Ok, it’s true college isn’t what it used to be.
A college degree used to be rare, meaning you could get any degree and do any job.
Obviously, it’s not like that anymore. Everyone has a degree. You need to get a degree that means something.
If you have rich parents that will support you, great, you can fuck around and graduate after 8 years with an English degree, and you’ll be alright.
If your parents aren’t rich and can’t support you indefinitely, you need a degree in something that is hiring or will be hiring when you graduate. Preferably, with a large paycheck, so paying back the loans is reasonable.
Or, ya know, just don’t go to college. Learn to weld or install sattelite dishes, or even better, be a general contractor. You can make a goddamn fortune as a general contractor.
Or, do what Mark Twain did, and mary into wealth. Love is fake anyway!
But, ya know, being 18 and impressionable to romantic ideas, it’s tempting to think you don’t have to follow this guidance and get an art degree and you’ll be fine. Don’t fall into that. Be smart.
being 18 and impressionable to romantic ideas, it’s tempting to think you don’t have to follow this guidance and get an art degree and you’ll be fine
The bigger trap IMO is going into a field you aren’t passionate about. I have a computer science degree, my program had many students who didn’t really like it but were there for the money. While I’m sure some succeeded a lot of people who were just there for the money failed out, or performed so mediocre that they could only get less desirable jobs, which don’t pay as well and are also shit working conditions (which since these folks don’t like the career means they tend to burn out super quick).
There is a compromise to be had, you need to find something that you at least mostly find enjoyable, but has a viable career to go into, their are plenty of arts careers out there that pay alright, and if you specialize into them early instead of pursuing eye in the sky careers then you’ll find yourself ahead of the pack. Of course you must also look outside school to see what these careers value (paid coops are a great opportunity if your school has them) I have a few friends with social work degrees who are doing pretty good for instance.
That said, Tuition is somewhat subsidized where I am (my tuition was 15K USD a year and one of the more expensive schools and programs, an arts degree would be more like 10K USD) so YMMV compared with the USA where I hear tuition can commonly be well over 100K a year.
The bigger trap IMO is going into a field you aren’t passionate about.
I went to an art school for a degree in audio engineering and I encountered seniors in their final year who had no idea what the fuck they were doing because they didn’t seek out any opportunities outside of classes. I interned at a recording studio for about two years while I was in school and that prepared me better than any class I took. This is an industry where you need to be passionate about what you’re doing because work is rare in the beginning and the pay is pretty shit. There were several kids in my advanced practicums who didn’t even know how to properly wrap cables or mount microphones onto stands. I couldn’t help but think to myself “why the fuck are you even here”. You really have to go out of your way and fight for every opportunity you can get in this industry. I’m fortunate to be able to make a living in it but somehow some of the people I graduated with came out with less knowledge than what I learned in my freshman year.
It just baffles me that people get degrees in these highly competitive industries without any sort of drive to actually make a career. Interesting to hear that this happens in STEM fields as well.
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Hard disagree. College filled in a lot of missing gaps in my education and gave me a good basis for continuing to learn when I started my career.
There are lots of useful things I learned in school but school is really what you make of it. I did my best to utilize the facilities that my college provided and got a lot of experience. Others just coasted and took courses, doing nothing outside of the coursework. Ultimately, the education helped me get to where I am. Especially in this industry where connections are everything, school can be a great tool to connect with professors and other students. It was also my gateway into the professional world because I was a good candidate for internships because of my background.
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That’s the thing, some people aren’t smart enough to study. Or better said: some people never received the right guidance to know what they’re good at.
Agreed.
Who was Mary?
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In my mind there are 2 reasons why someone should go to higher education:
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You want a career that requires a specific degree, and the pay will be worth the extra years of investment and essentially a delayed start in life.
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You are genuinely curious about the subject and want to learn it for the sake of learning it.
Great if you get both in the same subject but otherwise pick your price point.
No point in going to Harvard for something you have no way or intention to monetize later down the line.
I’m the second one. I’ve been studying physics for three years and it’s hard and I have no idea what kind of job this will lead me to. However nothing else is as facinating to me as physics so I would definitely do it again.
I think many people miss the point of studying. A massive amount of companies/decently positions require you to have a degree, PREFERABLY in a related area but not necessarily. They basically want to make sure you can read, follow instructions etc.
Of course if you want to work at the CERN you might want to know a thing or too about physics but other than that there is a decent amount of good paying jobs not related to your area that a mind like yours would have no problem in performing.
They basically want to make sure you can read, follow instructions etc.
And people don’t learn both of those things in high school or much earlier? Damn, the despicable GOP mission to dismantle the education system must be going much better than I thought 😮💨
Unironically? No, not at the level of university. In highschool you are basically being babysat while they teach you. You’ll be quizzed periodically and steered and told when you’re falling behind.
