Wow! Bravo, Mum!
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So you’re telling me, all things being equal: not having a degree isn’t a major handicap to getting a job in tech?
That’s truly laughable.
Let me just wait here for you to say “I had significant extenuating circumstances and experience equivalent to a degree so nobody should ever have to go to school to do as well as me”
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There are essentially two workable models for university sports, and the US is stuck between them.
One is the European model, where the sports clubs are genuinely amateur and often run by students. The only athletic scholarships are there to cover the cost of training and competing (travel to tournaments, equipment, etc). But with a few exceptions, the standard is quite a lot lower and only friends of the students involved are interested in watching.
The other is the South American model, where clubs are genuinely professional teams owned by the university, and their players aren’t students. Pumas UNAM, a football (soccer) team attached to the National Autonomous University of Mexico, has won the Mexican championship several times.
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Kind of why I pointed out it’s a bad faith argument on their part from the very beginning.
It’s all “hey. I’m a well off white guy who never went to college and yet found myself still employed at google in IT. See, no one needs to even go to college they just have to work hard.”
Ya know. Because it was that way for him it should be that way for everyone. Right?
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Room & board will certainly still be a problem, but the textbooks are simply a widespread scam. What I paid for ALL of my textbooks in 1972 would probably not buy a single textbook now. How is this even possible in an age of digital printing? The cost should have gone down, not up. And of course, there is always the lovely ‘new edition’ scam so that one can’t reuse texts. I can easily see UT Austin not having any type of a problem with free tuition because 1) it operates off of a permanent fund, that is it simply works from the interest from all the oil money it accumulated and 2) weirdly, the athletic dept actually pays for itself, something very few places manage to do (and you’d better believe that football is one HELL of a big deal here).
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That’s true, but it’s also tax payers that benefit from a well educated population.
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It’s not an absolute requirement. Is it harder, yes.
Nowhere did I say that. You’re reading what you want and not listening to what I said. It’s clear you’re not here for a conversation but wish to vent some frustration on some random stranger that took the time to interact with you.
After the Navy, he indeed did work in Alaska for awhile for the Wildlife Dept.
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It’s so cold in Alaska… or so I hear Stephanie say.
But honestly, I think a forestry degree is plenty practical and useful.
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Yes, please. Spend the money on academic services, not luxury apartments.
Not necessarily. Unlike tax cuts, education is a government expense that really does pay for itself by increasing the tax base long-term. Maybe a better way to phrase it would be, “tailor the selection criteria to the school.” Some schools are challenging, some are less so, but still do a good job of developing students. Also, some high school kids are goofballs but get serious when they get to college.
The irony is, there are a lot of college students who “take it seriously” but are underperforming because of the stress of debt combined with working every non-class hour to afford college, even with a mountain of debt. Those students will perform at a much higher level if we don’t trade the ridiculous financial stress for ridiculous (and often unnecessary) academic stress.
Another factor in the 5- and 6-year graduation problem is that some colleges don’t coordinate the class schedules with their departments very well, and often fail to make mandatory major classes available to enough students. It’s difficult to get a degree in biology when there are 200 bio majors and a mandatory class only has slots for 25 students every 3rd semester…
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That doesn’t mean there are only two workable models. For all but 2 sports, US universities run fully amateur athletic programs. I took part in one. We got free shoes, occasional meals, training clothing, uniforms, and free laundry service. When there was a conflict between classes and sports, classes took priority.
The biggest problem I see with the two revenue sports is that there are clearly athletes who are participating in them who are there for the sports and not for the academics. They attend the school because that’s the pathway to professional sports. Many leave school early, but if they wash out of the pro leagues or have a career-ending injury, they are left behind. I’d rather see the universities continue their athletic programs as minor-league pro teams for football and basketball, but have a commitment to provide scholarships for all athletes who choose to study there, before, during, or after their pro career.
There are some who will attend school for a year or two then leave early for the pros. There are some who have no interest in school when they are 18, who go pro and want to earn their degree after their pro career. And the majority of athletes in college basketball and football programs will never play pro ball, and just want to play sports while being a legitimate student-athlete. There is room for all of these options. The biggest barrier is the NCAA’s stranglehold on college sports. They need the control over student-athletes to continue to rake in the billions from college sports. Break that control and it benefits both the universities and the student-athletes.
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Really… I have had recruiters pass on me because I don’t have a degree (and even if I did it wouldn’t be a CS or related degree) for jobs I could do in my goddamn sleep. Never mind my 20 fucking years of experience or even if I had the CS related degree that nothing I would have learned back then other than logic for coding is even fucking relevant today.
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