Trials
Well-known member
yep:| and if you say you want to be a Veterinarian the guidance counsellor will talk you out of it.
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How crucial is education in the real world?
- Thread starter Mina
- Start date
Hack
Well-known member
Yeah... I think my degree in midevil lesbian dance theory was a waste of time.
I have recently come into contact with A LOT of young people with university degrees who tell me they wish they'd taken a different path, but what can you do...
They've been contitioned all their lives to believe uni is what you need to do ...
I'm guilty of it too... I have two kids in university and I know... but I'm okay with the fact that their degrees won't necessarily by their ticket to success..
University is too accessible.... the value of most 4 year degrees has been reduced to a point where... "so what, you have a degree... so does everyone"
I have recently come into contact with A LOT of young people with university degrees who tell me they wish they'd taken a different path, but what can you do...
They've been contitioned all their lives to believe uni is what you need to do ...
I'm guilty of it too... I have two kids in university and I know... but I'm okay with the fact that their degrees won't necessarily by their ticket to success..
University is too accessible.... the value of most 4 year degrees has been reduced to a point where... "so what, you have a degree... so does everyone"
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Bingo.
Trials
Well-known member
yep
didn't even teach you to spell medieval" What I don’t understand is young people heading off to university to persue degrees in fields that have little to no opportunity and marginal income. "
Probably because theirs parents, or someone, told them that they would never be management without a degree, any degree. The piece of paper mattered and the cheaper and less time it took to get it the better. I don't have a degree but have years and years of experience. Early in my career at a major bank, I had just spent a month training a recent uni graduate when I was called into the VPs office. He told me I should consider working for another company. When I asked why he proceeded to tell me it had nothing to do with my work, if he had his way I would be promoted on the spot. But the policy was that a degree was required above a certain position. He proceeded to tell me that the kid I had just trained would be my boss within six months as they were ramping up and needed management and it wouldn't be me no matter how good I was. We were IT. I told him the kid had a degree in Geography!!!. Didn't matter, he had one, I didn't. I moved on. The kid called me about a year later to thank me for the training as he had just been promoted to manager of the dept.
So....education? I'm not so sure. A piece of paper that says you have one? Yes.
Probably because theirs parents, or someone, told them that they would never be management without a degree, any degree. The piece of paper mattered and the cheaper and less time it took to get it the better. I don't have a degree but have years and years of experience. Early in my career at a major bank, I had just spent a month training a recent uni graduate when I was called into the VPs office. He told me I should consider working for another company. When I asked why he proceeded to tell me it had nothing to do with my work, if he had his way I would be promoted on the spot. But the policy was that a degree was required above a certain position. He proceeded to tell me that the kid I had just trained would be my boss within six months as they were ramping up and needed management and it wouldn't be me no matter how good I was. We were IT. I told him the kid had a degree in Geography!!!. Didn't matter, he had one, I didn't. I moved on. The kid called me about a year later to thank me for the training as he had just been promoted to manager of the dept.
So....education? I'm not so sure. A piece of paper that says you have one? Yes.
I said this before but a university education also likely teaches critical thinking skills (although that seems to be a little less obvious these days), team building skills, communication skills, time management skills and working to deadlines and under pressure. Regardless of the subject these are likely skills a student should be picking up. This is why a post secondary education is important in many cases.
Video games can potentially teach you the same skills set and you won't be up to your eyeballs in debt after the fact!
Interesting thread and an interesting topic for young and "old."
I'm 51. In my last year of high school (1986) I was accepted at UW (Western) for Materials Engineering. After a year I realized the material and subject matter were not to my liking. I had always been a hands-on kid, worked on cars and loved computers (C64, PETs etc) in high-school and at home and found the theory taught at university simply didn't grab me. I tried a 2nd year there but ultimately decided to follow another path and entered college of "applied arts and technology" (is that still a term today?) for electronics technology. I loved it -- very practical with enough theory to understand the principles -- and ended up with a bunch of bursaries and grants and awards, including the Governor General's award for highest academic standing. I'm only saying that as an indication that I loved what I was doing there, not to boast; it was, after all, "just" college. In those days college was seen as a joke, where the dummies went to take Basket Weaving 101 etc.
I was hired immediately out of school into a Waterloo firm and stayed there for 17 years; 3 years into my time there I was promoted to Engineering and spent the remaining time designing medical and industrial metrology equipment, coding embedded controllers and running the regulatory compliance group.
In 2008 that company went through an upheaval and let a bunch of folks go, myself included. I did a stint with a medical start-up helping them establish a QMS but really needed to get back into electronics. I interviewed with a robotics start-up in 2011 and was nervous as hell. Having "only" a college diploma from 20 years ago I thought I was wasting my time. Turns out they didn't care; they wanted my experience. I spent 7 years there and, as the company grew, felt like I'd become a pretty important part of the embedded design group despite being "only" a college guy.
I was tasked with interviewing many candidates for permanent and co-op positions. I came to understand that a degree and/or grades only told a small part of the story of the individual and that answers to questions about hobbies and other interests, what they did in their leisure time, examples of home-made projects and so on gave us a much clearer picture. We'd also administer a very basic quiz of 4 pages that ranged from solving a simple resistor divider to safety circuit design and were often stunned by how poorly folks with an otherwise impressive CV did on even the most basic technical questions. The quiz reflected broadly the sort of work the individual would be doing on a daily basis so the results were pretty important.
