College Scam

[Sten]

Try and get a management job in the fortune 500 without a college degree.

[Sigaba]

FWIW, every three years, The College Board, an advocacy group, publishes Education Pays, a study that quantifies the benefits of a college education.

The 2010 edition of this publication is available here.

HTH.

[FedFarmer]

Originally Posted by Richard

I was a high school principal during that time period and that may be what you heard - our focus with our students was on individual student aptitude, talents, and desires - college was an option for some but not for all - trade schools and corporate-sponsored on-the-job-training programs were equally as viable for many of our students and we helped guide them in that direction - America only offers opportunity and it is best realized when one is honest with themself in their self-appraisal and in developing 'realistic' goals.

And so it goes in the 'real' world...

Richard

I wish more educators had a similarly realistic approach to education. While I'm not exactly sure where the disconnect begins, I strongly believe that young people today (my generation, particularly), suffer from a sense of entitlement which greatly diminishes their chances for success.

Interesting read here: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/...rticle2169409/

Wente: "The entitlement mindset didn’t come from nowhere. It came from us. It came from a generation of adults who believed that kids should never be allowed to fail, or told the truth about their abilities, or learn that getting what you want is sometimes hard. On top of that, we have the modern fallacy of higher education – much beloved of politicians, who believe the acquisition of a BA is a sort of alchemy that can transform intellectual dross into gold and ensure that everyone, no matter how inert, can succeed in the knowledge economy."

[Ret10Echo]

Originally Posted by Richard

I was a high school principal during that time period and that may be what you heard - our focus with our students was on individual student aptitude, talents, and desires - college was an option for some but not for all - trade schools and corporate-sponsored on-the-job-training programs were equally as viable for many of our students and we helped guide them in that direction - America only offers opportunity and it is best realized when one is honest with themself in their self-appraisal and in developing 'realistic' goals.

And so it goes in the 'real' world...

Richard

Point taken, however experience here has been quite the opposite...or perhaps not what the target should be.

Neighbor's kid was having trouble in school (grades), managed to get into a vocational program at the school and was excelling in it. It was very visible, the turn-around. Actually WENT to school EVERY day, his "extracurricular" activities disappeared...and he looked forward to going to school.

That is, until the administration pulled him out...he wasn't doing "well enough" in his "college prep" courses to stay in the vocational program.

Result, another statistic. Dropout...wandered off somewhere.

Shame.

[BOfH]

Originally Posted by Sten

Try and get a management job in the fortune 500 without a college degree.

Which is why I am considering an online degree at the moment, just for the damn piece of paper. I've always wondered if it was discriminatory in the legal sense, that a piece of paper could still hold more value than the equivalent experience...

[ZonieDiver]

Originally Posted by BOfH

Which is why I am considering an online degree at the moment, just for the damn piece of paper. I've always wondered if it was discriminatory in the legal sense, that a piece of paper could still hold more value than the equivalent experience...

Learning Effect vs. Screening Effect

[ZonieDiver]

Originally Posted by Ret10Echo

Point taken, however experience here has been quite the opposite...or perhaps not what the target should be.

Neighbor's kid was having trouble in school (grades), managed to get into a vocational program at the school and was excelling in it. It was very visible, the turn-around. Actually WENT to school EVERY day, his "extracurricular" activities disappeared...and he looked forward to going to school.

That is, until the administration pulled him out...he wasn't doing "well enough" in his "college prep" courses to stay in the vocational program.

Result, another statistic. Dropout...wandered off somewhere.

Shame.

Having spent the last ten years of my teaching career in the academic side of the Career-Technical Education field, let me assure you that this is not uncommon, unfortunately.

Schools are rated by state and federal agencies on things other than producing productive citizens. That said, in most instances, schools don't require honor roll performance in academics to stay in CTE. I'm not sure of the situation in your case. In my schools, if they could maintain a "C" average, they were usually good to go!

[Ret10Echo]

Originally Posted by BOfH

Which is why I am considering an online degree at the moment, just for the damn piece of paper. I've always wondered if it was discriminatory in the legal sense, that a piece of paper could still hold more value than the equivalent experience...

The piece of paper supports the experience. To go along with ZD's comment: Lacking a better external measure, an employer is left with the generally accepted measure of performance. For better or worse, that measure is a degree or certification from an accredited institution.

I have spent the years since my retirement (grudgingly) executing that very process.

[BOfH]

Originally Posted by Ret10Echo

The piece of paper supports the experience. To go along with ZD's comment: Lacking a better external measure, an employer is left with the genearlly accepted measure of performance. For better or worse, that measure is a degree or certification from an accredited institution.

I have spent the years since my retirement (grudgingly) executing that very process.

QPs ZD/Ret10Echo,
Thanks for your informative replies. Ret10Echo, I think you have hit the nail on the head, it may be bad, but there is nothing better, and the alternative worse at times. I'm sure I'll be heading down that path soon enough, and I have many, many years before retirement

[Sten]

Originally Posted by BOfH

I've always wondered if it was discriminatory in the legal sense, that a piece of paper could still hold more value than the equivalent experience...

