking. I know many who were English, philosophy, or history majors in that field and others that require a degree but just want a box checked.
    • sanderjd 9y ago
      It is also not the most efficient way to achieve the required training for those jobs. We could have future doctors and lawyers go straight to trade schools focused solely on those professions, and likely shave a couple years off their total education. But most people in our society agree that we like our doctors and lawyers to have the breadth that an undergraduate degree is intended to provide.
      • hanklazard 9y ago
        I don't really care if my thoracic surgeon has a strong grasp of microeconomics or 19th Century British Lit. I only care that s/he has good medical training and experience. Note: I'm a doctor.
        • eropple 9y ago
          You don't care if your surgeon has been exposed to the idea of opportunity costs and given a framework for thinking about them structurally? That's pretty weird, Doc.
  • closeparen 9y ago
    Graduate and professional school are different animals. They, like the workforce, have a strong preference for people who have first gone to college, but not necessarily because they have dependencies on particular college classes.
    • pmiller2 9y ago
      Preference? What US law or medical school can one go to without a bachelor's degree?
      • Larrikin 9y ago
        I think his point was that it's possible to get into those schools without a related degree.
• treehau5 9y ago
  > That's it. Actually, you scratched the surface, but it goes so much further than that -- that sadly most of our modern universities have lost sight of. I've posted this in previous comments, but universities are actually suppose to help build more just societies -- an idea Plato describes as the purpose of university, and echoed by many chancellors across the country. "The goal of university education is to help build a fairer, more just society" - Steven Schwartz. [0] "Plato regards education as a means to achieve justice, both individual justice and social justice." [1] [0]: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/comment/columnists/the-higher-purpose/176727.article https://www.timeshighereducation.com/comment/columnists/the-... [1]: http://epublications.marquette.edu/dissertations/AAI9517932/ http://epublications.marquette.edu/dissertations/AAI9517932/
  • 09bjb 9y ago
    I think this is what everyone is missing. If we're treating college strictly as a financial ROI calculation (which, partly, it is) it's obviously getting dicier by the year. This is exacerbated by Colleges and Universities treating every major from Economics to Cultural Studies as if they held roughly equal career prospects (they obviously don't). Yes, it is a luxury to have the time to take a step back and consider your own society from a wider lens than "how can I beter secure my financial future this week." But without experiences like College, gap years, travel, and other "frivolities," you'll most likely end up as yet another short-sighted member of upper class who's spent a majority of their lifetime's creative power accumulating and hoarding wealth. Many don't have the bandwidth for both personal security and a strong social conscience, and I don't blame them for it...but I sure wish there were more with that ability. Money is a very powerful tool and 18 is usually not old enough to be done with the formative experiences that will determine what you do with that power.
    • dokein 9y ago
      Most short-sighted members of the upper class went to college too; not clear that we have any data on if / how much a liberal education modifies selfish behavior.
    • deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
• rayiner 9y ago
  > Many people make the mistake of thinking that college is a jobs training program, or a career readiness program - it's not. It was never intended to be. College is supposed to give someone a broader perspective, a more complex worldview, exposure to a vast array of topics and ideas, and to develop habits that are generally beneficial to any life or intellectual pursuit. That's it. In short, it was designed as a luxury for rich kids who didn't need to contribute to society or provide for themselves. That militates towards setting up a "start something" fund (and maybe that "something" is setting up a Subway franchise or a construction company!) for your kid rather than a college fund.
  • sanderjd 9y ago
    I don't see the connection between the first part of your response and the second part. Yes, it was designed as a luxury for rich kids to get a leg up in adulthood in all the ways your parent mentioned, and then society realized that maybe it shouldn't just be the rich kids getting that luxury, maybe smart and / or hard working but not rich kids should also have a chance at that luxury. Of course it turns out to be expensive to make that work, but that doesn't mean the idea is bad. Are the rich kids moving on to some better way to get their start in life? It doesn't seem like they are, to me. So college seems like it is still a valuable model, and making access to it more fair still seems like a worthy goal.
    • tptacek 9y ago
      It's worth keeping in mind in these discussions that tuition and expenses aren't the only cost of college attendance; four years of opportunity cost in earning are also involved. We can drive tuition costs to zero and still the overwhelming majority of selective school attendees will be from high-earning families.
      • mulmen 9y ago
        I'm not sure I follow, are you assuming poor college students are expected to help support their families while in school?
• watwut 9y ago
  I would strongly prefer job training element in college for my kids then just "exploratory program". Science training counts too. People pay for college so that they can get a job that is not menial and low paid. Not everyone will inherit company from parents nor has buddies to call to when they want high paid job. Most of us need the job to pay bills and we need to be qualified to get that job.
• Chathamization 9y ago
  > Many people make the mistake of thinking that college is a jobs training program, or a career readiness program - it's not. The numerous jobs that require a college degree as a prerequisite suggest that it's the de facto job credential program for a large chunk of the economy. The fact of the matter is, if you want to get into a lot of (though not all) high paying jobs, college is a necessity, and that's likely the reason almost all college students are going to college (how many students are taking classes after they graduate?). We can talk about what college theoretically could be, but it's important not to ignore what college currently is.