<p>You've referred to the example of a plumber and tradespeople in the context of a vocation several times in contrast to a college education. Doctors, lawyers, engineers, musicians, dancers, accountants, etc. also all have a vocation. It's just that their vocation requires different training than a plumber or electrician. Engineers and others don't receive strictly engineering classes either. They must also take a core curriculum and GEs that include a number of humanities courses. </p>
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I have heard that a lot of the same classes at UCs are taught by TAs.
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fyi - Almost all of my kids' classes at UCSD and UCLA have been taught by full professors - including intro courses. Only a required writing course at UCSD was taught by a TA (which IMO it shouldn't have been - it should have been taught by a teacher - not necessarily a PHD).</p>
<p>UCLAdad, of course that's true, about other vocations. I was simply responding to the idea that college was a segue to a vocation. It isn't. Certainly there are plenty of jobs which require specialized education and training. </p>
<p>But strictly for the point of this discussion, there are vocations which don't require an education (or at least a college education), and these were the ones of which I was speaking.</p>
<p>They must also take a core curriculum and GEs that include a number of humanities courses.</p>
<p>Depends on the school- I just looked at the course of study where my brother recieved his degree- semester courses-16-17 credits per semester.
Freshman year- they take 3 credits of a humanities course each semester- senior year spring semester another 3 credit humanities class- the rest of the courses are vocational/math/engineering based- one 3 credit business class-Considering that I would view a college education to encompass arts- history- english- lab sciences- music-philosophy as well as math, I would like to see degrees like education, business, and engineering- left to post BA work, or perhaps be a 5 year program?</p>
<p>Personally- quite a few of the plumbers, electricians, and even house painters I know, have a college education.
Not required, but for kids who don't necessarily apprentice right out of high school, it may take them a few years to learn what they are really interested in.
In certain areas or families college is just what you do.
( even in my dads generation.)
I think we have a couple things going on.
I see college students- not able to find a job or wanting a "relevant" job after college graduation, pursuing vocational training or career.
I also am aware of jobs which require a college degree to apply, even though it is hardly required to complete tasks required ( filling orders at amazon for example)</p>
<p>I would agree that for some areas, the courses in high school have been homogenized and dumbed down over the years so that attending college may be one of the easiest ways to get a basic education- however that assumes they have the resources to apply and to attend.</p>
<p>To expand on jobs that shouldn't need a degree, but do now, I also refer to what my husband does. He is a highly skilled aircraft worker- who works on experimental and composite materials. He works on the military side mainly but also built the prototype for the 787- He doesn't have a college degree- and his pay reflects that - however- he easily is as important to the company or more so than some of the engineers who are great perhaps as long as their work stays on paper.</p>
<p>I disagree with Darius that the new college diploma is one from a prestigous university- rigor of the admission process, is not the same as the rigor of the education recieived-
I think that NCLB was an attempt to evaluate state grad requirements and curriculum and it is interesting to me, that while our state universities- require 2 years of a language to enter and three to graduate- our high schools don't require any to graduate.
At the same time other state universities don't require a lang.
I think we should lift up state reqs( and federal support) for high school graduation- instead of expecting everyone to attend college.
However, that would mean that K-12 needs to be supported & teachers need to be trained so that appropriate math is taught in elementary for example- instead of expecting the students to make up the gaps in high school.</p>
<p>But I think college IS viewed by most to be a segue to a vocation and greater employment opportunities. Sure, one can attend college and take courses with no regard to a degree (which if you think about it a degree is somewhat pointless if the only goal is learning) and cost but I don't think very many students have this in mind when they attend, the resources for this, or the inclination for it. I think most attend college in large part because they feel they'll get a better job as a result.</p>
<p>* think most attend college in large part because they feel they'll get a better job as a result.
*</p>
<p>They may feel they will get a better job
But college doesn't neccesarily make you employable
For example this is a common scenario.
One student works in computers while in high school-Cisco training etc- decides not to attend college right away- has a better job right out of high school, than his sibling does two years after graduating from a little Ivy university with straight As.
When my D was attending classes at the community college a couple years ago, several of her classmates were recently graduated from schools like Oberlin, and WUSTL, who were needing to supplant their degrees so they could be employable.
That is an expensive and time consuming process- I wonder if some of it could be avoided if we required high school graduates to perform community service for a year- so that they are older and more focused when they enter college?</p>
<p>Yes - I should have emphasized the 'feel' in my statement.</p>
<p>My concern is that there are a lot of students who don't have a realistic view of what employment opportunities will be available to them upon graduation and they'd be well-served by having a better understanding before dropping huge amounts of money and time in an area that really doesn't enhance their employability significantly. If after having a reasonable understanding they want to pursue that area anyway, then I say great for them.</p>
<p>Thank you BedHead, for your post #5. It is indeed the <em>best</em> trained, <em>most</em> qualified, <em>most</em> educated teachers, from the <em>best</em> programs that leave and have left teaching in massive numbers because it takes so long to get to a middle-class-lifestyle-supporting paycheck, combined with the headaches associated with so many public systems (including lax academic standards or LCD standards). The formula of the two factors combined is economically negative (financially + emotionally).</p>
<p>UCLAdad, we are in total agreement, you see. I think people really ought to look carefully before dropping huge amounts of tuition money as well, because it isn't ALWAYS a segue to greater earning potential (seen too many psych grads earning $20K working in halfway houses).</p>
<p>The psych grads in halfway houses benefit society in many ways=
1- they're performing a needed service
2- they're learning if they want a career in social services, or medicine, or clinical psych without "wasting" tuition dollars at a grad program which doesn't meet their needs.
3- The ones who can't take working with crazy people end up going to B school (not that folks like me in corporate America aren't crazy) and flush out of the field early on before they can do serious damage.</p>
<p>One of my siblings worked in a prison after undergrad. I don't think the actual job required a HS diploma, let alone a college degree.... but after a year a PhD program in clinical psych was the obvious answer. To me, that's the best $4/hour (or whatever minimum wage was at the time) that anyone can earn-- it either validates ones long term goals or gets you quickly moving to the next stage. The clinical rotations in the undergrad pscyh program were in places like Head Start centers (everyone likes little kids, right?) and nursing homes (everyone likes cute old people, especially with moderate dementia, right?) but it took the hard core environment of a prison teamed up with a well-known forensic psychiatrist to really make the career plan develop.</p>
<p>I dont agree that taking a scut work job for less money than you could have made as a refrigerator repair man is a bad deal for a college grad. That's how you figure it all out. If all anyone did were the glamor jobs with the big paycheck coming out of school, what happens on the first bad day or with the first bad boss or with the first awful client or customer?</p>
<p>The reason that psych graduates have a hard time landing good jobs is because psych is perceived as a soft major. This is no different from having difficulty getting into a selective college with a soft high school transcript. Thus, it is essential for a psych student to include courses that could demonstrate an ability to excel in hard subjects as well.</p>
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The reason that psych graduates have a hard time landing good jobs is because psych is perceived as a soft major. This is no different from having difficulty getting into a selective college with a soft high school transcript. Thus, it is essential for a psych student to include courses that could demonstrate an ability to excel in hard subjects as well.
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<p>You are talking about my dear sister. Although she was officially a psych major, she had the distribution requirements for a degree in general science and/ quantitative methods. Looking for work was a breeze.</p>
<p>I never said that psych grads have a hard time finding good jobs... I was responding to the statement that somehow working in a halfway house was an indictment of the education that a psych grad had paid for.</p>
<p>I hire psych grads all the time for a global corporation to do a variety of things. But- if someone wanted to explore whether they wanted a master's degree in social work, a master's in educational counseling, or a PhD in clinical psych, working in a halfway house, even at a low salary, seems to me to be a better way to explore the field than taking one of the jobs we'd be offering in sales or investor relations or HR.</p>
<p>Wow - now going for a Med degree. What degree will you get after that one? (just kidding - I wish you the best). Are you going to try to combine that with some sort of international/government agenda?</p>
<p>I was thinking I'd get an Ed.D for good measure. </p>
<p>The MD thing came about as I sat at my desk and realized that I hate my career options with the MA. Every one of them leads me to some lackey job in Washington, DC writing papers nobody will read or care about. I'd probably do better financially in the long run without the MD (simply because of the combined opportunity costs and marginal costs of the loans), but oh well. I want a job where I get to help people-- this was my original plan with the MA in IR. Sadly, the reality of the government is...bleak to me.</p>
<p>I'm hoping to get involved with international medicine in some form in the long run, but first thing's first... I gotta find a post-bac pre-med and take chem and physics!</p>
<p>My comment was in no way an indictment on the education of psych majors. I was an undergrad English major, and certainly do not regret my undergraduate education. I do think, however, that if people are looking for secure vocational possibilities, the psych degree may not be the most lucrative (even if later on, said grads land in Blossom's company).</p>
<p>Honestly...I think that every BA in America should be required to take at least some math and econ. Oh, and a class on Excel. I don't care WHAT you do for a living... Excel will rear its ugly, ugly head.</p>
<p>Psych is a much softer major than most people would asumme. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that psychology is one of science's major roadblocks. </p>
<p>The problem with psychologists is a general belief that actually learning about how the brain works is futile, so rather than learning the precious few things that computer scientists have learned about the human brain, psychologists rely on vague and unprovable theories (aka Freud) and models that are extremely simple and don't result in reliable models and mechanisms (like the models of the brain that </p>
<p>Another problem is that the brain is basically a computer. Psychologists don't have the mathematical background to understand this, so they generally tend to assume that it runs on pixie dust, and the only useful thing about the brain's anatomy is for treating diseases. Psychologists don't even try to study neuron's from the perspective of functions. </p>
<p>On the contrary, Computer Scientists have amassed the best knowledge we have about human thought and behavior through 2 primary mechanisms: </p>
<p>Neural networks are obviously the path to learning about the brain's function, yet most psychologists have never heard of them. Psychologists may know that seratonin causes xyz, but they don't know why that happens, or what role that it plays in the brain's general function. There is no over-arching theory of how thought occurs, its just a bunch of random and disjunct theories that contribute nothing.</p>
<p>Neuroscience is the respectable version of psych. </p>
<p>There ARE majors that scream "I'm too dumb to get a real B.A." and when I was young when dinosaurs roamed the earth it was Sociology...I'm afraid now that Communications, Psych and Women's/Gender Studies have joined the "fake degree" pantheon.</p>