American Higher Education: Necessary or Unnecessary Burden
Several of us have been having a discussion on American education and whether it has improved or stagnated since the 1960s. The main participants have been Tom and Billy Joe. Below is a summary of the discussion thus far, as recorded by me. I apologize in advance if I misinterpret any of the arguments, or leave out anything that the speakers think are vital to their argument. Also, I will provide some statistics about the topic, and hopefully, we can use this as a beginning of what I hope to be a good conversation.
Tom: Education in the US has significantly declined since the 1950s. This conclusion is mostly derived from my own personal observations as an educator in a highly ranked university over the past 15 years. A bachelor’s degree no longer, on the average, provides a boost to lifetime salary compared to a high school diploma. Essentially, most students are paying significant money for a degree that is worthless. Most college students lack the basic knowledge and skills that would allow them to compete with 8th grade students from the 1960s. I know from personal experience, that my accelerated students could not string together sentences possessing proper grammar. While there may be statistical evidence that shows education has improved in the States, these tests in grade and high schools have been rigged to counterfeit good performance and high graduation rates to keep their share of federal funds.
This stems from the shift in education that occurred around the late 1970s and 80s. Due to governmental intervention in schools, most teachers are forced to “teach the test” as opposed to teach what people should know, which curtails actual growth and development for the student body at large. While students back in the 1950s were directed into appropriate tracks (smart kids for college, middle of the road kids for trade skills, and dumb kids to be able to function in society), that does not happen now. As a result, the smart kids are held back and are bored and/or are drugged into submission, causing them to drop out or be intellectually stunted. The dumb kids are held to standards that they cannot meet and do not get the skills that they need to function. As a result, you stifle the high end of the bell curve and prevent the low end from being able to function so they are easy marks. This leads to things like the mortgage crisis, where people are suckered into non-beneficial transactions.
So if you are a smart kid, after college you should go out and start on your project immediately and forget college. Four years in the real world is much better than being trapped in academia. After all, many CEO and highly paid individuals never went to college, and they are doing fine. To quote directly:
“I certainly would drop out and go the entrepreneur route if I was in HS today. The first self-made millionaire (at 23) I knew had a GED. He made millions re-packaging and selling cheap RAM on the Internet in the mid-90s. As far as I know, he’s never bothered to go any further with his education, although his sales force came from college.
One of the founders of YouTube hadn’t finished his degree. After he made his first half-billion, his mother made him go back and finish. The current CEO of Pavlov Media, the largest supplier of connectivity to apartments in college towns, is only a HS grad.”
In short, the modern American educational system teaches the worst of a 20th Century mindset when what we need is a 21st Century way of doing things. While current students get the techniques they need by 16 to be able to succeed in the 21st Century, they need the historical perspective and ability to communicate with their elders. They lack this ability, and are thus limited.
Billy Joe Mills: Tom, you are overreacting. While more people are going to college then in the 1960s, the sheer number of schools and the competition to get into the best schools lead to the stratification of minds and educational opportunities that you seek from the 1950s. If the K-12 is so bad, going for more education in college would have to be better than none because it offers another 2 to 4 years to acquire more skills. Also, your argument on how some CEOs and highly paid individuals never got a college education is the exception, not the rule. Finally, statistics are n9t all that bad; indeed, I love them. So despite your argument on standardized tests and their failures, here is a link to educational statistics.
I took some time to check Tom’s claims, and some of them are wrong. First and foremost, his claim that a bachelor’s degree no longer provides a boost to earning potential is wrong. According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2007, the average high school graduate makes $31,004 a year, while a person with a bachelor’s degree make $54,392 a year, a difference of 75.2%.
Secondly, he cited two groups of individuals “who did n0t need a college education” to be successful but whom actually did have some amount of college education. The Pavlov Media CEO is a man by the name of Mark Scifres. According to the website, Mark started the company while finishing his engineering degree. While I don’t know if he actually got the sheepskin or not, I don’t know if it is fair to say that he did not need his college education since he spent time in the school and probably did pick up some things.
Also, the YouTube thing is interesting. There were three guys who started it: Jawed Karim, Chad Hurley, and Steve Chen. Both Karim and Hurley got their bachelor’s prior to striking it rich with You Tube (although Karim got his degree via correspondence as he was working for PayPal). I could not find anything more about Chen, but at least two of the three were college graduates prior to striking it rich. While I can’t say definitively that their education helped them, it would be hard to argue that it was unimportant.
As to Tom’s CEO point, generally those individuals are older and went to school in the 1960s when college graduation rates were lower (only 7.7% of the population graduated from college in 1960 versus 28% in 2006). I don’t know how indicative Tom’s allegation that college degrees do not matter to career advancement as applied to future prospects, since there will be a larger pool of college graduates to choose from in the future.
So there it is. Is American higher education a huge waste of time? You be the judge. Again, if there were any misstatements of Tom’s or Billy Joe’s arguments, I apologize. Gentlemen, please make any corrections you deem necessary in the comments.
Comment by Segen on 30 March 2008 at 4:32 pm:
I think a lot of the “dumb kids, middle-of-the-road kids, and smart kids” getting “meaningless” bachelor’s degrees debacle can be solved by…
…getting rid of grade inflation.
I think a degree can be worth something if it correctly ranked you in the sea of other graduates by having GPAs reflective of students’ abilities.
