Posted on 05/07/2012 6:55:36 AM PDT by Black_Shark
OUR oldest son is finishing up his junior year in high school, and we’re already overwhelmed by what I’ve been calling the college challenge — trying to figure out what college he can get into and what we can afford.
But there’s also a bigger debate raging that hovers over all our concerns. What exactly is a university education for?
Is it, narrowly, to ensure a good job after graduation? That’s how Rick Scott, the governor of Florida, views it. He has made waves by wanting to shift state financing of public colleges to majors that have the best job prospects. Hello science, technology, engineering and math; goodbye psychology and anthropology.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The purpose of college?
My word! Color me cynical.
The purpose for the parents is too often Narcissistic self-congratulation.
The purpose for the college is money.
The purpose for the current giverment is control and propaganda.
The purpose for the banks is taxpayer-backed loans.
The purpose for the youths, if any of the current crop are even capable of giving it rational thought, is rarely about knowledge, wisdom, strength and clarity of mental abilities, moral or intellectual maturity. Totally unprepared to think, in general, and immature in the extreme along every front, they are largely incapable of knowing who they are, what they might want that is of true and lasting value, and how to discipline themselves to achieve it.
Some people’s pursuit of happiness involves learning, studying and experiencing things and being among people with similar interests—if they can afford this on their own dime or with the support of willing family members, why on Earth shouldn’t they have it? It’s not just PC fluff to say a college education is much, much more than a beeline toward a career—arguably, if that’s all you’re looking for, you might be better off SKIPPING college.
A practical skill is worth much more today than a college degree. Find a technical school that teaches electronics, welding, computer technology, etc. Let him choose the skill according to his interests. Back him financially until he learns the skill. Then he can earn his own way through college. He will not have a mountain of debt when he gets his degree.
Also, if he decides later to join the military, a certificate from a technical school and an actual work record will give him a definite advantage in job choice, promotions, etc.
This has been a big debate in our household. I have a graduating high school senior.
My husband and I are engineers, and we were hoping he would want to go into engineering. He wants nothing to do with engineering. He’s good at math, but not interested in science.
He wants to go into economics and get a minor in statistics and maybe a minor in accounting.
I think that is good enough for him to get a job after college.
The other interesting things has been figuring out where he’s going to college. We live in California, and he got into multiple UC’s, but after visiting them this year he did not want to go. It looks like we’ll be paying out of state tuition and sending him to my college, Texas A&M.
“The university should be a place for reflection for the young to explore areas of the human experience, to be fully aware of history and the arts,” Professor Delbanco said. “We don’t want to have a population that has technical competence but is not able to think critically about the issues that face us as a society.”
The university used to be a place for men (women didn't go) to learn about the true and the good.
The universities have spent 50 years denying the true and the good exist, and not they are upset because students see college solely as a meal ticket.
Why should students spent years of their lives and incur tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt to learn about something their instructors deny even exists?
Not = now.
Perils of spellcheck. Sorry.
Why not move to Texas and get a job - any job - and, then, after the residency period runs, avoid out-of-state tuition? A & M is a very good choice. Accounting and statistics would be good in the job market. More than a handful of econ courses would be a complete waste.
BTW, petroleum engineers are in VERY high demand. The overall economy is going to tank. Engineers will swim; econ majors will mostly sink.
One of my favorite comics!
Interesting. I had a similar dilemma as your son in that I love math but am uninterested in science.
I am graduating with a B.S. in Economics this Saturday from a major math/engineering school. Here’s my experience: The B.A. is complete crap and a waste of time as it has no math in it. The B.S. is essentially applied mathematics as he will take calculus based macroeconomics/microeconomics, at least 1 year of econometrics, diff eq, 1.5 years of calculus, linear algebra, statistics, etc.
It essentially has the same level of mathematics as required by our College of Engineering. However, it does teach you how to think critically through the formulation of mathematical models, diagnostics, etc.
In regards to the Job Search, it’s rough. I am interviewing for multiple Analyst jobs that are forecasting/econometric based jobs. If he decides to go this route, tell him that he not only needs to learn how to apply the models but also HOW THEY WORK. He needs to understand the theoretical underpinnings for the models or he won’t get past the front door in interviews.
