On rich plumbers and eggheads
This New York Post editorial by Jack Hough got links by provocatively claiming that a university education is “a bad deal for the average student, family, employer, professor and taxpayer.”
Sure: it’s easy to pick numbers that show how a plumber who saves diligently will out-earn an egghead saddled with student debt. (How did plumbers become the Everyman, anyway? In the U.S., there are more lawyers than plumbers.)
The second half of the article raises a more important point: before you can say whether a college education is “worth it,” you need to measure what is actually learned.
Maybe it’s because I went to Drake, which has a big actuarial science program, but I’m a big fan of testing for competency in fields that lend themselves to quantitative measurement. If a college graduates accountants, it should be accountable for what they know, not just to employers but to everyone who helps subsidize that education.
Hough points to the College Board’s AP exams as a template to consider. They’re hardly perfect. Anyone who took AP US History will remember that it’s far too easy to study for the test and then forget everything you learned.
But testing does prove what you can learn. For many of today’s jobs, one’s knowledge is less important than the ability to pick things up quickly. I don’t know that you’ll ever be able to place a value on a film degree, much less measure what was learned. But if you test for adaptability across a range of disciplines — writing, technology, presentation skills, creative problem-solving — I think a film school grad would measure up well.
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July 2nd, 2009 at 6:52 am
I agree with you on the value of a film education. But, does one need to get that education in a university setting?
July 2nd, 2009 at 7:43 am
If it’s only about the money, maybe he’s right.
Everyone should be able to go to college if they want. But that doesn’t mean everyone SHOULD go to college. Many people would be much happier learning a trade, be it plumber, electrician, whatever.
But a college education would probably open their minds to many other possibilities in life. My local carpenter is great fun to discuss literature with; he’s happy he “wasted money” on a degree he will never use in his career.
In hindsight, my own plan would be to take the money it would cost me to attend; invest an equal amount on stocks pertaining to alcoholic beverages.
I could have graduated, taken the dividends and paid off my student loans, and still have been able to retire comfortably at 25.
The Catch 22– I wouldn’t have known that if I hadn’t attended a university.
Ah, the wisdom age brings….
July 2nd, 2009 at 8:22 am
I went to college because I like to learn stuff.
July 2nd, 2009 at 9:08 am
Well some people go to college to learn. But those people are probably silly elitists.
There are plumbers and electricians who have gone to college. And there are people who have gone to college who can’t form a sentence.
I hate that everything as to come down to how much you earn. Not every one should go to college but this anti-learning/intellectual strain in America is going to be our downfall.
July 2nd, 2009 at 9:18 am
College graduates on average earn 40% more than non-graduates. And 87% of jobs are created by those holding degrees. – Sorry. Thats the end of the debate on the Republican side, AND the Dem side. – (The student makes enough to pay beck her debt. She just wants an iPhone more. – Think I’m kidding? – Raise your hand if you skipped a principle only payment to get your iPhone?)
The average exiting college student holds almost $6k in daily-compound-interest credit card debt… and holds a credit score to match that problem. – & what’s weird about it is <— The stats say that that’s because “they’re uneducated”. — So sure, a lot of degrees go underpaid and unused, but the sheer volume of success stories says that: If you want North Korea, you educate 600 people… if you want Azimovian Utopias, you educate 6 Billion.
July 2nd, 2009 at 10:13 am
I don’t know. I’m kindof turned off by the whole “college degree” thing. Three of my last four bosses/supervisors earned a degree that had absolutely nothing to do with their job.
Does it just matter that you have that piece of paper (the degree)? Not necessarily what’s printed on it…
I didn’t go to college (well…some, but no degree.) I think I hold my own, wage-wise, with similarly-aged people that did get a degree. Of course, if I didn’t apply myself I COULD be working for minimum wage in a Wal-Mart somewhere…but I’ve got more ambition than that…
July 2nd, 2009 at 12:11 pm
I can place a value on a film degree, John. And I think I’ve got it in my sofa cushions right here…
July 2nd, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Degrees have a more subtle role in the hiring process.
A degree says that you’re someone who can learn, navigate a social hierarchy, and complete a series of tasks working up to a long term goal. It’s a piece of paper that says you’ll probably show up, complete your work, and maybe do it well after some training.
Having expertise specific to the job you’re applying for is nice but a degree also says you’re capable of learning new things.
Getting a degree is a rite of passage. No one needs it but it’s a challenge we should all have the opportunity to face and it would be nice if college education was cheaper and more accessible.
July 2nd, 2009 at 12:56 pm
A degree from a typical school means nothing. A degree from a “good” school means you had parents who could afford to pay for your ivy league education while you wasted four years binge drinking and having sex while wearing a toga.
