Value of a college degree

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And that hits the nail on the head. My wife's youngest son got a marketing degree from Florida State. He ends up managing a shoe store in a mall in Orlando. He wakes up and realizes he screwed up by not pursuing a degree in a specialized field. He then goes to Atantic Univ. in Pompano Beach and gets a 2 yr degree in administering specialized medical tests and provding reports for doctors. He now lives in a gated community in Plantation and drives a Lexus. Besides his job with several hospitals he is also teaching at Atlantic Univ. in the same field that he obtained his 2 yr degree in. The marketing degree at FSU opened zero doors except to more dead end jobs. Without majoring in a in demand field you can be dead in the water job wise.
 
I agree with everything you've said. Education has become all about money like healthcare. Also, it's getting so bad that even engineering and science graduates can't find jobs. But one thing is, education does somewhat reflect the way things are going and the private sector. Nowadays, it seems to be success is as much about personality, talking and looking good than it is about having the right education, knowledge and skills. It seems less is being done in this country as much as it is just more posturing.
 
Normally I avoid heated topics like this, but I'll share my experience. When I was 19 I started working as a computer tech for a large company (Abbott Labs). The company treated me well. I was going to night school, but with a full time job and a cute girlfriend I wasn't making much progress. I often dropped the classes or never went back.

When I was 21 I left for a better position. At 21 I was making 90k a year. Of course being stupid and 21 I spent most the money on eating out and electronics. 2 years later left for a start-up. I was making a killing on the stock options and base salary of $105k a year. Then the dot-com bubble burst and people with Masters degrees were fighting for jobs at Starbucks. I went back to JC and took several programming courses, but ended up working as a glorified secretary at a bank. I worked my way back up and was made $120k a few years doing mortgages (and I never ripped anybody off).

Then the first real estate crash happened. The timing worked in my favor and I jumped back to computers and was making $115k a year. Since then the economy has taken a serious dive and I was laid off.

For the past 5 months I've been stretching my resume every which way to get back into high tech. I've done a few consulting jobs to make ends meet. I could go back into real estate, but that industry is pretty bad right now, and doing so would take away from my high-tech job search.

So looking back on my life: I think going to college at the time would have been a bad move. I've done well for myself by working hard and looking for advancement opportunities. I supported my parents while my mom battled cancer and again when my dad had a stroke. My wife and I have a nice house and our cars are paid for (the two biggest things that people buy). The equity we earned in the house by paying the mortgage and from appreciation has simple evaporated from the state of the economy.

Even though I have fun working in high-tech I wish I could shift to working in psychology. I have both in interest in the human mind and would like to help people in need (abuse, addiction, etc.). Even if I hadn't been baited by fast and easy money at a young age a 2 year college degree was all that my family could have afforded. To get into anything psychology based therapist, etc. you really need a Masters.

On the flip side my brother in law, AND sister in law have graduated medical school. Brother in law is same age as me and has about $200k in medical bills, drives a [censored] car, has a 1y/o, and a baby in the oven crammed with his mother in law into a small apartment in LA. He's going to have to weather this for another year until his fellowship is complete and he can start to make good money. Comparing his life choice of going to school versus my choice of going starting from nothing I'd pick my route again.

BUT now that he has a degree in a stable field he'll be set for life making good money. I'm struggling to make the mortgage payment.

The trade schools such as WyoTech and Heald to me appear to be ripoffs. Especially when you can get your ASE certification through a JC for much less. I did recently consider going to aviation mechanics school, a two year program at the local college. But my wife's job alone can't sustain our mortgage and credit card debt for that long. And coming out of that program I wouldn't be making GREAT money until I had several years experience.

Keep in mind I live in the heart of Silicon Valley where tech jobs were once easy to get, now I'm competing with immigrants that bring several years of experience and degrees for a fraction of the price. So having a [censored] or MA doesn't guarantee success in given field, but does offer more options, and long term more stability.

I think geography plays a huge factor in schooling and career options. Having parents wealthy enough to pay for a full ride changes everything. I hope to have college fund for my kids and teach them how to save.
 
Originally Posted By: JHZR2
Originally Posted By: CivicFan
Are you talking about science degrees?


Science, math and engineering can generally be lumped together. Granted some science areas (bio as cited for example) get dumbed down versions of chemistry, math and physics, but that is a means of selling degrees.

As a chemical engineer, we had to take the higher level (more integrated calculus was generally the difference) chemistry and math classes. The chemists could opt out of the tougher variants of chemistry classes, or take them if they so decided. Biologists could take the dumbed down versions of everything. Biochemists generally took the tougher variants.

Not to knock bio, but it is a prime example of a dumbed down degree to sell slips of paper, even though it is a science degree... And Im sure some biologists understand extremely complex chemistry... but not your typical graduate.


I think a lot of it depends on the student.

One of my best friends in high school went on to study biology. He is now a full blown professor and does funded research in the area of immunology or something like that the last time we spoke. So he's in the "ivory tower" of academia.

