Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wonder about this myself, OP, and I was a college professor in the hard sciences for a decade. The knowledge, that students can gain at elite universities at the undergraduate level, is available to anyone through books and professional journals (with some guidance on what is worthy of reading), with the exceptions of lab experience. For a motivated student, the theoretical knowledge could be obtained at a very small cost. The astronomical costs we see mostly go to pay for “undergraduate experience,” (including social aspects of it) and a piece of paper certifying to the outside world the students’ qualifications. There is a point when tuition costs are so high, that they don’t justify paying for those extras...

You must not have been a very good professor, if you didn't feel you offered anything beyond what students get from books.

There is a question you should ask yourself: up until the early 1900s, you could get a degree by test (in fact, my great grandfather was the last to become a laywer by test in CA. Abe Lincoln became a lawyer by test). Why have we given that up? When you can answer that, you'll understand why college is not going away (hint: it is not about learning facts which, as you said, have been readily available in books since Gutenberg).

Anonymous wrote:I wonder about this myself, OP, and I was a college professor in the hard sciences for a decade. The knowledge, that students can gain at elite universities at the undergraduate level, is available to anyone through books and professional journals (with some guidance on what is worthy of reading), with the exceptions of lab experience. For a motivated student, the theoretical knowledge could be obtained at a very small cost. The astronomical costs we see mostly go to pay for “undergraduate experience,” (including social aspects of it) and a piece of paper certifying to the outside world the students’ qualifications. There is a point when tuition costs are so high, that they don’t justify paying for those extras...

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Military, vocational school, get a job

PTSD, get recruited to a shitty for-profit colleges, squander your GI bill, take out loans anyway bc your military salary's risk of death bonus puts you out of proportion with your skills in the workplace.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a kid who is coming up (current 6th grader) and I am seriously questioning the value of a college education in the current system. I don't trust the admissions process, and I think they are basically corrupt institutions that protect their own. From the outside now the current system just looks ridiculous. The cost is unethical, causing massive lifelong burden on the kids who can least afford it. It's appalling how little the colleges are taking responsibility for their part in the corruption scandal, and I can only assume it's because that scandal is just the tip of the bribery iceberg and colleges don't want to open that can of worms. I don't think there is a correlation between teaching quality and college level, so saying it is for the education seems false.

Has anyone had their kids who might have been competitive for a "good" college step out of this process entirely? Skip college or go to a community college and then transfer to a state college? I just feel sick about the idea of gearing up to give institutions that seem wholly corrupt thousands of dollars that were really hard to earn, for a degree of what I perceive as less and less valuable.

This is a very sensible approach but most DC types who post here think that's a step down. Ignore them. All that matters is where the final degree is from. Most states with a well developed state college system offers some sort of variation of this. If you are in VA, you need to meet certain requirements such as taking core courses and get a certain GPA. Each VA university has its own cut-off.

Since you just want a piece of paper, maybe. But if you are looking for actual education, then no.

NP. I got a ...gasp...actual education at my community college.

What a gross thing to say.

Anonymous wrote:I have a kid who is coming up (current 6th grader) and I am seriously questioning the value of a college education in the current system. I don't trust the admissions process, and I think they are basically corrupt institutions that protect their own. From the outside now the current system just looks ridiculous. The cost is unethical, causing massive lifelong burden on the kids who can least afford it. It's appalling how little the colleges are taking responsibility for their part in the corruption scandal, and I can only assume it's because that scandal is just the tip of the bribery iceberg and colleges don't want to open that can of worms. I don't think there is a correlation between teaching quality and college level, so saying it is for the education seems false.

Has anyone had their kids who might have been competitive for a "good" college step out of this process entirely? Skip college or go to a community college and then transfer to a state college? I just feel sick about the idea of gearing up to give institutions that seem wholly corrupt thousands of dollars that were really hard to earn, for a degree of what I perceive as less and less valuable.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a kid who is coming up (current 6th grader) and I am seriously questioning the value of a college education in the current system. I don't trust the admissions process, and I think they are basically corrupt institutions that protect their own. From the outside now the current system just looks ridiculous. The cost is unethical, causing massive lifelong burden on the kids who can least afford it. It's appalling how little the colleges are taking responsibility for their part in the corruption scandal, and I can only assume it's because that scandal is just the tip of the bribery iceberg and colleges don't want to open that can of worms. I don't think there is a correlation between teaching quality and college level, so saying it is for the education seems false.

Has anyone had their kids who might have been competitive for a "good" college step out of this process entirely? Skip college or go to a community college and then transfer to a state college? I just feel sick about the idea of gearing up to give institutions that seem wholly corrupt thousands of dollars that were really hard to earn, for a degree of what I perceive as less and less valuable.

This is a very sensible approach but most DC types who post here think that's a step down. Ignore them. All that matters is where the final degree is from. Most states with a well developed state college system offers some sort of variation of this. If you are in VA, you need to meet certain requirements such as taking core courses and get a certain GPA. Each VA university has its own cut-off.

Since you just want a piece of paper, maybe. But if you are looking for actual education, then no.

Anonymous wrote:^^ my cousin did it that way (community college) then transferred to a California University. And guess what? Her GPA was much higher than it would have been had she done all four years at the Cal University because grading was easier at the community college.

Anonymous wrote:^^ my cousin did it that way (community college) then transferred to a California University. And guess what? Her GPA was much higher than it would have been had she done all four years at the Cal University because grading was easier at the community college.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your poor kid OP! You've already ruined his/her life. Maybe put them up for adoption.

OP here. How so? By teaching critical thinking? Not to believe all marketing hype?

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Thanks for all the (mostly) thoughtful responses. I think what bothers me looking down the road is that this has all the signs of a bubble: overvaluation, artificial scarcity, lack of regulation, cheating, etc. It's not an investment I would otherwise make. The value just isn't there, perhaps aside from a number of STEM programs.

My kids aren't trust fund kids. Anything spent on their education is earned by us, or is a loan. The whole approach to this seems crazy to me -- no transparency, corruption, very little concrete ability to perceive value. And the idea of just hand-waving how the "education" is worth it just seems like so much marketing fluff from this distance.