Reply to How is it possible that only 50% go to college?

Forum Index » College and University Discussion

Reply to "How is it possible that only 50% go to college?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous]Only about half of my HS graduating class went to and graduate from a 4-year college.

In rural areas, there are a number of pathways that don't involve college, and for a lot of people, the combination of college costing money AND delaying when you can start earning money makes it a no go. Also a lot of people are just not that academic and don't want to sit in classrooms for an extra 4 years taking general ed courses or learning about philosophy. I am a super academic person and that's exactly what I wanted to do when I was 18. But I knew tons of people who didn't and it's fine? I'd just gone through 12 years of school with a lot of people who didn't care about school and wasn't going to then expect them to go populate colleges where they also wouldn't want to be. I was excited to go to college where presumably most people would actually want to be there (this is not totally true, sadly, but should be).

Anyway, here are what HS classmates who didn't go to college did instead:

- Military
- Worked on family farm/ranch
- Construction where they could make a pretty decent income with no additional education right off the bat
- Married someone who was going to college or already had a career, became a SAHP
- Trade school to be a plumber, HVAC tech, etc.

I also know some people who did one or two years of college, decided it wasn't for them, and then went to work. A lot of these people wound up in office type jobs where their little bit of college actually was an asset in getting the job. You don't need a 4-year degree for a lot of jobs in things like marketing or administration -- you need a decent head on your shoulders and the ability to learn on the job.

And then there's a whole category of people who went to work in construction, retail, food service, etc., after high school, and then later went and got a degree. This includes some of the most successful people I know. They went to college after living and working for a bit and then pursued a degree with a lot of self-knowledge about what they wanted out of life and what they were good at.

What I've just described is normal and good and reflects a perfectly healthy society and economy. I do not understand why anyone would ever want 100% college enrollment. That makes no sense. You want the people who cook your food, stock shelves at the hardware store, fix your electrical system, repair your car, do landscaping, to all have 4 year college degrees? Why? And who pays for that when college costs as much as it does now?

For college educated people, some of you are incredibly naive and ignorant.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics