College degrees are worthless

SPL Tech

A bit one sided, but a great video IMO. But yea, I am still going to go to college, sorry NIA.

College Conspiracy - YouTube

tpatt100

I can't watch the video but I have to say college degrees are worthless and I encourage anbody and everybody who works in the IT field of Security and or auditing to not go to college. Instead play xbox and eat pop tarts and do drugs.

especially in the Michigan area.

Monkerz

But how can you afford the the Xbox, live membership, pop tarts and drugs without a job which requires a college degree. Damn double edged swords.

erpadmin

tpatt100 wrote: »

I can't watch the video but I have to say college degrees are worthless and I encourage anbody and everybody who works in the IT field of Security and or auditing to not go to college. Instead play xbox and eat pop tarts and do drugs.

especially in the Michigan area.

Michigan is a depressed state (and I mean financially depressed, but the other meanings can take hold as well.) I don't even need to mention Detroit...

I saw a couple of minutes of the video and saw where it was going. I can't as of yet make a comment on the entire video, but so far, as I have said from almost the beginning of joining TE, I didn't need a college degree to get the job I have now. I do have one now, and it is currently in the hands of the Postal Service) but I didn't need to bother with one for my current job. I got it to mark off the checkbox and go into a Master's program so that I can adjunct teach young minds. But for what I do...I didn't need the degree (though I'm glad I have one now... ) Having a degree gives you more options you might not have otherwise had. That's in spite of the first minute or so of that video.

tpatt100

erpadmin wrote: »

Michigan is a depressed state (and I mean financially depressed, but the other meanings can take hold as well.) I don't even need to mention Detroit...

I saw a couple of minutes of the video and saw where it was going. I can't as of yet make a comment on the entire video, but so far, as I have said from almost the beginning of joining TE, I didn't need a college degree to get the job I have now. I do have one now, and it is currently in the hands of the Postal Service) but I didn't need to bother with one for my current job. I got it to mark off the checkbox and go into a Master's program so that I can adjunct teach young minds. But for what I do...I didn't need the degree (though I'm glad I have one now... ) Having a degree gives you more options you might not have otherwise had. That's in spite of the first minute or so of that video.

Well on the bright side Michigan is picking up again because plenty of people are leaving its starting to cause a shortage of qualified people.

Best States for Job Growth, From Michigan to Massachusetts to New York - The Daily Beast

veritas_libertas

tpatt100 wrote: »

I can't watch the video but I have to say college degrees are worthless and I encourage anbody and everybody who works in the IT field of Security and or auditing to not go to college. Instead play xbox and eat pop tarts and do drugs.

especially in the Michigan area.

LOL, I fled the state back in 2009.

This is a difficult subject, and everytime it gets brought up the thread ends up locked.

cyberguypr

The video doesn't make sense. No sane person would buy a lambo if they have a house with no garage.

SPL Tech

cyberguypr wrote: »

The video doesn't make sense. No sane person would buy a lambo if they have a house with no garage.

But if you have a Lambo its likely you have more than one house, maybe their other house has a garage?

Tackle

Bring on the Pop-Tarts. Food Club brand = 3 packs of 2 (6 pastries) for $1.00. Yumm...

Without college, most people will hit the glass ceiling wayyy to early.

shodown

Colleges degree's aren't worthless, They are just overpriced and don't return the ROI they once did.

it_consultant

shodown wrote: »

Colleges degree's are worthless, They are just overpriced and don't return the ROI they once did.

I won't say they are worthless but the second part of this is spot on. American companies aren't just not hiring foreigners because they work harder than we do, they hire them because they learn more in college. As a consultant I see the turnover in my companies, HR departments can't rely on colleges to produce employable, grounded, and knowledgeable employees.

NOC-Ninja

I agree that college degree are worthless. If i can turn back time, I would spend my money somewhere else.

Bl8ckr0uter

For some occupations college degrees are worthless but I would never trust a self taught doctor. For me since I do want to do go law school one day, I have to finish at least 4 more years of formal education (2 for a BS and 2 for a JD at least).

spicy ahi

The video is blocked here in my office so I haven't seen it. However, I can't totally agree with the blanket statement that college degrees are worthless. There are many professionals who I would WANT to have a college degree (doctors and accountants come to mind immediately) because those professions benefit most from having formalized education. In our profession of choice, it seems like a college degree is unnecessary and it is if you want to remain only on the technical side of the house. But from what I've seen, if you have aspirations to move into higher levels (VP, CIO, and other heavy hitting positions) formalized education is the gateway you have to cross. Me personally, I earned my bachelors degree mainly because I don't know what the future holds and should one of those upper level positions become available, I'd like to do anything and everything I can to be within striking distance. And there's always the adjunct teaching route erpadmin mentioned. I'm not sure I can trust myself not to corrupt the youth with all of my bad habits and shortcuts though!

ptilsen

The video makes a lot of great points, and there is a lot of truth to it. That said, I find much of it to be taken to an extreme. The truth, as usual, is somewhere in the middle.

To say college is "worthless" is generally an overstatement. College has at least some educational and employment value.

Someone in almost any field -- certainly any remotely cerebral field -- can benefit from a college education, even if it's just a general education that lacks job-specific relevance. An individual in many, maybe most fields, can receive at least some career-specific education in college. So from a standpoint of education, there is at least some value to college. The issue is that that value is often, perhaps usually not in line with the cost.

Getting into employment is another story. Regardless of the perceived value of a college education, the market value is generally indisputable. On average, college graduates make more than non-grads and are less likely to be employed. Most of the "better" jobs require a college degree or are more likely to go to candidates who have college degrees. So in terms of market value, college indisputably has some worth. Once again, the value is often not in line with the cost and is often overstated.

Moreover, there is a misconception that getting a college degree guarantees or even makes a candidate likely to gain employment in the industry of their choosing. There are many, many factors that dictate that, and a college degree is only one of them, and often a small one at that. As many of us in IT know, there are many jobs to be had in this industry that do not require a college degree at all. Many of us also feel to some extent that the degree is simply to fulfill an employer requirement, not to actual learn anything (this is also where many of us struggle).

The video's depiction of the problems with lending are to some extent overstated. Whether the government directly controls lending, delegates control to a NGO, regulates lending, or doesn't regulate lending at all is largely immaterial to the current problem, which is that education costs too much. While easy access to low-risk, low-interest, long-term loans does exacerbate the problem, ultimately the problem is with financial management of post-secondary institutions themselves. The cost of tuition is no longer in line with the actual cost of the education. While there are legitimate reasons for costs to have increased at a greater rate than inflation, there is no good reason for costs to be where they are now. Between excess spending on vendors, employees, equipment, profit, and books, I would make the claim that more than half the cost is pure waste, on average.

More and more people attend community college for less than 10% of the cost of their local big-name state or private college because they can transfer after two years and get the same degree -- and, for the most part, the same education -- for less than half the total cost. That alone highlights the real problem.

Ultimately, a college degree cost more time and money than it should, but for most of us, there is return on investment and we will get better jobs with a college degree.

shodown

Made a correction we were both on the same page, my grammer was screwed up. I guess i need college

the_Grinch

Haven't watched the video, but I will once I get home. But I can't agree with a blanket statement that college degrees are worthless. Yes, in IT you can work without a degree, but as others have said you will hit a ceiling eventually. I do think there needs to be some reforms as far as costs go because they are out of touch. In my discussions with Professors, many believe that the bubble will begin to burst. People are seeing that the ROI isn't what they thought it would be. But I also think people need to be realistic, as others have said, the degree is a checkbox and nothing more. I do feel the government needs to up what they give out in the forms of low interest loans. I had to privately fund about 95% of my college education due to my parents making too much. Of course they didn't make enough to pay for school, but made too much thus federal loans were for very small amounts. Best advice, go to a state school part time while working, that should keep you sane.

SteveLord

How about....expensive? It costs a lot to spend 75% of your time getting drunk/high and nailing anything with a heartbeat while living off ramen noodles, pizza, mountain dew and driving a rusty old Honda Civic.

BradleyHU

shodown wrote: »

colleges degree's aren't worthless, they are just overpriced and don't return the roi they once did.

^^^
this!!!

ImTheKing

ptilsen wrote: »

While easy access to low-risk, low-interest, long-term loans does exacerbate the problem, ultimately the problem is with financial management of post-secondary institutions themselves.

I was just about to note that many universities raise tuition because they can. There's a mentality in this country that you can just get a loan or government aid for education even if you don't have the means. Universities know this and they take advantage of it. There's almost no incentive for them to cut back on waste because people continue to attend using loans or government aid.

bryanthetechie

SteveLord wrote: »

How about....expensive? It costs a lot to spend 75% of your time getting drunk/high and nailing anything with a heartbeat while living off ramen noodles, pizza, mountain dew and driving a rusty old Honda Civic.

