<p>
Now, now, let’s not get into a snit match on what types of contributions are more important.</p>
<p>Cobrat, H complains all the time about the poor writing skills of his subordinates. He often has to completely rework their reports himself to make them presentable.</p>
<p>The statement about college being oversold has no meanning. nobody was physically threatened to go to college. People choose it voluntarily. Well, how about BMW’s being oversold? How many own it? Do they complain? did anybody thretened them if they did not buy it? it is the same logic. Is house ownership being oversold, is having kids being oversold? All have no meanning whatsoever. everybody decides what they need for their own future. And for those who want to go to Med. School, Law School, any Grad. school, is it being oversold or college is a mere must for them?<br>
as for me personally, yes, I would have a job without college, but I would not have my current job. My current employer requires at least 4 year degree for my position. this happened to be my best job out of 9 that I have had. Apparently, college was not oversold to me, but I did not pay for it, my several other employers did, but again, nobody threatened me if I decided not to take advantage of this great opportunity.</p>
<p>College is not principally about getting a job or making money. College is about becoming an educated person. A good education should equip a person to be an active citizen with an engaged, informed, curious, ever-learning mind. As my mentor said, go to college, read, write, become educated, then go drive a taxi to make money… </p>
<p>Perhaps it is more accurate to claim that college has been mis-sold rather than oversold?</p>
<p>“College is about becoming an educated person”</p>
<p>-and I strongly disagree with this. Educated or brain washed is two different things. You can can educated while going to college or not. You have to resist with all your convictions not to let yourself to get brainwashed while going to college. I do not call this education.</p>
<p>Thomas Jefferson more an engineer and math lover than a philosopher. </p>
<p>[Jefferson</a> and Mathematics](<a href=“http://www.math.virginia.edu/Jefferson/jefferson.htm]Jefferson”>http://www.math.virginia.edu/Jefferson/jefferson.htm)</p>
<p>And a slaveholder, dilletante, and spendthrift who died a pauper to boot!</p>
<p>^ you forgot to add rapist to that list!</p>
<p>There’s an undertone in this thread that I’m picking up on, and it has something to do with sour grapes on behalf of the non-STEM majors. </p>
<p>[url=<a href=“Dr. Michio Kaku America Has A Secret Weapon - YouTube”>Dr. Michio Kaku America Has A Secret Weapon - YouTube]Michio</a> Kaku has an interesting say in the matter.<a href=“So%20does%20the%20other%20guy%20in%20the%20video.”>/url</a></p>
<p>Truly, I believe that the reason the world is better now than it was 2,000 years ago is 95% due to a better understanding of science and technology. You’re not going to convince me to be a management or English major on the basis that STEM fields aren’t useful.</p>
<p>sylvan had a good post on page two. Go take a look at that if you haven’t already.</p>
<p>He was just ahead of his time. You should leave such an interesting and real legacy.</p>
<p>I have two STEM degrees (chemistry and mathematics) and have YET to have ever held a stable job or a job where I didn’t feel underemployed (i.e. not doing b*tch repetitive lab work that pays less than $40k a year or temp job after temp jobs that offer no or very little health care). I’ll never get ahead in life with these useless degrees, I have no idea why I paid for them. “We need more STEM degrees!” is complete nonsense. We’ll need more STEM degrees if we ever create the jobs first.</p>
<p>2xHarvard is correct. Post #43 gets my +1.</p>
<p>Exactly which colleges are doing the over selling? Link please? Show me the college promise links of great jobs after graduation. Can someone show me one link?</p>
<p>No, the problem is that parents and students have over bought by placing too much importance on the mythical link college=job. There is no such linkage and there never was.</p>
<ul>
<li>Wheaty</li>
</ul>
<p>“He was just ahead of his time. You should leave such an interesting and real legacy.”</p>
<p>He was way behind his time, even when he was living. Thought the future of the country was expansion of a bunch of slaveholding plantation owners. Turned Maryland, Virginia, and North Carolina into an ecological nightmare through tobacco and indigo growing. Charles Ball, a slave who escaped three times during the period, noted that in many areas of the three states, the plantation owners were as poor as the slaves because of what they did to the land.</p>
<p>Be very careful when dealing with historical perspective and applying modern norms. E.g., someday in the future people who now earnestly believe in abortion rights, as I do, could be popularly labeled as “baby killers”. </p>
<p>So be thoughtful with your words and judgments regarding the distant past, because a long time from now you could be next to be pilloried.</p>
<p>Here’s the thing–without at least a B.A. in something, I would venture to say that an early twenty-something has NO chance at a decent paying job. The degree itself is a litmus test & the common thinking is in most hiring quarters that those without do not even make it to an interview. The alternative is the ‘trades’, but with a lack of construction, those fields are suffering as well.</p>
<p>So while college is ‘oversold’, it’s still necessary, if only to get that piece of paper that at least puts one into the fight.</p>
<p>"So be thoughtful with your words and judgments regarding the distant past, because a long time from now you could be next to be pilloried. "</p>
<p>These were judgments made in HIS time. Charles Ball was a contemporary. These were the norms of HIS time. He was pilloried in HIS time for being a spendthrift, a hypocrite, a very unwise farmer he ruined his own soil, and died a pauper. </p>
<p>I think people hold (unjustly) a far, far higher opinion of him now (that we know much less about him, and he gone through a thorough mythologizing process) than people held of him in his own 19th Century time. Doesn’t take anything away from his writing of the Declaration. But by the time he tried to pillory Aaron Burr (and failed miserably), much of the world had already passed him by</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>No it won’t.</p>
<p>We’re not dealing with minor dips in consumer sentiment and the like but with fundamental paradigm shifts that won’t be undone any time soon. As such, we’re toast.</p>
<p>The current and previous administrations either did not understand the issue or they did not come out and admit to the gravity of it. In either case little could be done so it’s not really important.</p>
<p>I read someplace that if the top 10% of high school students were put in a closet for 4 years and then let out, they would still achieve more than the lower 25% that attended college during those 4 years. (I am not condoning putting students in closets!)</p>
<p>Opinions?</p>
<p>Depends on your definition of ‘achieve more’. The lower 25% could get jobs in some decent profession and bring home $50k a year, while the top - and uneducated - 10% could take the $200k, open a fast food franchise and make twice that. No disagreement.</p>
<p>Which of the two would have a better chance to, as Apple would put it, “Change the world” ??? the sandwich store franchiser, or someone who, even in a boring job, may help someone.</p>
<p>
Because sandwich store franchisers, as well all know, don’t help people.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>^This</p>
<p>People are either too stupid or just in plain denial to see what is really going on. We aren’t in some recession where we will bounce back to normal. It IS a paradigm shift and we are in a transition period of world history where the age of American dominance is over. It happened to Britain, and now it is happening to us. We now have the most educated and un/underemployed workforce in our country’s history and it is going to stay that way or get worse. Jobs in R and D are terribly unstanble and our manufacturing base has been decimated and will NEVER return. Maybe the best bet for our STEM grads is to become educated here, since yes, I still do believe we have the best universities in the world here, but after graduating find jobs overseas. It’s a global economy these days and STEM grads need to go where not only the work is, but also where it will lead to more stable careers. The US is headed the way of Britain post 1900. </p>
<p>I’m really sick of making $35k per year with 7 years working experience and having on and off health care due to never ending strings of temp jobs. I really do think that after I get my grad degree in engineering I may head overseas for countries like Germany, Brazil, or China that are investing heavily into R and D.</p>