In college/uni that’s just you having to have or get your shit together and self-manage all that.
It makes a world of difference.
Well of course I’m not worried I won’t find a job at all but I’d prefer to find a job within my field of study. Working at CERN or ESA would be the dream but I’m definitely not counting on it.
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I don’t understand people who go study for a profession that’s hard work and low wage, and then complain that it’s hard work and low wage.
A lot of people, myself included, grow up thinking that a person’s job is the most important aspect of their life, and often hear the phrase “Do what you love and you’ll never work a day if your life.” So, they find a job they would like - something that fits with their identity - because that’s how the world had been explained to them.
I spent 8 years working toward my “dream job,” and realized I hated it within 6 months of getting my first position in the field. Then I quit, and spent 6 months wallowing on my own self pity for having lost the cornerstone of my identity.
Once I got back on my feet, I got a boring white collar job in a field I wasn’t interested in, rebuilt my identity with things I was actually interested in, and realized that working is just a thing I have to do to survive, not some life calling that’s supposed to define who I am as a person.
@[email protected] 5 years
If you don’t mind, what was your “dream job”? It seems incredible that you could study for 8 years in a topic and get no working experience that would indicate that you’re going to hate it when you finish.
I never had a clear idea of a specific dream job, just a field. Now I have such a job I’d say 60-80% is interesting stuff I might do as a hobby (if not doing it at work), with the rest being bureaucratic bullshit most jobs involve.
It’s not super high paying considering the field, but it is often satisfying.Sorry, this will be a bit long-winded. My dream job was to be a genetic counselor. I loved learning about genetics, and people told me I would make a good therapist, so I thought it was a great fit. I got good grades throughout undergrad and grad school, and got decent reviews from my rounds through several hospitals before graduation - the only note was that I wasn’t great at building rapport, which is the first part of the session where you make basic small talk with the patient to try to get them to open up to you. All in all, I was confident I’d be fine. At my first job, though, things were a lot more complicated; my workload was way higher than anything I had to deal with during grad school, my supervisor had no idea what my job was actually for, and my rapport building skill ended up being worse than I thought.
Genetic counseling generally consists of talking with patients to get their feelings about whatever genetic condition is potentially affecting them and/or their family, then helping them process those feelings, and ultimately determine if genetic testing is right for them. When it’s handled correctly it drastically helps patient outlook and confidence moving forward with their diagnostic odyssey, but it’s not often handled correctly in practice. Doctors mostly want to just tell a patient they needed genetic testing, which is mostly what happened in the past couple of decades, since genetic counseling is a relatively new field. But now the hospital requires a genetic counseling visit before a genetic test can be ordered. So, the doctors will tell the patient they were ordering them a test, but that they had one other appointment they needed to attend before it could go through. This caused 2 major issues:
- First, it confused the patients. They often thought they were just there for a blood draw, and were unprepared for a counseling session, which further exacerbated my rapport building issue; I’m a great counselor, but if I can’t get the patient to actually open up and start talking to me about their worries, everything falls apart, causing the patient to leave annoyed and feeling like I wasted their time. This happened often enough to make me feel worthless, and like I was causing undue stress for people during an already difficult time in their life.
- Second, it annoyed the doctors, who felt like I was nothing more than an extra step clogging up their workflow. This was more damaging than it seems at face value, because hospitals have an unspoken hierarchy; doctors are the moneymakers for the hospital, so when they’re annoyed, the higher-ups are very motivated to address that. As a genetic counselor, whose sessions are complimentary and not billable, I was at the bottom of that hierarchy, so my needs barely mattered. Pair that with the fact that my supervisor had no idea what my role was, and wasn’t willing to learn, I had multiple meetings that essentially told me I need to get genetic testing for all patients, which specifically goes against patient autonomy, which is one of the great pillars that genetic counselors are meant to uphold.
Ultimately, I immediately felt burnt out, disrespected, unhelpful, and unwanted. I spoke to many classmates from graduate school, thinking maybe it was just my specific hospital that had these problems, but they all reported the same scenario. Most of them decided to stick it out, but I left. And now, many of them are struggling with mental health issues as a result of trying to preserver in these harsh working conditions. I have a lot of respect for them being able to continue providing this essential service for their patients, but I’m happy I left.
Damn, that’s tough. Working in a new field must be hard enough, but it must be even tougher when no one understands why it exists or values it’s existence.
Yeah, it’s tough. Some genetic counselors are finding success in private practices, or at hospitals with a younger group of doctors who aren’t already accustomed to doing all the genetics work themselves, but I’m already well integrated in my new career, and don’t want to try going back. It’s good to see things are getting better, but non-MD hospital workers will always get pushed around by the doctors if they don’t like what you’re there to do.
Yeah I can imagine it would take a lot of energy to both do your job well and constantly justify its existence to your peers.
