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<p>I actually was able to afford more student-rate season subscriptions when I was in grad school than I can afford at full rates now. Not to mention that I had more time back then… 
And as an undergrad I’d volunteer as an usher to see professional theater. </p>
<p>Anyway, why bother going to see a live performance? Can’t you just watch a DVD, just like you can listen to Yo Yo Ma on a CD rather than going to hear him perform live? 
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<p>You can just read plays in books you check out of the library.</p>
<p>I got a ten hour a week job, and my grades in college improved. The regrets I have about college are about the cultural things I missed - though I still wish I’d found time to take the basic economics class. I had a conflict every semester. I certainly did not need to keep my nose to the grindstone to get mostly A’s. After the first year, I always took one more class than the minimum and audited one fun thing (usually art history) beyond that.</p>
<p>I hire people for a living (hundreds of people for year) and when I interview college seniors, nothing is a bigger turn off than this:</p>
<p>"My think is very different from most posters in this thread. I think most of the value of college by far comes from the daily grind of going to class, paying attention, taking notes, reading, doing homework assignments, doing the labs, taking tests, talking with professors, getting good grades, graduating. This is the ONLY thing that REALLY matters.</p>
<p>I am not at all impressed by celebrity speakers although colleges seem to think that students and parents are impressed by these “edutainment” business people. They have only a miniscule impact on your child’s future compared to the learning that accrues through conscientious scholarship. Hearing an occasional visiting scholar can be beneficial but these speakers are generally unknown to the general public.</p>
<p>I can buy Yo Yo Ma’s cds and read about Obama in the news.</p>
<p>Colleges spend way too much of your tuition payments on window dressing and “flash”. Colleges should spend more money supporting professors and the classroom experience. "</p>
<p>Anyone who has spent four years at a college and thinks that listening to a CD is the same as attending a concert, or thinks that the sum total of intellectual inquiry can be obtained sitting in your dorm room doing homework is someone I don’t want to hire. </p>
<p>Yes- for some students who commute and live at home and can’t afford a residential college, their experiences will be very different. But seriously- during the course of an entire Bachelor’s degree- not a single minute for doing something- one thing- to take advantage of the cultural OR artistic OR political opportunities???</p>
<p>My daughter is half-way through college and has a perfect 4.0 and is active in 4 college clubs and enjoys time with her friends and boyfriend and doing stuff in the city she lives in (eating, museums, etc.). You can definitely do stuff without your grades/education suffering! </p>
<p>Many of you are citing specific examples of students who participate in a lot of activities but I am not always reading that they get good grades. As I said, some students can do it all but I maintan that the majority of students neglect their studies in order to do things that are more fun but which will not pay off for them in the long run. I am talking about misplaced priorities. If you attend every cultural event, join clubs, make lots of friends but don’t get good grades, then you have not nearly taken full advantage of your opportunities in college. College students would rather play than work. My proof if what I have observed with my own eyes. I don’t need a research study to tell me this. I have eyes and I have logic.</p>
<p>BTW, I did not mean to suggest that a cd or dvd is as good an experience as a live performance or lecture. I meant that you should forego the live event if your time could be better spent otherwise. Priorities. Time management.</p>
<p>blossom, your comment about hiring people points out one of the major flaws in the business community which is that people are often hired for reasons other than merit. That is why America is losing its competitive edge. People are hired because of their charm or looks or because they are fun to talk with or because they fit some demographic rather than because of competence. The cream doesn’t rise to the top. Instead, success often goes to those who lack competence but have a forceful or fun personality. It is unjust. Should be illegal. Would you want your straight A child to lose out to a C student who attends lectures and concerts?</p>
<p>What make you think blossom doesn’t hire based on merit? As someone who has been in the business world for 30+ years, I place the ability to influence people as a great trait/merit. I work with a lot of smart people with different, strong opinions. I spend most of my time in brokering agreements between all of those people, and it often takes a lot of charm/compromise/diplomacy…because if I couldn’t get an agreement, things couldn’t get done.</p>
<p>collegehelp - you are very naive.</p>
