What is College?
As I was looking through some Job Posting recently I once again saw all the requirements for College Education of some sort. I should stress the 'some sort' part because that is exactly for what they ask. Many do not ask for a degree actually related to what the job may be; it simply asks for a degree in general.
Now of course, it is true that I do not have a degree and thus I may be looking at this with exceptional bias, though I doubt it. What I seeing is companies equating 'degrees' with 'ability' and that is a pathetic way to determine who is hired or fired.
Many people know situations where their they, or someone they know, is refused (or overlooked for) promotion, a raise, or a job because they did not meet the educational requirements. This is quite laughable when the promotion is not given to someone who has many years of on-the-job experience with the same company in favor of handing it to someone who may be fresh out of college because this person has a degree.
My current position in Information and technology permits me to associate with many people with many different levels of formal education. It is always telling when, after a intellectual conversation takes place between me and someone with college, they ask me where I went to school to learn such things, ideas, or whatever. My usual response is that I've only really been to college to visit friends and that I've never really attended otherwise.
There is a more-than-slight bitterness that can be detected in so many of these people and it exactly this type of attitude I find so disturbing. Yes sir or madame, it is possible that people can gain knowledge without having to pay for it at a university, and yes sir or madame, it is also very possible to remember it, put it to use, and be able to recite facts and figures without having to had a test to make sure you know it.
What is really gained at the university anyhow except the ability to meet people around your own age in an 'open and free' atmosphere, and party, and make excuses that can not be gained in the real world?
If you are someone who has attended a university, how much of those credit hours are still used by you today? How much on-the-job knowledge that you've gained is used?
While it remains true that I'd prefer not to have my surgeons completely learning on the job, the fact that so many hospitals are run by universities suggest that the classroom might help start you off, but in the end what matters is what you do and how you do while doing your job. If this is good enough for life and death under the scalpel, then perhaps it should be good enough for most other jobs.
Another job that is important to have a 'controlled environment' and a formal education would be for tax and accounting laws, and other jobs where obscure, idiotic, and other forms of nonsense are permitted the light of day. In jobs like these it is obvious that someone who might be honest and using common sense could still be completely wrong and thus needs to be versed in the ways of the law.
In other cases a degree or college time is not useful at all. Would you trust your life more with a sergeant or a lieutenant in a firefight? Who do soldiers usually trust more? This is a life and death case where you'd prefer the on-the-job experience far more than the "I read this in a book, let's see what happens" graduate.
How many jobs really need college in order to 'do well'? If so many people feel that college is needed to do these jobs that can obviosuly be done by people without it, why is this the case?
Is the twelve years we all spend before we're adults so very misused that we need even more just to be able to get a job that pays well?
It is disturbing, and int he end could this be the biggest form of discrimination that is permitted since it states that if you have not gone to the university you are incapable of doing the job? It's a lie if nothing else.
Now of course, it is true that I do not have a degree and thus I may be looking at this with exceptional bias, though I doubt it. What I seeing is companies equating 'degrees' with 'ability' and that is a pathetic way to determine who is hired or fired.
Many people know situations where their they, or someone they know, is refused (or overlooked for) promotion, a raise, or a job because they did not meet the educational requirements. This is quite laughable when the promotion is not given to someone who has many years of on-the-job experience with the same company in favor of handing it to someone who may be fresh out of college because this person has a degree.
My current position in Information and technology permits me to associate with many people with many different levels of formal education. It is always telling when, after a intellectual conversation takes place between me and someone with college, they ask me where I went to school to learn such things, ideas, or whatever. My usual response is that I've only really been to college to visit friends and that I've never really attended otherwise.
There is a more-than-slight bitterness that can be detected in so many of these people and it exactly this type of attitude I find so disturbing. Yes sir or madame, it is possible that people can gain knowledge without having to pay for it at a university, and yes sir or madame, it is also very possible to remember it, put it to use, and be able to recite facts and figures without having to had a test to make sure you know it.
What is really gained at the university anyhow except the ability to meet people around your own age in an 'open and free' atmosphere, and party, and make excuses that can not be gained in the real world?
If you are someone who has attended a university, how much of those credit hours are still used by you today? How much on-the-job knowledge that you've gained is used?
While it remains true that I'd prefer not to have my surgeons completely learning on the job, the fact that so many hospitals are run by universities suggest that the classroom might help start you off, but in the end what matters is what you do and how you do while doing your job. If this is good enough for life and death under the scalpel, then perhaps it should be good enough for most other jobs.
Another job that is important to have a 'controlled environment' and a formal education would be for tax and accounting laws, and other jobs where obscure, idiotic, and other forms of nonsense are permitted the light of day. In jobs like these it is obvious that someone who might be honest and using common sense could still be completely wrong and thus needs to be versed in the ways of the law.
In other cases a degree or college time is not useful at all. Would you trust your life more with a sergeant or a lieutenant in a firefight? Who do soldiers usually trust more? This is a life and death case where you'd prefer the on-the-job experience far more than the "I read this in a book, let's see what happens" graduate.
How many jobs really need college in order to 'do well'? If so many people feel that college is needed to do these jobs that can obviosuly be done by people without it, why is this the case?
Is the twelve years we all spend before we're adults so very misused that we need even more just to be able to get a job that pays well?
It is disturbing, and int he end could this be the biggest form of discrimination that is permitted since it states that if you have not gone to the university you are incapable of doing the job? It's a lie if nothing else.
posted by Edward W. Prather at 15:02
