<p>My wife is a brainy pharmaceutical project manager responsible for managing high 8-figure research budgets for multi-billion dollar product lines likely to save 10’s of 1,000’s of lives over the next few years. She recently felt betrayed by her career by learning that car dealership Sales Managers earn bigger salaries than she does.</p>
<p>epiphany: Oh, I’m certainly not opposed to kids going to community colleges or trade schools if that’s what they want to do! I just don’t want to see them <em>discouraged</em> from the 4 year college path. And I’m saying that in some communities, which are probably not the ones that a lot of C-C posters come from, kids still <em>are</em> discouraged from that path.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I mentioned the post that this quote came from to a friend who founded a fairly successful software startup. His comment:</p>
<p>“Entrepreneurs are all about managing and mitigating risk. At least the ones that don’t go broke.”</p>
<p>And he sent me this link about Bill Gates, which addresses the “dropout” thing, and also makes the point that while Gates left Harvard (initially through a leave of absence, rather than a dropping out per se), he also had the odds in his favor through his family connections, and that he had a pretty secure safety net under him when he left Harvard.</p>
<p>[Do</a> You Really Know Bill Gates? The Myth of Entrepreneur as Risk-Taker](<a href=“http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2009/09/13/bill-gates-risk-taker/]Do”>Do You Really Know Bill Gates? The Myth of Entrepreneur as Risk-Taker - The Blog of Author Tim Ferriss)</p>
<p>Also, for entrepreneurs, college can allow them to meet potential collaborators. The people I know who started businesses, met the people with whom they teamed up while in college.</p>
<p>The reading I have done re: the british system and university suggests it is a much more rigid meritocracy than in the US. Admittedly though, my reading is decades old, and may not be particularly true today …</p>
<p>Only the top few percent of the population go to University. They were chosen at around the 8th grade based on tests to pursue a college-prep tract. This was known as the ‘A’ levels.</p>
<p>The second tier students complete HS and matriculate by passing a set of easier exams called ‘O’ levels.</p>
<p>A third tract for 8th graders who are thought either not capable, or are not interested in matriculation, go to trade schools.</p>
<p>Addendum: Description from wikipedia:<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tripartite_System[/url]”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tripartite_System</a></p>
<h2>This system has been replaced as of 1975 at least in name by the ‘comprehensive system’ which sounds more american in structure, but I don’t know how it plays out in the field.</h2>
<p>The brits waste a lot less money, but probably miss some portion of the talent pool who are unable to jump tracts at later points in life.</p>
<p>if our high schools were taught by the teachers from yesteryear and graduates were equipped yesteryear, then college would be more optional. a few decades ago, our high schools were taught by really really smart women who had little in the way of career choice. prior to gender equity, really smart women could go into either teaching or nursing. their presence in the classroom must have been partly responsible for the rise of american secondary schools, but as career opportunites for women opened up, the really really smart women left to careers that are more lucrative but not socially useful for our long term future as a country like law and finance. </p>
<p>picture this, imagine if sally krewcheck(?) (the cfo of citibank?) taught your son and daughter’s math class, i think i would be more reassured. in this thought experiment, i think the sally krewchecks of the world would do better than a less gifted teacher. </p>
<p>no, i’m not saying we should turn back the clock on gender equality and if sally wants to go pursue mammon and wealth, that’s fine. but i think this partly explains why teaching doesn’t have the prestige and excellence it may have a few decades ago and this could explain the decline of science/math teaching at the high school level in the united states. we rank 78 or something embarrasing for a supposedly industrialized science oriented country. so if teachers are of lesser quality today compared to yesterday, then of course students need to enroll in college to learn remedial skills that they would have otherwise picked up in high school. so to answer the question: are too many students going to college? i say no, unless we make our high schools stronger and reward our teachers so they are compensated like sally krewcheck and students pick up the necessary skills they need in high school. we have to recognize that some students need to go to college to learn the things they should have picked up in high school.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Prepare to be amazed. I have four children, and I’d be happy if any of them launched into a personally satisfying, rewarding career that didn’t require college as a barrier to entry or as a sole path for gaining prerequisite skills. So far it looks like my oldest is college-bound, but he would be the first to tell you that college is a step on the way to other things he wants to do, not a goal in itself for him.</p>
<p>Yes, and people are also having too many kids. I often wonder if I’m the only person on the planet who realizes that if we keep covering up land with parking lots, housing developments and malls, we will eventually have no where to grow crops or raise animals for food.</p>
<p><q> My wife is a brainy pharmaceutical project manager responsible for managing high 8-figure research budgets for multi-billion dollar product lines likely to save 10’s of 1,000’s of lives over the next few years. She recently felt betrayed by her career by learning that car dealership Sales Managers earn bigger salaries than she does. </q></p>
<p>cool story bro.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>“They took all the trees, and put em in a tree museum
And they charged the people a dollar and a half to see them
…
Hey farmer, farmer, put away your DDT
I don’t care about spots on my apples,
LEAVE me the birds and the bees please
Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you got till it’s gone