But he's also a pretty well rounded person. I recall in high school he had a band. (Imagine nerds playing 70's rock covers.) The school wouldn't let him do Clapton's Cocaine so he and the guys in the band rewrote the song. Propane. It's a gas, it's a gas, it's a gas.... Propane.

They were a hit during the high school talent show.

You can have a science bent, and still appreciate or even possess talent.

I for one had my choice of studying music, or engineering. Of course the Army wasn't about to pay for me getting a music degree. But I did have offers for music scholarships. I just didn't think I could pay the bills. I was better than average, but not a superstar.

Sometimes I do wish there were engineering groupies!
 
I'm peeved on just how useless my BBA really is...most of the very few job openings around here don't even require them.


I want to go back to get my masters (if I can get a better job), but it doesn't even seem worth it anymore....
 
Good points.
What use is a degree in a specific ethnic studies?

We could use a few more workers in this country. People who produce , fix, build, etc.. We already have enough people who want to be bosses.
 
Ive said the same thing in numerous posts here concerning the "college system" and employment.

Universities are nothing more than business'. They do not care about your well being nor what you pick and choose so long as they are paid.

I am paying for an education I never completed(student loans), If I found this out sooner than later I wouldn't have bothered and went with my original plan to goto a trade school.

There are a few things to note here.
-Don't go mainstream. IE, whatever is "BIG" is not worth it. Business, Nursing etc always have ups and downs and they are VERY VERY drastic. The downs are really bad, and the ups can be very good.

-Don't bother with student loans, if you can't afford a "college" then goto a community college, get an education that is just as good, if not better for 1/3 the cost. My own personal experience showed me just how much better the community college was I had attended. You actually were provided a better curriculum that was 'hands on' and provided you with a better understanding of the subjects at hand. When I finished my time there(1 year 2/semesters) I decided to transfer to a full fledged university with a better "reputation". Instead what I got was a horrible curriculum, distant professors who didn't care much about you or their work and insanely high costs to attend said university.



Universities are not what they used to be. They never were for "everyone". Looking back, historically universities or places of higher education were a place for the best of the best to progress and learn more and more. These were our pioneers! As with anything that is good, bad stems from it. Greed, politics and commercialism.

You end up in loan debt, credit card debt and you spend a majority of your lifetime paying these debts. Another thing to keep in mind that was touched on above though is prestige and perception.

No matter how smart you are, if you went to a school like "Rutgers" and applied for a job that someone from "Harvard" applied to, you won't get it 90% of the time. The guy from Harvard can be an idiot for all we know(and this is an example, not picking on the school or any attendees) but the name of his institution alone can land him a job. I've seen this happen on several occasions and they were poor ones at that.
 
Originally Posted By: mechtech2


We could use a few more AMERICAN workers in this country. People who produce , fix, build, etc.. We already have enough people who want to be bosses.


There, I fixed that for you! The majority of people who now fix, build, and produce things in this country are from Mexico and work illegally.

Are the people who continue making this possible surprised when wages are so low, yet complain about it? Idiots...
 
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I say more science and math type degrees,


To do what ..and where? Are there vacancies where you are? See a whole lot of ads for hard core engineering types? Plenty available off shore. Now for defense contractors ..a domestic crop is essential, but is there enough demand in that sector to fill the needs of all those you allege should go into it?

Before the DRPA, my FIL worked at GE. When he started his on the side head hunting business he got all the rejected foreign national applicants to GE from his former boss. Security checks were the only reason they were rejected.


I may have missed your intent, perhaps you're suggesting that any curriculum have mandated higher level math and science skills. That would be about the only way it would work. Force feeding.

I also agree that those are essential to all that functions, but ..as you also see, we're not necessarily all that function nor all that creative.
 
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Im 21 years old completing my Associate of Arts degree this summer. I am looking into obtaining an Associate of Arts in Heating/Air Conditioning/Refrigeration Technology or obatining an Associate of Applied Science in a related Computer Science field. If I choose the Computer Science scenario, I can get my Associate degree and then move on toward a Bachelor and Master degree in the near future. If I choose the HVAC field, I can complete my degree in about 1.5 years and get employed as a part time or full time instructor by my local community college where I will be graduating. I want to know what some of you guys think about these fields and what is the best field of Computer Science in terms of income, benefits, retirement, etc...
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As long as they don't end up in banking, I'd say let's have more.

Part of the recent banking crisis was siphoning math wizzes off into the finance world to dream up the schemes such as credit default swaps and derivatives, etc.

So instead of investing in something tangible, folks were placing "educated" bets. Stuffing the sausage with lesser quality components if you will, with the idea that if you leave enough high quality investments in the mix, adding more lower quality loans, bonds, etc, would really make little difference.

So math and science types that could be working on solving real issues are just churning little pieces of paper hoping they will grow into even more little pieces of paper.
 
Originally Posted By: JHZR2


Thoughts?



If the only objective is money, wealthy plumbers, electrcians, lawyers, and doctors are pretty common so I guess I would agree that a good trade or entry level professional degree beats a college degree, regardless of how advanced the degree might be, like a full house beats two of a kind.

Of course the wealthiest tradespeople are the ones that parlay their trade into an owned business or businesses, the text book millionaire(s) next door. And it's certainly not a requirement to have a degree in anything to be a good business person.

