Primrose Road

The Chicago Tribune offers up an article about why college might not always be "worth it". For example:

But they caution that some college choices are no longer a wise investment. Students destined for low-paying careers, they say, simply cannot manage certain debt levels. Loans can surpass $100,000 depending on the school and the borrower.

"If you're going to be a nursery school teacher your whole life, you should not be taking out a lot of loans," said Sandy Baum, senior policy analyst for the College Board and an economics professor at Skidmore College. "That's the problem. It's an investment people make without knowing how they will pay it off."

The counterargument, of course, is that the value of college is not necessarily a higher salary, but more finely-tuned critical thinking skills:

Experts point out that the college experience is not just about financial rewards. There is also that business about learning a few things. Students are able to explore their interests. They often become inspired by subjects they never knew existed and are able to view the world through a broader lens.

"There's value added when it comes to critical thinking and moral reasoning," said Ernest Pascarella, a University of Iowa professor who has studied the effects of college.

...

"Career-wise, college has been very important for me," [a 22-year-old finance major] said. "But it's also about knowledge. If I wasn't in school, I wouldn't be able to understand what's going on with the economy and with other things that affect my life."

I wonder if the question is not so much one of whether college is "worth it" but whether college has become the new high school. Young people in many places in the US find themselves competing for service and retail jobs with college graduates, even though these jobs do not necessarily require "college-level" skills. Meanwhile, graduate school seems to be fast becoming the new college, where college graduates find that they can't get higher-level jobs unless they hold M.A.s or M.B.A.s, and some, unable to find jobs after graduation, enter graduate school in order to delay their disappointment with the job market.

Perhaps the critical thinking skills that we work so hard to develop in our freshman comp students need to be taught in high school. I'm concerned that instead of teaching important skills in high school, parents, teachers, and the public education system in some states are merely extending adolescence until at least age twenty-two.

(Sometimes, I give my 200-level literature classes tongue-in-cheek "how to be a grownup" lessons. They're more appreciative than you might imagine.)