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot” - Counting Crows</p>
<p>No, you’re not the only who thinks that, don’t worry. That statement just really reminded me of that song. I wish more people realized it though :(. [Btw, I apologize if you were being sarcastic. It’s hard to tell online.]</p>
<p>Sorry romanigypsyeyes, the song is was a cover by Counting Crows. “Big Yellow Taxi” was written and originally performed by Joni Mitchell. That’s for us old folks who still remember Joni Mitchell. I really do not like the cover version.</p>
<p>Who could forget Joni Mitchell?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Someone who wasn’t born when she was singing the original. My ipod is full of Joni Mitchell (but I have the cover version by Counting Crows on my ipod, too, it’s kind of a bouncy, catchy version)</p>
<p>For my petite, non-mechanical dd, who struggles in high school and may not make it into/through college, I have had trouble coming up with jobs she could pursue that pay decently and are not hard to get training for or employment in. She is not a candidate for plumber/electrician/contractor type jobs.</p>
<p>Sorry guys, I failed :(. I actually have her on my mp3, but the only version I ever heard was by Counting Crows.</p>
<p>I don’t have Joni Mitchell on my iPod. I can’t even associate any songs with her.</p>
<p>I know families who pushed their child into college to keep his/her health insurance coverage. Full-time student is covered on parents’ plan. I can’t blame them.</p>
<p>
You’re kidding right?!</p>
<p>EricLG - Re: comment on quality of nurses encountered: I believe the source of your experience in nursing is what had Ontario revise its nursing qualifications several years ago to require a university bachelors degree in nursing. I believe same are quite employable/in demand in the U.S.</p>
<p>On another note: Streaming – Someone referenced the Canadian coop system. Maybe we only like what we’re familiar with, but what seemed to work when I was young and living in Canada was the identification of target destination and the subsequent nuance in not only the subjects studied but the specific content. So in my day, 4-year, college or trade bound math students studied more “practical” application, and 5-year university bound students studied more “abstract” math. The system did not <em>decide</em> which stream you took, but you did begin self-selecting by Grade 9 based on the courses you took.</p>
<p>About a decade ago, due to delivery cost and politics, Ontario did away with “Grade 13” – which was the level of graduation required to attend university. But they still “stream” insofar as students intending to go to university are required to take “12U” (or college preparatory) classes. Many end up doing a “Victory Lap” (a fifth year of HS) to get the grades or prereqs required.</p>
<p>Community colleges offered a number of pragmatic business and trade training courses (and not as ambitious a pallet as some community colleges seem to offer here, eg. philosophy!)</p>
<p>In that way, it seemed that everyone received the level of training required. It is not useful, for example, to learn advanced calculus <em>instead</em> of accounting if you intend to work in or own a small business. Many technical jobs require tactile training and a level of practice/hours in to achieve mastery. (It’s been a long time since I’ve met a nurse/technician who does a good job drawing blood, for example : )
So insisting that students study “college prep” courses isn’t always the best use of their time, and disrespects the other types of intelligence that make the world go around. At the same time, we live in a world where the idea that “education” only occurs until you’re 19 or 21 or in GS, 25 ish is ludicrous. The exponential nature of technological advance requires that we constantly participate in self-education throughout our lives.</p>
<p>The other day I entertained and irritated my spouse on a long drive with an evil plan for a brave(er) new world:
I said: “What if every member of society went to school 4 hrs. a day to advance any skill for which they have passion, or research, or whatever, for life, and spent the other 4 hours of the day working in divisions based on training/capability but drawn by lottery. Wouldn’t that be cool?”</p>
<p>H. responded that there would be no incentive for a garbageman to be good at his job or show up; that it would quell innovation, etc. etc… I argued that it would change the lens through which we value or devalue things, and increase innovation through constant daily collaboration going as far as possible with your contributions, all while staying grounded and making fresh contributions to the practical aspects of maintaining a society. The ole “fresh set of eyes” theory. A madcap idea – lifelong employment for all, lifelong education for all. Hi ho : )</p>
<p>The idea that the trades are for less able kids and that college is for the bright ones needs to be reexamined. An independent skilled tradesman (plumber, carpenter, mechanic etc.) not only has to know how to fix things, he also has to find clients, handle billing and scheduling, and essentially run his own business. All of these tasks require a pretty high level of cognitive ability, much more than graduating with an increasingly mediocre and hence devalued B.A.</p>
<p>Going back to what some other people have said, I think its harmful to say, There are too many kids in college, lets send them to the trades when too many kids is being used as code for poor kids or lower class kids or dumb kids. A truly dumb kid should not be put in a position where he can accidentally electrocute himself or miswire a house so that it later catches on fire. To me, its about putting kids where theyll flourish and be happy . . . making an effort to show them all available paths so they can choose for themselves, without bias about which professions are better. That might mean the son of two PhD recipients becomes an electrician and the son of two mechanics becomes a doctor of philosophy. The path that makes your kid happiest is better for him or her!</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Who here has used it as a code? The problem with America is that has been the stigma for past few decades and it needs to stop. That is the jist of what pretty much everyone has been saying here as far as I’ve seen.</p>