I don't agree that college degrees are worthless, however, even the ones you consider to be dumbed down. People should be broadly educated, taught to think critically, and without an agenda underlying the education. A person knowledgeable only of high level science and math can be as profoundly ignorant as someone who only studied classical literature, imo.

And I don't think there is anything inherently wrong with being a college educated line manager at Wal Mart or a cell phone store. I see no reason to belittle people in this manner. Maybe I took your post in the wrong context.

And I actually think that educated people should have kids, and we should have policies that encourage educated people to have kids. Right now, it seems to be the other way around.

So I guess, other than agreement on trade schools, I don't really agree with much of the rant. What brought it on, anyway?
 
Win, let it die down. I don't really agree with much of it either but it's a rant, nothing more.
 
Originally Posted By: mechtech2
Good points.
What use is a degree in a specific ethnic studies?


And what does that say to prospective employers? That I'm gonna rat on you for imaginary quota/discrimination issues? It's like women's studies...
 
/Politically Incorrect ON

I studied all sorts of women in college, I didn't know I could get a degree for that.

/Politically Incorrect OFF
 
Originally Posted By: javacontour
/Politically Incorrect ON

I studied all sorts of women in college, I didn't know I could get a degree for that.

/Politically Incorrect OFF


That is why about half the guys go to college anyway - and that half has no business going to college! The world doesn't need anymore business majors for crying out loud.

I was one of them.
 
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Originally Posted By: Win
And I don't think there is anything inherently wrong with being a college educated line manager at Wal Mart or a cell phone store. I see no reason to belittle people in this manner. Maybe I took your post in the wrong context.

And I actually think that educated people should have kids, and we should have policies that encourage educated people to have kids. Right now, it seems to be the other way around.

So I guess, other than agreement on trade schools, I don't really agree with much of the rant. What brought it on, anyway?



The rant was brought on by the linked article - the "value" of a college degree may be far lower than the ads make it out to be...

The ROI is poor in many cases.

Nothing wrong with being a college educated line manager at wal-mart per se. The issue is that kids go into college, "learn" a lot of stuff in a relatively useless major, and come out without enough true, practical knowledge to apply themselves well. So then they go back to the cellphone store to sell AT&T plans... the same one the high school graduate does and tells me about.

My point is that so many of the majors are so worthless for 95%+ of the folks who graduate with them, that it may well be smarter to go into a trade or make your way another way. We ARE short on competent people in a lot of fields. This "recession" aside, getting good people in a lot of areas is a tough thing to do. Why? because they are neither well prepped by their college education and lined up to do something practical with it, nor competent enough to do the trades and skills to produce something.

And my point really then was that if folks had to take a good deal of true science and math courses (not dumbed down to HS level) to graduate college, they may ultimately grasp a better understanding of how.why things are how they are and how nature and the world works. And be able to conquer more as a result.

My rant was more or less grumping about the proliferation of mandatory college degrees, most of which are in relatively worthless major areas. Since the ROI for the diploma isnt what is claimed, lots of folks end up with a lot of debt and not particularly worthy knowledge without much to show but a good 30 years of student loan payments...
 
Originally Posted By: javacontour
/Politically Incorrect ON

I studied all sorts of women in college, I didn't know I could get a degree for that.

/Politically Incorrect OFF


yeah, I majored in females.
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My point is that so many of the majors are so worthless for 95%+ of the folks who graduate with them, that it may well be smarter to go into a trade or make your way another way. We ARE short on competent people in a lot of fields.


Some colleges are degree mills pumping out graduates with degrees in Business, Economics and Finance that couldn't run a lemonade stand on Miami Beach during a hot summer FL day. The job market is just waaaaaaaaaaay too saturated with people like this.

I have an Associates Degree (electronics) from the Community College of the Air Force and I did field service for Dräger and GE (Datex-Ohmeda) for 11 years after I left the military. I never made the money an Electrical Engineer would make, but with my 2 year degree I had many opportunities working with high end medical equipment (perfusion, heart & lung, anesthesia, cardiac balloon pumps, etc). I notice many young people do not want to work with their hands in any blue collar type job trades, most want to be in an office with a shirt and tie.

The AF Reserve and ANG are good for young folks who don't know what they really want study in college, but get money for school while also learning a trade.... plus their security clearance also opens many, many doors.
 
Well, I'd say that we're seeing at least some of the side effects of the broader availability of money for college. It's not like these institutions are going to NOT assure that a broad span of people are going to qualify and succeed. Every graduate was a 4 year customer.

I agree with Win. A socialized population is surely desirable. Unfortunately, we're taught to chase a buck from our first gift giving holiday.

..and if not for the expense, I'd say that 4 years of pondering your life choices isn't all that unwise. It's a long boring life when you're channeled into some career path that turns out to be not such a good thing when you finally come to true awareness. I think Drew has expressed that pretty clearly.

No one is truly encouraged to do what they really like to do if it doesn't have $$$ on the other end of it. You end up with an entire society seeking satisfaction out of a wallet. If it was a plan, it sure worked.
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