Best #15

[Entropy]

was that the 4th time you took your junior year or 5th?   =)

[847badgerfan]

10 years total. You tell me. I always thought I was a senior for 7 years.

[Entropy]

all joking aside.. I had a classmate who lived  across the hall from me my first year at Chicago.... he was a "4th Year" but had attended school for 6 years (he was there for his 7th).   Not the cheapest University to attend for 7 years.   He had switched his major 4 times which caused the "delays".  I know he graduated and at that time he told me he was taking a few years off to travel and discover himself.   He was extremely smart and a wiz with computers and programming...  but literally was a zero on the motivation scale.  

btw...   Charlie Ward could have run both offenses.

[847badgerfan]

I have a niece who just graduated from U Washington with a degree in art history. She lives in the PHX area and could have gone to ASU or whatever for an art history degree. Or even stayed home and read a bunch of books.

But no.

My brother in law enabled that shit. No F'in way on my watch. But hey, she's got a degree.

[Entropy]

I'm not sure what I'm going to do when my kids get to that age....    I have mixed emotions about quality of education and value for the price.  

[847badgerfan]

I'd make them work a shit job for shit money and tell them if they don't like working a shit job for shit money, they need to get a degree in something that will allow them to gain a great job for great money.

I'm paying engineer interns, right out of school (two this year), $75K/year plus 1.5 OT.

You ain't getting that with a BA in art history.

[Entropy]

I don't disagree about the degree and where you attend school.  If you want to be a HS teacher (and nothing wrong with that), going to Harvard would be a waste of money, imo.

I was thinking of more general terms....   Are you better off attending Harvard or Rutgers?   Does it matter?   There is prestige involved, but at what point do the costs make Harvard a bad choice (regardless of degree)?   Do a large extent, college is what you make of it.. so is the debt worth it?  

I would say for me it was worth it.   Doors were opened that would have been closed at UNL.   But that was 20+ yrs ago.   And prices continue to climb at rates well beyond inflation.   Maybe the current answer is... it depends upon your major.    But 10 years from now?

[Hoss]

 

btw...   Charlie Ward could have run both offenses.

I could understand a UChicago grad making this post, but not one that grew up a Husker fan as well. Inexplicable, explainable, horrible.  

[ELA]

I don't disagree about the degree and where you attend school.  If you want to be a HS teacher (and nothing wrong with that), going to Harvard would be a waste of money, imo.

I was thinking of more general terms....   Are you better off attending Harvard or Rutgers?   Does it matter?   There is prestige involved, but at what point do the costs make Harvard a bad choice (regardless of degree)?   Do a large extent, college is what you make of it.. so is the debt worth it?  

I would say for me it was worth it.   Doors were opened that would have been closed at UNL.   But that was 20+ yrs ago.   And prices continue to climb at rates well beyond inflation.   Maybe the current answer is... it depends upon your major.    But 10 years from now?

That's the issue.  It's been too expensive for a generation now, but for some, if you did it right, was still worth it, because it opened doors.  Now, you still need it to open those doors, but even at that, it puts you in such a hole, that's it's no longer worth it.  Absent a bunch of scholarships or parents rich neough to pay it, I don't get it.  But still without it, you'll almost certainly work a shit job.  The days of being able to prove yourself and work your way up if willing to put in the time are over.  My brother in law didn't go to college, has worked for years as a bank teller.  Is trusted, leaned upon, and reliable.  But has been told there is zero room for growth unless he goes back to school.  Even to get to middle management, no shot without a degree.  But he's 33, so now he's stuck.  He can't really support a family being a bank teller, but to even be the manager of a single bank branch he needs to go back to school...and take on tens of thousands of dollars in debt, to what?  Maybe be considered for one level of promotion.  He's stuck.
I don't know what the right thing to do is.

[betarhoalphadelta]

I was thinking of more general terms....   Are you better off attending Harvard or Rutgers?   Does it matter?   There is prestige involved, but at what point do the costs make Harvard a bad choice (regardless of degree)?   Do a large extent, college is what you make of it.. so is the debt worth it?  

I remember a study I read years ago where they were trying to correlate future economic success with choice of college.
What they actually found was that the correlation was with where you APPLIED to college. Didn't matter whether you were even accepted, or where you attended. It was all about where you applied.
I.e. if you thought you were good enough to get into Harvard and applied there as well as Rutgers, it didn't matter if you went to Harvard or Rutgers. If you went to Rutgers you'd end up just as successful as the guy who attended Harvard but applied to Rutgers merely as his fallback. 

[847badgerfan]

In my community college district, there are 8000 manufacturing jobs open and they can't be filled due to a lack of trained people. These are $50-60K/year jobs.

Guess where one could obtain the training and gain a 1 year certificate or AAS degree for $5K to $10K tops?

If you guessed "at the community college" you would be correct. 

Much better than fighting for $15/hr to flip burgers, no?

[ELA]

In my community college district, there are 8000 manufacturing jobs open and they can't be filled due to a lack of trained people. These are $50-60K/year jobs.

Guess where one could obtain the training and gain a 1 year certificate or AAS degree for $5K to $10K tops?

If you guessed "at the community college" you would be correct.

Much better than fighting for $15/hr to flip burgers, no?

Closer to half that

[847badgerfan]

Closer to half that

Not here in Illinois and other silly places like it (read into that what you will). The $15/hour mandate is going to be real, and soon, as it already is in some places. 

Of course, leadership doesn't have the foresight to understand that paying Micky D's employees $15/hr is gonna make the Big Mac cost $10/each, thereby making it still unaffordable for those making $15/hr. Furthermore, they are oblivious to the fact that all of these places are testing out self-ordering kiosks and stuff... eliminating those jobs with a preemptive strike...

[OrangeAfroMan]

In industries that have trouble finding someone, does the school even matter?  Moreover, do people really even have a clear hierarchy of schools that aren't in the immediate area?  We all know Harvard, Princeton, etc....but would someone hiring me in Arizona know the difference between the University of Florida vs South Florida vs Southern New Hampshire.com?  

Get the magical piece of paper as cheaply as possible.