Thread: College Time!
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Join Date: Sep 2001
Location: SoCal
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Originally Posted by Andy911sc View Post

I had a friend major in Latin at my college. She is now working in a bakery and trying is struggling to pay close to 1k/month in student loan payments. Make sure you evaluate the practicality of your major to today's and in 5 years job demand.
At least some of the job skills necessary 10 years from now don't currently exist. Graduates need to learn how to learn, and a good liberal arts degree teaches just that. Many students however don't really understand that, and instead think that college will "get them a job." imho that isn't what college does - that's what a trade school does. And that isn't to demean trade school, as I actually think they are perhaps the most important part of the educational chain in this century if they adapt.

Nothing wrong with working in a bakery. Having unrealistic expectations of what a degree will get you, and the resulting value proposition for college - well, something can be wrong with that. I'm encouraging my son to do what he loves and also have a backup plan. But I'm also not telling him, "college at all costs." Frankly he will do just fine without it as there are a lot of paths these days. Programming skills are the "trades" of the 21st century. You don't need to go to college to learn how to code. You do if you want to design and do some of the other aspects.

A degree is useful for some, useless for others. The field these days isn't that critical, as you aren't learning your "job skills" in the classroom. It is how you think and how you present yourself. We hire a variety of tech and creative types. Some years back there was a pretty standard background. These days, not so much.
Old 03-25-2014, 09:35 AM
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