Is a college degree still worth it?

By Tristin Burris (Whetstone staff)

The prospects of a college degree often outweigh the actual possibilities. Whose fault is this? The college’s — or the student’s? Perhaps it is society’s fault for pressuring and convincing young high-school students into believing that a further education is the only way to succeed today. No matter at whom the finger should be pointed (or maybe they are all to blame), the main question that shoots up from this list like a flare: Is a college degree still worth it?

The answer should be yes.

Should be.

A good college institution offers great potential to its students. Research shows that just by earning a degree, a person will make an average of $20,000 more per year than if they had just stopped after high school. This is one of the biggest perks of earning a degree.

Note: Earning a degree differs from receiving a degree, and enrolling in a college becomes nothing but a wasted monetary investment if the student does not invest his or her time.

Aside from doing it for future money, students should earn college degrees to secure decent employment and better job stability and retention.

The disclaimer: Only the motivated should apply.

In other words, college is necessary only if the student is willing to make it worth it—only if a student prides herself in her work and efforts. Many students—too many students—do not.

A degree used to be a safeguard warding off unemployment, but it no longer guarantees a job or a position.

Here is why:

According to the University of Chicago Press, a study found that 36 percent of students who attended college – but did not graduate – did not exhibit any significant knowledge gain or improvement in learning.

So was college worth it for them?

No.

Fifty-four percent of college students drop out, according to a Harvard study. It is not ironic that these dropouts who are decreasing college retention rates are many of the same people who also have trouble with job retention.

Our society contradicts itself: it pressures young adults into attending college, but also doesn’t value a true  college education.

College today has become more of a rite of passage than an institutionalized gateway for learning.

“Four to six years of partying do not equal an education,” said Craig Brandon, an award winning author.

Too often students say, “C’s get degrees.”

I don’t understand why students do not ask more of themselves, why they are not committed to a higher standard of excellence for themselves and their futures.

Perhaps an equally important question is whether that institution of higher education is committed to the students.

Many students are simply shuffled through their classes by their professors. Satisfactory, exemplary or lackluster, no matter the level of quality their work is, they are passed along.

The fact that this happens demoralizes those of us who are hard workers – it even discourages us.

Online colleges are some of the worst culprits of this grade inflation. What is the point in having an online course when students cannot even compose a simple email?

When did grammatical calamity – careless errors with an obvious lack of thought, and laze of editing – become acceptable in the classroom?

Because of this, a diploma at the commencement ceremony is, for many, now just another document. Like the handouts passed out in classrooms, they are simply run off a printer and issued out haphazardly.

And another flare is shot.

The time spent, or wasted, in that specific type of college setting is time that could be spent gaining experience.

There are plenty of jobs that do not require college degrees. It may make more sense, for some, to skip all the FAFSAs and Sallie Mae. Skip college and the unnecessary baggage strapped into the course schedule and go to a trade school, or even right into on-the-job-training.

It is disheartening to realize a college degree – something that was once prestigious – no longer holds the same value, but costs even more than it ever has to attain.

It is true that the potential return for receiving a college degree is higher than any other alternative, and therefore a college degree should still be worth the work.

Should be.

 

Sources:
http://www.usnews.com/education/articles/2008/10/30/how-much-is-that-college-degree-really-worth
http://www.usnews.com/debate-club/is-a-college-degree-still-worth-it
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/01/09/college-degree-worth-pew/1820787/