Just because you show up to class does not mean you get an “A” in my book, that should be a “C”. “A’s” should be kept for exceptional work–not just doing the basics in school.
Read more about grade inflation .HERE
Comment by tet on 30 March 2008 at 5:12 pm:
Looks like I was partially wrong about Mark–he went back and got his degree after he started Pavlov, like the co-founder of YouTube. My mistake.
My comment on earning potential does not refer to the average income of a person coming out of college now, but the estimated lifetime earning potential for a typical bachelor’s degree. Since we know that other educational information (graduation rates and comparative test scores) has been purposely falsified, it is possible that those Labor Department figures are also false. (It’s hard to trust people once you know you’ve been lied to).
I’ve been searching for the study in which I read the disputing argument and I cannot find it. I may have to concede you the point for the present.
I am interested in what the readership, especially those in their 40s and 50 and in educational professions, have to say, though on this subject.
One thing I’m curious about, Prescott. Is there any correlation in the statistics to show whether or not the graduates made their money working in their major? (In other words are the psychology majors working in the field of psychology or for their dad’s firm?) Perhaps the seeming difference in earning potential is a selection effect stemming from their parents’ abilities to get them into good jobs due to having the income to pay for tuition in the first place? (In other words, is there a provable causal relationship that eliminates those biases?)
Tom
Comment by tet on 30 March 2008 at 5:22 pm:
I agree with Segen on the grade inflation. I used every bit of my ability to prevent it in my class.
One numerical example of the futilities I faced as an instructor:
In 1992, my students were able to perform two Cobalt syntheses in four hours using three fume hoods.
In 2006, my students were unable to complete the same syntheses in eight hours using twice as many fume hoods in a class that was staggered to maximize efficiency.
Same materials, same procedure, same write-up in the lab book, more efficient placement of materials that they need for the experiment.
I can’t think of a more controlled experiment to show the deficiencies of the students I received in my courses.
Guys, professors know this about you. They’re not allowed to speak–this was one of the subjects I was strictly forbidden to talk about while I was employed. I expect I would have lost my job had I mentioned this prior to January.
Grade inflation is not the exception, it is the rule.
Tom
Comment by tet on 30 March 2008 at 5:30 pm:
Prescott, I want to bring up the other CEO I was talking about, Steve Moberly.
When he started this company in 1996, he didn’t even have a high-school diploma–he was a bored dropout. He wasn’t 40 or 50 years old, but 22. He later went back and got his diploma, but I don’t know whether or not he ever got any college.
Tom
Comment by Augur on 30 March 2008 at 7:50 pm:
Perhaps a more helpful statistic would be what percentage of CEOs of fortune 500 companies have college degrees, or what percentage of say the top 100 grossing new companies in the last 10 years have college degrees.
If I were hiring for most types of companies I would place more weight on an intensive interview, writing samples (preferably put together in house), and skills/aptitude testing.
I do think extracurricular involvement while in college can be a helpful gauge of how effective an employee will be.
In large part, I agree with Tom that college is a scam. But it’s a fiction almost everyone has bought in to. It is currently necessary b/c employers expect it. Were a high schooler to role into an interview for an ibanking firm and try to sell the interviewer that college is overrated hype, 99 times in 100 they wont get anywhere. So assuming Tom is right, what are the practical results?
One projection I heard on the radio today, in 10 years the average tuition will be 50K per year.
Perhaps colleges will have to change their approach. More flexible student specific curriculum, more group work, a broader liberal arts education, more practical experience while a student (more credits for internships/ better job placement).
I don’t find it particularly helpful to just say “college is now meaningless.” This is probably a question for Tom, mostly, but if that is true, what will the impacts be? How will college curricula differ in 10 years? How will enrollment numbers differ? How will the “typical college student” differ?
How should colleges and academics adapt to stay relevant. Surely there is a place in the future for the academy, for the creation of knowledge. What do you think it is?
Comment by tet on 30 March 2008 at 9:02 pm:
I’ll think about it overnight, Augur and get back to y’all in the afternoon, after rewriting.
Tom
Comment by kofi the and the other savings could be used to improve current high school ed, perhaps extending it to a five or six year stint on 30 March 2008 at 10:03 pm:
The increasing cost of tuition is a good thing, at least if you subscribe to Tom’s point of view. As college becomes increasingly more expensive (and therefore the supposed benefits of the degree become increasingly less attractive) fewer students will go the college route. The two direct consequences will be: 1) non-degree workers will be less disadvantaged for not playing the game and wasting four years; 2) degree workers will be properly compensated for their extra education. There are over 4000 schools of higher education (2400 four year and 1700 two year) in the United States. What a waste. If we can get that number down to 500 we’d be much better served. Not only could the government save money by subsidizing fewer college students (and really, getting money to go to NeverHeardOfIt U is about as irresponsible as getting a subprime mortgage), but those that are deserving of attending the few select schools could have more of their education paid for.
Comment by Hanno on 31 March 2008 at 10:43 am:
Who “deserves” it?
Comment by Not too many. on 31 March 2008 at 10:48 am:
I’d say about 10% of the 35,000 kids at UIUC.
Comment by Hanno on 31 March 2008 at 12:18 pm:
That doesn’t give any indication of how we pick them, now does it?