The upshot of this is that the degrees and grades didn't reflect an ability to problem solve. In most cases, especially evident with co-ops, it was more an indication of rote learning and/or remembering lines from a script.
Anyway, as I age and the world moves on, I question the value of pursuing a degree. Perhaps there's an inflection point where, as long as you can prove basic competence in the field for which you are applying, your work experience means more than a piece of paper that says you basically have a good memory. I will say the apparent prejudice against those only having college papers scares me a bit. The company I'm with now -- 3-1/2 months in -- didn't care. I fear that won't always be the case.
I'm 51. In my last year of high school (1986) I was accepted at UW (Western) for Materials Engineering. After a year I realized the material and subject matter were not to my liking. I had always been a hands-on kid, worked on cars and loved computers (C64, PETs etc) in high-school and at home and found the theory taught at university simply didn't grab me. I tried a 2nd year there but ultimately decided to follow another path and entered college of "applied arts and technology" (is that still a term today?) for electronics technology. I loved it -- very practical with enough theory to understand the principles -- and ended up with a bunch of bursaries and grants and awards, including the Governor General's award for highest academic standing. I'm only saying that as an indication that I loved what I was doing there, not to boast; it was, after all, "just" college. In those days college was seen as a joke, where the dummies went to take Basket Weaving 101 etc.
I was hired immediately out of school into a Waterloo firm and stayed there for 17 years; 3 years into my time there I was promoted to Engineering and spent the remaining time designing medical and industrial metrology equipment, coding embedded controllers and running the regulatory compliance group.
In 2008 that company went through an upheaval and let a bunch of folks go, myself included. I did a stint with a medical start-up helping them establish a QMS but really needed to get back into electronics. I interviewed with a robotics start-up in 2011 and was nervous as hell. Having "only" a college diploma from 20 years ago I thought I was wasting my time. Turns out they didn't care; they wanted my experience. I spent 7 years there and, as the company grew, felt like I'd become a pretty important part of the embedded design group despite being "only" a college guy.
I was tasked with interviewing many candidates for permanent and co-op positions. I came to understand that a degree and/or grades only told a small part of the story of the individual and that answers to questions about hobbies and other interests, what they did in their leisure time, examples of home-made projects and so on gave us a much clearer picture. We'd also administer a very basic quiz of 4 pages that ranged from solving a simple resistor divider to safety circuit design and were often stunned by how poorly folks with an otherwise impressive CV did on even the most basic technical questions. The quiz reflected broadly the sort of work the individual would be doing on a daily basis so the results were pretty important.
The upshot of this is that the degrees and grades didn't reflect an ability to problem solve. In most cases, especially evident with co-ops, it was more an indication of rote learning and/or remembering lines from a script.
Anyway, as I age and the world moves on, I question the value of pursuing a degree. Perhaps there's an inflection point where, as long as you can prove basic competence in the field for which you are applying, your work experience means more than a piece of paper that says you basically have a good memory. I will say the apparent prejudice against those only having college papers scares me a bit. The company I'm with now -- 3-1/2 months in -- didn't care. I fear that won't always be the case.
sburns
Well-known member
These sound like items taught or learned on the job, not in a class room.
I had originally said the same thing, then thought i'd just get 50 posts countering with "who has the resources to hire someone and have them learn this crap from the jump."
But i agree with you.
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48Connor
Well-known member
Might be different for other majors, but I went through 4 years of schooling to be a mechanical engineer, and this is taught in the classroom for us, then perfected on the jobsite. Without a doubt, university was much more of a juggling act of time management and team building than any job I've had so far, especially in the later years when you've got 5 different courses with 5 different group projects with 4 different people in each group all due around the same time - it really pushes you to the limit.
It's part of the reason why engineering has a 75% drop out rate at our school.
Maybe not in your classrooms but in mine they are.
Hack
Well-known member
yep
Yeah... I know, but I do know where to capitalize.
They weren't actually taught. You figured out on your own that you needed to learn them or you'd fail, and you were at least partially successful in the attempt.
He'd be better off teaching you how to use a search engine.
sburns
Well-known member
I believe this goes back to what the OP was inquiring. Somethings cannot be taught in school. Part of education is just another life experience the other part is a validation you are qualified to do something. I certainly wouldn't want someone just off the street piloting a passenger airliner. Then again you might have all the credentials, and experience and have earned that executive promotion, but the boss went ahead and hired his nephew's buddy from college days, cause well there are no guarantees in life.
It all depends on what goal you are shooting for and how much time you have to invest in it.
Depends on the teacher. When I was teaching in the horticultural apprenticeships, I started teaching students how to manage projects, conduct efficient meetings and develop overall plans to help with time and multiple school projects with tight deadlines. I wasn't taught this stuff, but I certainly did help teach it.
As for education being needed in the real world - formal education certainly isn't always needed, but some form of post secondary is important. In my field of work - no chance getting into a job that's anything higher than entry level without some form of formal post secondary - apprenticeship, diploma, degree is mandatory with some amount of relevant experience. The less experienced you are, the more education you would need to have.
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