If your son wants to continue on this path, he better really love math or he will burn out in 1-2 years because the first 2 years you are on the engineering track with economics courses instead of physics/chemistry. Same math and stats.
Let me know if you would like anymore info.
Haha, that’s hilarious!
I do know that my old engineering roommates from Freshman year loved to make things that went BOOM! We lived on the 9th floor of our dormitory and we had a trash chute that went to the bottom floor...
Needless to say, police were called multiple times and we even had a toilet blow up thanks to someone who placed an explosive device in it. Who knew mechanical engineers loved to blow crap up?
What’s college for? Depends on the college. What’s education, or more accurately, schooling, for? That’s the important question.
Schooling should help prepare one for life. But this in turn begs the question, What is life for?
The answer is, to know, love and serve God in this life, and to be happy with Him in the next. True education must serve this end.
The means to achieving this end can be very broad, depending upon a child’s gifts. Religion must always be central, whether formally or informally.
The ability to make a living is a legitimate consideration, but should be balanced against whatever calling or gifts the child has.
Serious consideration should be given to the moral atmosphere that the student will exist in, keeping the student’s ultimate end in mind.
I attended a secular engineering college. A positive aspect of an engineering education is that the truth cannot be wished away. Engineering encourages orderly thinking.
Unfortunately, engineering ignores philosophy, so I graduated ignorant of fundamental principles of reason, such as Aristotelean logic and metaphysics.
Objectively, these branches of knowledge are more important that the natural sciences, since the natural sciences assume these principles.
OTOH, it is difficult to find good teaching in these areas, and one can learn logic and metaphysics outside of formal schooling.
I would argue with you in that the B.A. econ majors will sink but us B.S. - Economics with strong backgrounds in calculus, diff eq, statistics, mathematical macro/micro will be in strong demand thanks to the field of Data Analysis.
The difference between a B.S. in Econ and a B.S. in engineering is the science that we learn. At my college, we have the same math requirements that engineers have we just take mathematical econ vs. physics/chemistry.
Formal Logic/metaphysics *shudder*
you’re bringing back nightmares.....
These few web pages provide a great synopsis of basic Aristotelean principles in a fairly painless way....
Combine this with Peter Kreeft’s “Socratic Logic,” and you can go a very long way. It’s worth more than most college degrees in their entirety.
Both of my daughters went straight from high school to college and neither really knew what they wanted to study. As a result they majored in social life and left school after about 2 years.
My oldest, however, went back when she had matured mentally, 28 yo. She is now a registered nurse with a bachelor’s degree. I’m hoping my other daughter will follow her example.
My advice to kids fresh out of high school. Get a job first or join the service. When you are 25 or 26 and a grown up in maturity, then go to college. You really need to lose the social life years before you spend a lot of money going to college for real.
The original purpose of a university education was to graduate a well-read individual capable of critical thought, innovation, and synthesis of need and capacity. Today, however, students are taught just the opposite: there is only one valid way to think and believe and all else is bourgeois stasis.
In light of that, it ill behooves the inquisitive student to attend a PC university. Far better to get a technical degree in something useful, then devote one’s life to reading, studying, and taking whatever university courses interest you, taking pains to point out the hypocrisiy of professors who stifle free discussion under the rubric of “tolerance” and “diversity”.
Colleges have worked very hard over the last decades at making themselves irrelevant.
We’ve thought a lot about moving, but my husband has recently diagnosed with cancer (hopefully cancer free since surgery) and my 15 year old twin daughters have medical issues. One of them has a brain injury and the other has recently been diagnosed with a movement disorder like Parkinson’s called dystonia.
I can’t handle moving at this time.
My son is going to try to establish residency.
I wish I could convince him to go into petroleum engineering. My dad was and one of my brothers is in the oil & gas industry.
We’ve thought a lot about moving, but my husband has recently diagnosed with cancer (hopefully cancer free since surgery) and my 15 year old twin daughters have medical issues. One of them has a brain injury and the other has recently been diagnosed with a movement disorder like Parkinson’s called dystonia.
I can’t handle moving at this time.
My son is going to try to establish residency.
I wish I could convince him to go into petroleum engineering. My dad was and one of my brothers is in the oil & gas industry.
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