That way, when you enter the job market you have a piece of paper that tells other people whose parents could afford to send THEM to ivy league schools to hire you so that the rich and powerful stay rich and powerful and everyone else gets to be a plumber.
It’s America’s rigid – yet invisible – caste system at work. You’re either elite, or your untouchable.
July 2nd, 2009 at 1:42 pm
As a former undergraduate of the same school from which John got his MFA, I can say that the first two years I spent fulfilling my general education requirements were more intellectually valuable as a whole than the film classes. Depth and breadth of education is what really matters. The value of the last two years was measured more in terms of the friendships, contacts, and opportunities I received because of where I went.
There have been many times that I wished I would have gone to a smaller liberal arts school like Amherst, then went on to a grad screenwriting program like SC, UCLA, or NW. Those first four years are the basis for lifelong learning, and I can usually tell the difference when speaking to someone whether or not they’ve gone to a four year college or university. That said, it’s not for everyone.
July 2nd, 2009 at 5:09 pm
“It´s as easy to learn something without going to school as it is to go to school and learn nothing”
From “Tom Jones; a Foundling”.
July 2nd, 2009 at 6:32 pm
John, how long have you been waiting for the right moment to post a link to a wolframalpha page? :)
July 2nd, 2009 at 9:59 pm
I actually majored in screenwriting. Was it worth the $40K+ a year? I’ve been thinking about that a lot lately. I wrote a lot and listened to a lot of people talk about writing. Now I’m working on the web (nothing screenwriting-related), only making enough to pay rent and food, and still don’t know the first thing about economics.
Then again, I’m doing the work I’m doing now because of what I learned in an internship that I would’ve never gotten had I not gone to college in NYC. So college tended to help me on more subtle levels. Not levels that necessarily were worth $40K+ a year, but…ah, who am I kidding. Don’t major in screenwriting.
July 2nd, 2009 at 10:05 pm
By the way: I’m a fan of competency testing too. But the entire AP system in particular as it stands now is pretty flawed. High school kids can take AP classes to get college credit, but it’s usually not up to them whether they get invited into the AP class in the first place (unless they have a pushy parent). As a result, all the system really does is ghettoize the non-AP classes by turning them into the “dumb” classes. A different issue, but worth noting.
July 2nd, 2009 at 10:47 pm
The GRE subject tests basically do what Hough says should be done: they test how much you learned in college on a given subject. Like the AP exam, they’re voluntary and only applicable under certain conditions (ie, you want a PhD and they’re requiring you to take the test to get into the program).
I’m not sure if requiring people to take a GRE-like test upon graduation would alter how people judge their choices in universities, which seems to be what Hough is concerned with. I think law schools are a good model for this sort of testing, as law school graduates are all required to pass the bar exam. The best law schools all have the highest bar passage rates, but is that because those schools better educate their students or because smarter kids want to go to the best schools? In the end, bar passage rates aren’t usually a big consideration for people picking their law school because within ranking ranges schools pass comparably, and everyone just assumes they’re smart enough to pass the bar their first time through.
Adding a test like this to undergraduate degrees would probably end up having the same effect, where the “best” schools will have grads that score the best on these tests, and so no one really worries too much about these test results.
July 2nd, 2009 at 10:59 pm
Hey, its not nearly that simple. – I spent 4 years as a financial consultant to indebted students and lived with a leading child development specialist most of my life, and as far as I know, there isn’t one study out there that says its the actual use of college DEGREES that makes college graduates more money. That’s a bad assumption. – I’m convinced its because of their ability to navigate facade based systems, communicate, and meet arbitrary deadlines with a pre-determined level of false sincerity as well as the family demographic graduates come from as much as anything else. – But its a statistic, and a strong one. – I’m a great example of the opposition. I didn’t even finish my second year in high school… and I now lecture at UC Irvine and know very few people my age with my paycheck. – But people like you, who do well without college, or Bon Jovi, (who dropped out as well) … are not average. But precisely 50% of the people are. –> Average or below that is. So if a college education only mildly bolsters those with aptitude… and severely bolsters those without… don’t you think its time we took advantage of the stats, and treated education like an in inherent right, like Fire Department protection? And cut our war budget by one fifth so we could bring that option to everybody regardless of their demographic, and start to catch up to the other 37 first-world nations that are creaming us in education across the board? Iranians can list our presidents. – We can’t find them on a map. Like… such-as.
“Schools should be palaces.” -Aaron Sorkin
July 2nd, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Sorry, that was @ Will Mahoney & Bob. :)
July 16th, 2009 at 3:32 pm
Testing does little more than prove one has a short-term memory. And if you want a crash course on picking up things quickly, it has to come from life. There’s no way that’ll come from a syllabus.