Why do some consider going to college a complete waste?

amother

↑ Bluebonnet

Tue, Dec 17 2024, 9:29 am

amother Garnet wrote:

My parents and their siblings were the first in their families to attend college (although my grandparents were very smart and extremely hard working, they were also poor.) They attended city colleges and worked part time jobs and summers to pay expenses. My father won a scholarship to one of the top 5 US Universities. This and the fifty years of hard work that followed completely turned our family’s financial status around. I don’t buy that a college education is worthless. I would not recommend coursework in East Asian basket weaving or Colonialism and Capitalism. I do believe in being a well rounded person who understands history, literature, political science, math, natural sciences and is employable. My relatives received a real education at Brooklyn and City colleges. I unfortunately see a total lack of this background in the current university age population, including those eschewing a college education. There needs to be a compromise.

You do realize when your parents and your aunts and uncles went to college, it cost like $300 a semester, right? You could easily pay that from just a summer or a weekend job. My parents did it too. Those days were already gone when I went to college 20ish years ago, and it's even worse now. Yes, even the "cheap" public colleges will still run you about 10k per semester if you're lucky. Many, maybe most, majors no longer offer the ROI they used to. There is no reason someone who wants to be a doctor or engineer needs multiple courses of literature and history. Being well rounded is great, but your rounded will be just as well if you spend $15 on a MOOC in Shakespeare than $1500 taking the same university seminar for credit. Other countries do not require their doctors and lawyers to do four years of undergraduate studies, most you can just do a year or so of prerequisites and then you go straight into medicine, law etc. And look at the quality of humans in universities right now. Not exactly a ringing endorsement. The whole system is a big mess and not living up to the grand promises like it did 50ish years ago. People are starting to wake up now. I hope it continues and forces universities to fix themselves.

amother

Diamond

Tue, Dec 17 2024, 10:38 am

amother Forsythia wrote:

You work 20 hours a week? So you make the equivalent of $96k full time. Not too shabby for OOT.

40 hours is full time for an office job. Not for a school job. Most schools consider full time to be approx 35 hours (even public schools and MO schools are usually approx 7 hours a day which comes out to 35 hours weekly).
I guess this is because school jobs require a lot of work outside hours

amother

Linen

Sun, Dec 29 2024, 7:00 am

amother Bluebell wrote:

It’s not worth the debt. It doesn’t help to just go unless you know what you really want to major in. It’s overrated majorly. Many jobs care more about experience than a degree. It’s a way to fill young minds with woke ideology and to control the masses, so it’s actually dangerous poison. Vocational school is a much safer bet.

WOKE ideology depends which college going to... not going to get that at Touro.

Having a college degree opens doors of opportunity. Lots of jobs want college educated as requirement the way h.s. diploma was once required.

Work for a heimishe place without a degree-- can expect to be underpaid, paid late, and sometimes even (labor laws) abused.

Get a degree, work for a legitimate company, save money, either invest r start own business... that is sensible way to go. And very hard to start to do when you already have 5 kids. or find oneself with kids and a divorce.

Sure lots of chassidim don't have degrees and are doing well in business (and lots are living below poverty line), but regardless, everything starts with an investment. Either need your own $ or someone willing to lend you $ to start a business.

You question the debt for a degree to get a better paying job??? Do you think there is no debt acquired when going into business?

amother

↑ Lemonlime

Sun, Dec 29 2024, 8:12 am

amother Linen wrote:

I don't know where you got the idea that the heimish places pay less and late. They actually pay very well and on time- without a degree.