AuntiE Loc: 45th Least Free State

Ditching College

Why not everyone has to go to an institution of “higher learning.”

Larry Sand - Front Page Magazine Fri Apr 1, 2022

One of the numerous reverberations of the Covid pandemic and our overwrought response to it is that many young people are now skipping college. For students who graduated from high school in 2020, college enrollment was down 21.7% compared with the prior year, according to the National Student Clearinghouse. And importantly, if a student doesn’t go directly from high school to college, he is much less likely to ever attend a school of higher learning. Men notably, in increasing numbers, are forsaking college. The Clearinghouse reports that at the close of the 2020-21 academic year, women made up 59.5% of college students, and men just 40.5%.

While much of the media has descended into pearl-clutch mode over the recent college exit, a reset has been long overdue. In fact, the push for universal enrollment is relatively new. In 1960, just 7.7% of adult Americans held college degrees, but 60 years later that number jumped to 35%. Writing on the subject in 2017, the late Walter Williams reported that about “1 in 3 college graduates have a job historically performed by those with a high-school diploma or the equivalent.” Williams, citing Ohio University economics professor Richard Vedder, goes on to say that the U.S. was home to “115,000 janitors, 16,000 parking lot attendants, 83,000 bartenders and about 35,000 taxi drivers with bachelor's degrees in 2012.”

Most universities are just not properly preparing young people for the job market. In Harvard Business Review, tech guru Michael Hansen writes that a recent poll of Americans who graduated from a community or four-year college in the past five years showed that 19% reported that “their college education experience did not provide them with the skills needed to perform their first post-degree job. Additionally, more than half (53%) of these college graduates have not applied to an entry-level job in their field because they felt unqualified, and …42% felt unqualified because they did not have all the skills listed in the job description.”

Many students don’t even get to the point where they get to feel unqualified, because they never graduate. Research reveals that the six-year completion rate for any degree or certificate is currently 62.2 percent. This means that more than three out of eight college students drop out with no credential whatsoever. Per Fordham Institute’s Mike Petrilli, “To put it succinctly, many young people don’t do well in college because they aren’t very good students in an academic setting, they haven’t done very well in school, and they don’t like it all that much.”

With these troubling numbers in mind, parents want something different for their kids. A Gallup poll from April 2021 shows that 45% of parents of current students wish more postsecondary options were available. In fact, there are several.

Petrilli suggests that high school students can get a head start by taking jobs while still in high school, specifically employment “that these students, for better or worse, have a realistic chance of attaining, in industries like food service, hospitality, caregiving, or construction. Let them get started on these jobs as soon as they turn sixteen, but under the guidance of a school-provided career coach/mentor/therapist, and with the hope that they build valuable real-world skills that will quickly lead to greater pay and more opportunities.”

We should also create high schools with the workplace in mind. Michael Meechin, the founding principal of NeoCity Academy in Kissimmee, Florida, stresses this point, saying, “The goal was not just to create a magnet school for students considering careers in science and technology, but to operate the school like the companies they’ll work for when they leave. Our building looks and operates more like a modern workplace than a traditional school. The same can be said for our curriculum, which we designed by asking, ‘How do Disney, SpaceX and Microsoft operate?’ Our inquiry-driven curriculum is framed by our mission to have student outcomes impact the world around them.”

Then there are traditional trade schools, which students could attend right after high school. Blue collar jobs – builders, mechanics, truck drivers, etc. – will always be needed, and all pay well.

Another solid alternative to college is an apprenticeship program. The number of apprentices registered with the Department of Labor has surpassed 636,000, which represents a 64% increase from the level a decade ago. An example of a successful program was detailed by The Wall Street Journal in 2020. Students of the Federation for Advanced Manufacturing Education (FAME) program, a mix of new high-school grads and older factory workers well into their careers, typically spend two days a week in class and three days on the factory floor, earning a part-time salary. “They learn to maintain and repair machinery; traditional subjects such English, math and philosophy; and soft skills such as work ethic and teamwork. After earning an associate degree, most work full time for the factories that sponsored them.”

A study conducted by Opportunity America and the Brookings Institution tracked 389 students who began the FAME program between 2010 and 2016, and compared them with students at the same schools of similar age and academic background. The results of the study revealed that one year after graduation, “the typical FAME graduate earned $59,164, compared with $36,379 for the non-FAME graduate. Five years out, the FAME graduate earned $98,000, compared with $52,783 for non-FAME graduates.”

It must be noted that states can help alleviate the pressure to attend college. Toward that end, Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan has just announced that his state “will eliminate the four-year degree requirement for thousands of state jobs and partner with workforce organizations to find skilled workers to fill them.” A majority of state jobs can be handled by STARS (Skilled Through Alternative Routes), workers who’ve trained in “community college, military service, workforce training, on-the-job learning and more,” Hogan explained.

