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What is your point? This seems pointlessly blame-y. Those who just graduated from high school and entered college have been told by figuratively-literally every

by Afton 6y ago

What is your point? This seems pointlessly blame-y. Those who just graduated from high school and entered college have been told by figuratively-literally everyone that that is what they should do. Then they do it, and it turns out it is a terrible idea for a variety of reasons and there is an ill-timed pandemic that cuts off the few reasonable opportunities that they might have otherwise had. But sure, let's blame those foolish, foolish young adults for their crazy choices.

yostrovs 6y ago
When I was in college, just starting out, I knew that making money after college is important and that certain fields that may be interesting, such as literature and psychology, don't provide a clear path to making a living. This didn't seem a secret, but many of my colleague students explicitly waved off such concerns. They "didn't care about money". So I chose computer science and many of them went with anthropology and whatnot. The results were predictable and it was indeed their own fault to not care. Now that there's talk of cancelling student debt, it infuriates me that they might get off paying the justly earned debt doing fun things in college while I was coding memory management, and pulling my hair out, into the night.
- Afton 6y ago
  "I suffered, so they should too". That's all I have to say about your fury. As for the other part: I was told, explicitly, that thinking about college as a jobs-training experience was the wrong approach. Learning how to think, how to write, how to organize ideas, that was valuable in and of itself. And maybe at some time, it was true. With a degree in the '70s, you could get in to a lot of sensible middle-class jobs, even in art-history and psychology.It turned out not to be true [edit: when I was in college, not in the '70s], but I was ill equipped to understand that. I also suspect that you have only the most superficial understanding of your cohort's motivations, yet seem absolutely confident in your analysis. I wonder if a course in psychology or philosophy would have benefited you some.
  - yostrovs 6y ago
    You dismiss me, but I spent four years alongside people who repeatedly and consistently followed the "money is not important to me" mantra. They were adults, old enough to understand consequences. But money was not important to them. We were in ones of the most expensive colleges in the nation, mind you. Now money matters to them, and they would rather someone else covers their debts, someone who actually generates productive output. And these people are almost exclusively from the economically upper quartile of the population. They want Bob the plumber to pay for their anthro degree. Lol. Now how about you take some sociology classes to understand this situation?

by Afton 6y ago

yostrovs 6y ago

When I was in college, just starting out, I knew that making money after college is important and that certain fields that may be interesting, such as literature and psychology, don't provide a clear path to making a living. This didn't seem a secret, but many of my colleague students explicitly waved off such concerns. They "didn't care about money". So I chose computer science and many of them went with anthropology and whatnot. The results were predictable and it was indeed their own fault to not care. Now that there's talk of cancelling student debt, it infuriates me that they might get off paying the justly earned debt doing fun things in college while I was coding memory management, and pulling my hair out, into the night.

Afton 6y ago
"I suffered, so they should too". That's all I have to say about your fury. As for the other part: I was told, explicitly, that thinking about college as a jobs-training experience was the wrong approach. Learning how to think, how to write, how to organize ideas, that was valuable in and of itself. And maybe at some time, it was true. With a degree in the '70s, you could get in to a lot of sensible middle-class jobs, even in art-history and psychology.It turned out not to be true [edit: when I was in college, not in the '70s], but I was ill equipped to understand that. I also suspect that you have only the most superficial understanding of your cohort's motivations, yet seem absolutely confident in your analysis. I wonder if a course in psychology or philosophy would have benefited you some.
- yostrovs 6y ago
  You dismiss me, but I spent four years alongside people who repeatedly and consistently followed the "money is not important to me" mantra. They were adults, old enough to understand consequences. But money was not important to them. We were in ones of the most expensive colleges in the nation, mind you. Now money matters to them, and they would rather someone else covers their debts, someone who actually generates productive output. And these people are almost exclusively from the economically upper quartile of the population. They want Bob the plumber to pay for their anthro degree. Lol. Now how about you take some sociology classes to understand this situation?