Work to live vs live to work
Sounds like you’ve been surrounded by live to work people, the saddest most pathetic people in society (unless they own the actual business they are slaving for, that’s a different dynamic)
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the real mistake is going to school for the job you want (with exceptions like being a doctor).
I went to literal clown school, I’m considered top of my game in the corporate world and have been head hunted for my last 3 jobs.
Chad moment
Requested: A clown version of the Critters-posting-on-4chan meme, with a horn on the desk and a red nose put around the screen.
I do keep a nez rouge at my desk on my “weeaboo” shelf, alongside a Bottlecap (currency), Xûr’s Strange Coin, The One Ring to Rule Them All, and an eyeball made by one of the people who helped on Stranger Thing’s Vecna design.
And, of course, a fake sword 👍
That for sure looks fancy. Well, if I could draw to save my life, I’d definitely include it.
Mostly they don’t, it’s assholes telling them they fucked up.
Going to University means you have a chance at a good paying job. Depending on the job, likely a better chance then someone who didnt go. I make decent money and did not go, however I am incredibly lucky and am not betting on that for any children i have. Trades or University/College is a must.
That being said, how about the Government reduces the cost of post-secondary education, instead of allowing banks to earn off billions of school loans each year. Here, they do reduce it for citizens, however not nearly enough. Additionally, many graduates end up moving to other countries because the pay is lower here.
I’m not from the US, I think I’ve heard that banks are obligated to give those loans with some characteristics?
It’s going to cost much less if getting a student loan becomes much harder, because universities still need people paying.
If anybody can get a loan, the cost becomes inflated.
Just a thought.
The costs HAVE become I flatbed, because everyone can get a loan for a degree, and schools keep raising tuition.
Well, then the solution is abolishing the law making these loans so easy. It will make things easier for students themselves (only after a transient process, though, which itself is going to be hard - but that can be softened by, say, abolishing it gradually, for different categories of students).
Depends on what you go for.
The big difference is the type of job you can get.
If you want to work retail you can make decent money, but you are standing all day, dealing with entitled people and work hours that make it difficult to have a life. If you want a 9-5 better get a degree.
I always wonder what people got their degree in that set the expectation of a high paying job.
Also some people go to school for 16 years to be donkey smart.
Engineering and CS, IME
Your wrong little Billy. It can help in getting you a we’ll paying job, it it depends on both your degree and perception.
Did you use your time at university to network and make lasting connections with people who will likely be more successful than you? Because that practically guarantees a job. If you kept your head down and did nothing of note except get a diploma, you wasted your time.
That’s so Raven!
I barely scrapped through high school and now 20 odd years later I’m in an office job on a 6 figure salary. One of the lucky ones I guess?
Good thing your job doesn’t require you to be able to spell
No you misunderstand, he attended the school of hard knocks
That’s pretty much a question of culture and the field.
In Germany, it’s pretty much impossible to get into some jobs without a degree. In others, you get a higher salary for having a degree, to the point where some companies will not take you for a position because your degree makes you too expensive. In the public sector, your highest degree determines your salary scale (and most importantly where it caps out).
Not saying the system is good like that, but it is currently that way, so at the very least here, degree often corresponds to higher salary.
In Finland when public sector is doing a competitive procurement from the private sector, e.g. an IT project, by law they have to prefer the company with higher educated employees. A lot of talented people in IT don’t have degrees, so those people don’t get hired to public sector jobs or even to private sector that has public sector as a client.
All public sector IT projects here have been gigantic, expensive shit shows.
What did you spend your money on?
A degree focusing on intensive career training in a field that is highly demanded, and networking,…
or a “life experience” and a degree in underwater basket weaving?
I mean I get why people like being edgy about this, but the statistics don’t lie. A bachelor’s degree on average increases weekly pay by about 50% over an associate degree or trade/apprenticeship. You can absolutely make a good living without a degree, but they are definitely worth the cost for most people.
Yeah editing my comment,y my “success” part just meant following a profitable major
Yeah, fuck that. I didn’t go because I had no interest in sitting in yet more classrooms listening to people drone on and smelling other people’s farts for 4 more years
Look if going to college didn’t cost four years of time with 20K per year, where in my career you’d be near to outdated (tech), I’d go.
But for tech I feel like its almost a scam. I’d rather have the certs and/or practical knowledge or be able to go through an interview via algorithms, soft skills, explaining how to go through what I know. Its harder work to learn this way but I think it keeps your skills sharper.
My experience is that the college foundation I got over 20 years ago is still incredibly useful as a developer, architect, and manager.
That said, the thing you need to learn the most is how to constantly keep up with the changes in technology, and my college at least did an ok job at that.
Did a shit job helping me get my first job, though.
My only solace is knowing that those same adults that repeated these lies to me as a kid will die starving and poor as I will have nothing to support them with.
Wow.