Please tell me you are kidding.

I got way more out of my college then a piece of paper.

[BOfH]

Originally Posted by Sten

Please tell me you are kidding.

I got way more out of my college then a piece of paper.

I'm not. Everyone's experience is different, and if the purpose is to educate, I know quite a few souls that "just got a piece of paper" and nothing more, but this topic (standards/quality) has been discussed to death. As with many things in life, College is one that goes into the YMMV category.

[Richard]

Here's a more recent and growing part of the problems of higher education.

How Pricey For-Profit Colleges Target Vets' GI Bill Money
MotherJones, Sep/Oct 2011

Last winter, the Department of Veterans Affairs tasked its newly hired blogger, a cantankerous Iraq vet named Alex Horton, with investigating the website GIBill.com, one of many official-looking links that come up when you Google terms like "GI Bill schools." With names like ArmedForcesEDU.com and UseYourGIBill.us, these sites purport to inform military veterans how to best use their education benefits. In reality, Horton found, they're run by marketing firms hired by for-profit colleges to extol the virtues of high-priced online or evening courses. He concluded that GIBill.com "serves little purpose other than to funnel student veterans and convince them their options for education are limited to their advertisers."

(cont'd) http://motherjones.com/politics/2011...rofit-colleges

More college students defaulting on federal loans in Texas, U.S.
DMN, 18 Sep 2011

The official default rate in Texas hit 10.1 percent last year, up from 9.1 percent the year before. The national average was 8.8 percent, up from 7 percent, the U.S. Department of Education reported last week.

A few years ago, Texas’ default rate was just below 6 percent.

<snip>

In Texas and nationally, default rates climbed at all types of colleges. But the highest default rates — 15 percent nationally and 16.4 percent in Texas — come from students of for-profit colleges.

Three Texas schools — Lincoln College of Technology in Grand Prairie and Trend Barber College and Sebring Career School in Houston — posted some of the worst rates in the country, with more than 35 percent of borrowers defaulting last year.

http://www.dallasnews.com/news/educa...ion=reregister

And so it goes...

Richard

[1stindoor]

Originally Posted by Richard

Here's a more recent and growing part of the problems of higher education.

How Pricey For-Profit Colleges Target Vets' GI Bill Money
MotherJones, Sep/Oct 2011

Good catch. That's part of the reason why I directed my Soldiers to the Ed Center and towards established colleges with a specific goal in mind.

[Groleck]

I've recently earned my "piece of paper" in Accounting, and I'm back in school earning a higher "piece of paper."

Sure, it is literally a piece of paper. The piece of paper happens to be very important to some professions and even others where the degree seems irrelevant.

More importantly, college allows a student to harness the networking and career services of the university. Sometimes you just need to impress one or two people in key positions in order to land a decent job when you graduate. "It's not what you know, it's who you know." Internships might sound like a joke to the uninformed, where a student is just a copy and coffee boy/girl, but that's not true. As far as the business school goes at my university, students are given actual responsibilities, most often at major regional and multinational firms. Interning for $25/hour isn't so bad, especially when you go back home for break and see your high school friends working full-time for half of that.

Just saying that there CAN be far more valuable experience gained by spending time in school vs. going straight to work out of high school. To many employers, seeing a 3.8 GPA and extra curricular activities carries more weight than a part-time enrolled student with a 2.8 GPA and years of retail or other unskilled labor experience.

So that I don't sound arrogant, I'm one of the people who has years of part-time retail experience and few extra-curricular activities, but I've managed to stay full-time in school and will tough out one more year. Even if I'm x number of dollars in debt, my degrees will not depreciate and they will make me at least nominally qualified for many jobs. I just like having options.

I also understand that some majors may prove to be less profitable than others. But that is up to the prospective student to decide whether or not the degree is worth the time and money and opportunity cost associated with not being employed full-time for 4+ years.

Dan's .000002 cents.

[GratefulCitizen]

Part of the problem with the whole college issue is the deception that a higher salary leads to wealth.
Not necessarily.

Besides student debt, there are other things to consider:
What is the cost of living/commuting/ancillary costs where you have to work?
How much of your time is actually required?
Are you "owned" by a salary arrangement? (the proper term for salary is "overtime exempt")
Does the lack of spare time cause you to substitute money where you could spend time?
Does the workload have a negative effect on your health? (a big deferred cost)
Does the lack of spare time prevent you from working a second job?
Will your career pressure you to pursue an expensive lifestyle?
And the big one -- make more, get taxed more.

It doesn't matter how much you make.
What matters is how much you keep.

Not running at your financial redline allows you to buy things when they're cheap.
Being at a financial redline (perhaps caused by student debt and listed questions) causes you to miss opportunities, costing you yet more.

Because of taxation, money not spent is better than money earned.
All the focus is on income rather than expenses.

Income is not that same thing as accumulating capital.