<p>We hire on “merit” which varies by function. The skills which make a good IT person are not the skills which make a good pharmaceutical researcher which are not the same skills as a good investor relations person. I may not care that an entry level IT person doesn’t read the Wall Street Journal regularly, but I sure as hell care if an entry level finance or marketing person does not. They should read it not because it’s assigned in a class, or because they get a grade for doing it, or because it’s “required”, but because a person who wants a career in finance at a large corporation needs to know the vocabulary and the current trends going on right now.</p>
<p>If I hear that an entry level finance person was too busy holed up in his room doing schoolwork so missed the lecture last month when Ben Bernanke came to campus to discuss globalization and inflation, I will be somewhat skeptical when I hear this kid talk about how interested he is in “International business”.</p>
<p>If someone who purports to love marketing couldn’t find his or her way to a lecture hall on campus to hear Shelley Lazarus talk about how social media has changed the advertising business I will be skeptical.</p>
<p>Book learning is great (and frankly, most of the time I get criticized on this site for explaining that my company asks for a transcript AND SAT scores for new grads). So that’s important. But dipping your toe into the real world when it intrudes on campus is important as well. </p>
<p>And if you guys think your kids who are not attending lectures and concerts and symposia are doing so because they are holed up in the library studying, i have a bridge to sell you. It is great to enjoy a party and wonderful to enjoy popular culture. But to focus your college experience on “Girls” or the latest cool show on HBO, in your room, with the door closed, is not a great way to get an education IMHO.</p>
<p>D currently has a 3.75, which should increase slightly based on this semester’s anticipated grades. I guess I’d better tell her to stop attending Shakespeare plays, playing rec soccer and flag football, and volunteering at the animal shelter until she does something about those abysmal grades!</p>
<p>And as a scholarship commuter student working off campus, I managed to attend many events and still graduate cum laude in a challenging major (and I did find a spouse as well, even though that was the LAST thing I was looking for in college!).</p>
<p>Not sure what schools you’re observing, but I’ve seen D and her friends, and they work very hard at their studies. Which is why I’m glad they have a wealth of opportunities to help them unwind. And what a shame it would be if they let these chances go to waste. Yes, I’ve also seen kids who waste their parents’ money - but that free ride ends eventually.</p>
<p>I doubt Blossom is hiring the “C” student over the “A” student - but when you have more than one qualified candidate, intangibles can make the difference. And someone who can have intelligent discussions about things other than just work may make the cut over someone who can’t. There’s more to building a productive effective team than just being able to do the grunt work.</p>
<p>What I don’t understand, collegehelp, is that you seem to think that “putting your nose to the grindstone” somehow makes a person able to to think on their feet, navigate office politics, and come up with innovations. Some things are simply not found in the drill and kill GPA uber alles that you seem to value. Merit encompasses more than GPA, as oldfort very competently explains. </p>
<p>I can’t think of a worse college experience than one that is friendless and nothing but studying followed by a life of work and nothing but nose to the grindstone. That’s why people drop dead of stress-induced heart attacks in their middle years. </p>
<p>If the lazy American life that values more than GPA merit bothers you, there are many countries where that’s the way things work. Maybe you can get a Visa.</p>
<p>collegehelp, I graduated with two degrees with honors (over a 3.8+ GPA), worked over 30 hours a week, participated in plays and other events, and STILL had time to have a social life where I experienced activities on campus: football, theater, speakers, gallery events, etc. </p>
<p>College students really, truly are not THAT busy. Even ones who work their tail off. </p>
<p>“BTW, I did not mean to suggest that a cd or dvd is as good an experience as a live performance or lecture. I meant that you should forego the live event if your time could be better spent otherwise. Priorities. Time management.”</p>
<p>Time spent enjoying a play or a speaker with friends IS time well spent,</p>
<p>You keep painting this either/or - that of a student wants to attend events, see plays, hang out with friends, that therefore they’ll also be incapable of studying, taking work seriously, finishing assignments and getting good grades. Is that your limitation?</p>
<p>In the work world, shouldn’t you be foregoing the live theater you enjoy to spend your time “better” working at your job? </p>
<p>“Would you want your straight A child to lose out to a C student who attends lectures and concerts?”</p>
<p>Well, I don’t hire based on GPA, I need a lot of things in my employees - and the ability to be interesting, creative, and draw inspiration from anywhere is among those things. I certainly don’t want someone who has done nothing but study, has no friends, no interests, just sat in a classroom. </p>
<p>I also see that experiencing life adds more depth to the work they produce.
