Is college for job training or learning?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Job training, unless you're rich enough to not need it for job training.

+1 OP doesn't have family money. I was the same. US colleges require you to take gened classes. You can study humanities and STEM in those classes.

Anyone would love to find that unicorn where you are passionate about something and make a good living from it, but for most of us, that's not reality.

You can also minor in something that you are more passionate about, but for most of us, college is a stepping stone to get a good paying job.

That doesn't mean you should major in something that you loathe, but for those of us without any family money (and who knows what it's like to be poor), college is about setting yourself up to get a good paying job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your kid has no generational wealth. Maybe even opposite generational wealth given your low HHI.

Obviously college is for job training. Even if your kid ends up going to Harvard.

80k is low?

For an entire household that’s sending a kid to college? Yes, when paired with low assets. (No if it’s annual income from a trust fund …. )

Emory just set their tuition-free bar at $200k, by the way. Not sure how that’s going to work out for them exactly, but it’s worth a look: https://news.emory.edu/features/2025/09/er_emory_advantage_plus_17-09-2025/index.html

Why is there a possibility of it not working out for emory?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your kid has no generational wealth. Maybe even opposite generational wealth given your low HHI.

Obviously college is for job training. Even if your kid ends up going to Harvard.

80k is low?

For an entire household that’s sending a kid to college? Yes, when paired with low assets. (No if it’s annual income from a trust fund …. )

Emory just set their tuition-free bar at $200k, by the way. Not sure how that’s going to work out for them exactly, but it’s worth a look: https://news.emory.edu/features/2025/09/er_emory_advantage_plus_17-09-2025/index.html

As the first 2nd tier college to do it, Emory stands out. Four elite colleges Princeton, Penn, MIT, Harvard already have it. The rest of the T10 is going to have to follow suit or lose out in the fight for the top need-based aid kids.
OP your kid will pay close to 0 at these schools and will get learning and enough training to go on to any possible career.
Aim high if your kid has top stats/rigor.

There's around 2700 4 year colleges in the US, Top25 or top1% being second tier is a stretch. Tha

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s a bad idea to major in something you aren’t that passionate about just because that’s where the jobs seem to be at.
Look what happened to CS! A lot can change in 4 years, so make sure your kid gets a well rounded education and learns how to learn, not just learn specific skills.

Agree with PP that avoiding loans is of the utmost importance. There are no guarantees of any degree “paying off” in specific monetary terms and everyone needs to understand that going in.

There is value in going to college even if you end up working in a completely different field than you majored in, as long as you stay away from debt.

We will be paying a lot for DS to attend a SLAC. I am fully prepared for the possibility that he may not end up with a traditional white collar job, and I am OK with that.

Absolutely not.

It’s a bad idea to major in something you despise, but the “passion jobs” are highly overrated. For one thing, every job has a bunch of dreadful tasks, and when you are just starting out, you are likely to get those tasks anyway. Second, having financial security when you come from a $80K/ year household is amazing. There is a lot satisfaction coming from that, maybe even more than following your passions in a job. Besides, there are plenty of other ways to follow your passions in life. And last but not least, the passion jobs tend to go to the well connected. The nonprofits, publishing, arts and the like are bursting with trust funders. Pluck gets you much farther in accounting.

[Anonymous]

The play is to go to a school where it can be both. At a school like say Williams, you can major in virtually anything quantitative and, with good grades, get a job in banking; or major in virtually anything and get a job in consulting with good grades and internships.

But if you're at say Marymount, you don't necessarily have that luxury. You want to do nursing or business there.

'Passion' is often code for nonprofit/academic work that pays cruddy. It should be treated with suspicion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Job training, unless you're rich enough to not need it for job training.

+1 Or at least job readiness. It doesn't need to be specific training like accounting, but it needs to lead to a career path to earn a decent living.

OP's family likely doesn't have Obama-level connections where their kid can indulge in whatever they want, then waltz into a coveted writer job, plagiarize someone else's work, then just keep living the .001% elite lifestyle on mommy & daddy's dime.

[Anonymous]

Both- learn stuff you’re interested in but also preparing you for a career.
Also a place separated from rest of society to mature, grow up and learn about who you are as an independent person.
These things are not mutually exclusive

[Anonymous]

It's different things for different people. I had always planned on getting a graduate degree, so for me it was for learning, maturing, expanding horizons, and making friends and connections. For my DD who wants to be an engineer, job training is also part of it for her. My DS is TBD, but he is choosing to attend a SLAC because he wants small class sizes and the ability to explore what the curriculum has to offer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s a bad idea to major in something you aren’t that passionate about just because that’s where the jobs seem to be at.
Look what happened to CS! A lot can change in 4 years, so make sure your kid gets a well rounded education and learns how to learn, not just learn specific skills.

Agree with PP that avoiding loans is of the utmost importance. There are no guarantees of any degree “paying off” in specific monetary terms and everyone needs to understand that going in.

There is value in going to college even if you end up working in a completely different field than you majored in, as long as you stay away from debt.

We will be paying a lot for DS to attend a SLAC. I am fully prepared for the possibility that he may not end up with a traditional white collar job, and I am OK with that.

Absolutely not.

It’s a bad idea to major in something you despise, but the “passion jobs” are highly overrated. For one thing, every job has a bunch of dreadful tasks, and when you are just starting out, you are likely to get those tasks anyway. Second, having financial security when you come from a $80K/ year household is amazing. There is a lot satisfaction coming from that, maybe even more than following your passions in a job. Besides, there are plenty of other ways to follow your passions in life. And last but not least, the passion jobs tend to go to the well connected. The nonprofits, publishing, arts and the like are bursting with trust funders. Pluck gets you much farther in accounting.

+1 Don't try to live a trust fund lifestyle without a trust fund.

There are so many disillusioned middle class "passion job" people in DC. They follow the footsteps of their wealthy college friends, then realize too late that their friends are able to have nice houses, private schools and nannies for the kids, expensive vacations - all because they come from money. It's also harder to attract a high earning mate when you're not a high earner and don't have family money.

[Anonymous]

You are not forced to pick one or the other.

They are not mutually exclusive.

[Anonymous]

College is not a trade school (with some majors as exceptions). Professional school is.

[Anonymous]

Good parents don’t try to program their children like computers.

Your children have unique talents, personalities, values and dreams.

Your job is to help them succeed in the path of their choosing. A kid who wants humanités would shrivel up and die as an accountant.

The choices aren’t limited to selling out or starving. Let them pursue their goals. A mature kid will take marketability into account. They often change their career focus in college. But your husband is wrong to try to change who they are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The play is to go to a school where it can be both. At a school like say Williams, you can major in virtually anything quantitative and, with good grades, get a job in banking; or major in virtually anything and get a job in consulting with good grades and internships.

But if you're at say Marymount, you don't necessarily have that luxury. You want to do nursing or business there.

'Passion' is often code for nonprofit/academic work that pays cruddy. It should be treated with suspicion.

I think people who advocate for pushing all kids towards “anything quantitative “ so they can go into consulting should be treated with suspicion.

[Anonymous]

You are much more likely to thrive in a field that you love.

Having food on the table is necessary , but aspire for more than survival for your children.

[Anonymous]

https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/1295621.page

https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/best-colleges-aren-t-best-120000222.html

families rank prestige lower than other markers of a “good” college: the availability of internships and research projects, the job placement of graduates, the strength of specific majors. More and more families are measuring a school’s worth by what it delivers rather than what it represents.

It's about job training for the most part.