It is imperative that we finally recognize that, despite all the social pressure to the contrary, college is not for everyone. If you are planning to be a doctor, lawyer, engineer, etc., then obviously it’s a must. But becoming an apprentice or getting a job right after high school could give a young man or woman a head start on their career, and avoid mountains of debt associated with college, which they very well may never finish. (The cost of attending college has more than doubled since 1985 even after accounting for inflation. As a result, the average American college student graduates with $30,000 in debt.)

And finally, most colleges have become politically correct hellholes where, if you are not a card-carrying member of the intolerant woke religion, you are relegated to pariah status. Students have learned to self-censor, fearing lower grades if they don’t. According to a 2021 survey administered by College Pulse of over 37,000 students at 159 colleges, 80 percent of students claim they self-censor at least some of the time. About half of undergraduate students described themselves as “somewhat uncomfortable” or “very uncomfortable” with expressing their views on a controversial topic in the classroom.

Hence, we have gotten to the point where colleges are much more successful at stifling contrarian views than helping students find a meaningful life path. Parents, before you blindly spend an ungodly sum of cash for your kid’s college education, you owe it to them to carefully examine and consider the alternatives.

woodguru

A year or two of a low cost community college can be invaluable for getting a kid that doesn't really know what they want to do have a chance to figure it out without breaking the bank...accruing some credits, getting used to the study ethic, and hitting a college that specializes in what they decide to do.

Trade schools are another option

AuntiE Loc: 45th Least Free State

I do not know who you are; however, you are not woodguru. He would never post such a reasonable thought.

My plumber earns a mid three figure income every year. Interestingly enough the gentleman who does heavy yard maintenance for us earns an excellent income. He has taken his off season to study the climate, soil, etc., for our area, and is able to make strong recommendations on plantings, etc.

bggamers Loc: georgia

TERRIFIC POST and very true

saltwind 78 Loc: Murrells Inlet, South Carolina

Woodguru, After I was discharged, I decided to go to college. Officers in the navy seemed to have a much better life, and I decided that the only difference between officers and myself was a sheepskin. I started out in Bronx Community College, and from there went to Wagner College in Staten Island. I loved college. Compared to swabbing decks and chipping paint all day it was a party. I loved studying about subjects I was interested in.
Being a history major, the only fields where I could put my diploma to work as a career was either teaching or law school. I was twenty five when I graduated and needed to make some money, so I chose teaching. I never felt sorry about going to college for a single second. I feel that it taught me how to think, and learned a great deal about a lot of different subjects.
Both my kids went to college, and were much more career minded. They are making real good money. If young people feel that they want to try college, go for it! It will help you in a career, and make you a more knowledgeable person, and may help you get a high paying job.

AuntiE Loc: 45th Least Free State

The issue is the societal pressure for all students to go to college. Not all students want, or are equipped, for the rigors of college.

I have a close relationship with a couple. She is college educated. He is not. Her father whined like a two year old toddler that she married someone not as educated as she was. What a blow to her father’s ego when he found out his uneducated son-in-law was making substantially more than was he.

Every semester I see students struggling with courses. Every semester I see unhappy students.I have, literally, overheard students state they are in college because of pressure for that degree.

It is time to change the question from ”What college are you applying to? to What interests you and how can you pursue it? Some may not have an answer. Some may. If the answer is not college but a trade, then encourage that.

Marty 2020 Loc: Banana Republic of Kalifornia

Our university system is churning out liberals and we need to shut it down!

bggamers Loc: georgia

Salt you had military training beforehand there for you had discipline these kids now days expect everything handed to them and someone else to pay the bill. Most people I know with a college degree cant find a job in their chosen field or don't like the office politics. My sons ex girlfriend had a bachelors and quit she makes more being a supervisor at Sams

bggamers Loc: georgia

When their in high school the teachers and counselors pressure parents and students telling both they won't go far or make a decent living without a college education they never mention trade its a disservice to the students and parents that all options are not given they also take courses that provide little or no opportunities

American Vet

Even a blind pig finds the occasional acorn.

River Reb Loc: MS Delta

Trade schools are the way to go. You'll actually learn a skill and be able to make a living. Also, you won't owe a lifetime of wages to pay off the college.

woodguru

When I got out of the military at four years my dad ran a constant non stop rant about how I was never going to amount to anything, would never make more than $10 an hour...he took it as a personal insult when I told him I was making $60k a year at 25, and topped a hundred grand a year by the time I was 30.

When I broke $50k in my early 20's I told him I was sure glad he was wrong about never making more than $10 an hour. The thing he never took into account was that I had a two year equivalent degree in electronics for nuclear missile systems, and a top secret clearance that was gold in the defense industry.

woodguru

I went to a ITT school to learn Autocad so I had the formal training, that and a top secret clearance got me into illustration work that paid over a hundred grand a year, to get that I had to work an aggressive OT schedule, but it was worth working five 12hr day work weeks, they wanted me to pick up weekends too but I drew the line on that.

woodguru

Conservatives, often being cognitively dysfunctional do not make up a very large percentage of college students...
think about it, Lol

American Vet

Of course you have data/evidence/proof to back up your nonsensical comment?