It’s a natural extension of experiential education.
My kids always simmered along processing what they were learning even if it wasn’t always evident. But then they would jump ahead in intuition and insights. You can’t predict what experience will make it all hang together.</p>
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<p>The expected time commitment of full time college course loads is 45 to 48 hours per week (including both in-class and out-of-class time spent), although actual time these days is probably somewhat less (probably between 28 and 40 hours per week, depending on major). Even the higher range of time commitment leaves students with free time for other things, just like it does for working people with full time jobs taking that much time.</p>
<p>Will you require your kids to take overloads in college in order to graduate early and save money, knowing that the overloads would just consume the free time that you think is better spent studying? Do you think that they will do well studying every waking hour other than the minimum necessary for eating, bathing, etc.?</p>
<p>“I think most of the value of college by far comes from the daily grind of going to class, paying attention, taking notes, reading, doing homework assignments, doing the labs, taking tests, talking with professors, getting good grades, graduating. This is the ONLY thing that REALLY matters.”</p>
<p>Collegehelp, did you have friends in college? Did you enjoy everyday social activities with them - I’m not talking about crazy partying til dawn, but just eating in the cafeteria, discussing a current event (even if not an “intellectual” one), enjoying the scenery at your campus when it was nice out, etc.?</p>
<p>I can tell you I’m 49 years old and the times when I spent hanging out with my girlfriends just talking about clothes and hair and boys and music were indeed time well spent. Indeed, spurred by this thread, I just called 2 of my girlfriends from those days and made plans to get together for coffee and … well, just hang out. I don’t do enough of that and it’s a part of life I don’t always pay attention to. My economics books are long since in the trash, but friendships are forever. </p>
<p>blossom, I am glad you check transcripts and SAT scores of new graduates. That is reassuring. I also understand that job requirements vary by function. People in sales need social skills. I hope it is generally true that human resource people value substance over style, and that they can tell the difference. I hope we don’t simply have a modern version of “good old boys” networks going on. I am not sure it is generally true that employers hire predominantly on merit.</p>
<p>Yes, employees have to work as a team but teams are no more effective than the talents of their individual members. </p>
<p>Knowledge and skill is a prerequisite to creativity. Knowledge and skill enables creativity. Otherwise you have people trying to make puppies out of mud. People with the best academic records tend to be the most creative as well.</p>
<p>Another terrible distraction from studies is part time work.</p>
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Maybe for some people. For me, having a job made my budget my time and study more efficiently. The one semester I didn’t work I got the worst grades of my life. </p>
<p>One thing that hasn’t been mentioned yet is that for lots of students, their extracurricular activities end up leading to their ultimate career choice.</p>
<p>And let me just say this, although it may not seem nice: if a college student has to spend every waking hour studying in order to make good grades, he’s at the wrong college.</p>
<p>“I also understand that job requirements vary by function. People in sales need social skills.”</p>
<p>Um, everyone needs social skills, collegehelp. I have to ask - and I mean no disrespect - are you on the spectrum? </p>
<p>“Yes, employees have to work as a team but teams are no more effective than the talents of their individual members.”</p>
<p>No, actually, teams are MORE than the sum of the talents of their individual members. I think you think of the world of work in a very linear, computer-like way - Person A does task A and passes it to Person B who does task B. I don’t think you understand that the best workers are <em>always</em> creative. That doesn’t mean dress-in-bohemian-clothes and listen to avant-garde music – it means that they synthesize everything around them for continued conceptual insights - whether those insights are about how to do the job better, how to influence people better, how to make processes work better, how to create new and different end products. Inspiration can come from anywhere.</p>
<p>In my job, I <em>have</em> to be an astute observer of consumer insights. I can’t do that if all I do is sit in my (metaphorical) dorm room and study textbooks. </p>
<p>Besides, what’s with the focus on everything having to be work? Can’t there just be value in the fun of going to theater, laughing with friends over a movie or TV show, etc.? </p>