Yea, but those were the good ole days... four-year party vacations cost a lot

spicy ahi

SteveLord wrote: »

How about....expensive? It costs a lot to spend 75% of your time getting drunk/high and nailing anything with a heartbeat while living off ramen noodles, pizza, mountain dew and driving a rusty old Honda Civic.

Thank you SteveLord for telling everyone what I did in college.

chrisone

education in any form , especially is credence of completion is never a negative thing.

tpatt100

ImTheKing wrote: »

I was just about to note that many universities raise tuition because they can. There's a mentality in this country that you can just get a loan or government aid for education even if you don't have the means. Universities know this and they take advantage of it. There's almost no incentive for them to cut back on waste because people continue to attend using loans or government aid.

Heh they are laying off staff at a few of the universities around me.

Tackle

Watched the video on lunch. Many good points, very one sided though. The one guy throughout the video is very sarcastic and made me laugh.

25.8% of my monthly take home goes towards paying off student loans, and that's only the minimum payment. I'm looking at paying for another 8 years, been paying for just over 1. Unless my income changes drastically, I cannot afford a house, car payment, marriage or child until I get them paid off. Right now, the raises I get barely cover inflation of rent and food.

It sucks and I wish someone had told me when I was 17 that the private college I signed up for was extremely expensive compared to a local community college.

daviddws

A college degree today is worth what a high school diploma used to be 25 years ago. I still remember a co-worker at HP. The guy had been with the company for 20 years, and all he had was a high school diploma. He rode the gravy train all the way to retirement. Today Steve would be an outlier. In fact if he was starting out today, theres a good chance he would be shut out of most career opportunities.

it_consultant

Be careful of taking the extreme examples and using them to represent the median. I forget which logical fallacy this is but it is being used here to affect. For example, using the example of a Medical Doctor is a statistical outlier among ALL college graduates. Most people who go to college will not become a medical doctor. To say a college degree is not useless for the median because one wouldn't want a self taught doctor is missing the point of the whole argument. Similarly, saying that a college degree IS useless because people who major in Latin or Family studies make minimum wage is a similar fallacy. Most college graduates do not study those two disciplines.

What we don't see is a hour per hour breakdown between college graduates and non-college graduates with regards to training. For example, I put in X amount of hours each year training myself. Compare me against a college graduate with a similar number of training hours. How do we stack up? Only some of college can really be thought of as training since much of it is not related to real life skills. However, once you start looking at the college degrees and notice that science majors start taking true "training" much earlier in their education - it becomes clear why they command a higher salary than non science majors. Among that group, they probably spend as much or more time annually than I do in training.

If, someone who has a degree in X does the same number of hours in training (or less) than I do and makes more than I do, that college degree is useful to me. If someone who has a degree in Y takes the same number of training hours a year that I do and makes the same or less, that degree is not useful.

XiaoTech

I won't say they're worthless, but like others in this thread already stated, there's not much ROI. I think it all depends on what you go out to do. $27k for ONE YEAR? Unless you're going to be a medical doctor, there are much, MUCH more affordable options out there. I went to a two year community college then transferred to a four year state university. I studied in Japan for one year too. All my loans combine are the same as this "one year private university" tuition. I think some people need to get their head's checked when they sign the paperwork for $100k liberal arts degrees. I have a liberal arts degree, but it didn't cost me $100k. @_@

I enjoyed college life. I got a lot out of (especially living in Japan). What's really worthless is middle and high school. I felt I learned nothing there. I dropped out of high school in the 10th grade and got my GED. Test was sooo easy back in 2001. I should have taken it after I finished the 8th grade.

JDMurray

Please keep all inter-member bickering to PMs. I'd hate to disappear a perfectly decent thread because of the threat of flames.

powerfool

The problem isn't whether college degrees are worthless or not... because they certainly have great value. Anyone that would claim otherwise is either bitter because of their choice of a degree, being defensive because of their lack of a degree, or just plain naive. I can't be anything but blunt, and if that is offensive, I have far more important things on my list of GaS.

Just because it is within the realm of the possible to get a job without a degree doesn't invalidate their value. One would easily be able to get a better job with one. And just because some people have been wildly successful without a degree doesn't, either... they are called outliers... and if you went to college and took elementary statistics, you would completely understand that... if you didn't, you still may understand but the chances are remote.

The problem is people doing more than necessary or choosing a ridiculously expensive degree from an Ivy League or similarly priced school and going after a major that is rather limited in terms of earning potential.... like going to Harvard, Princeton, Yale, or Stanford and majoring in elementary education. There is no way you are going to be able to afford your student loans on the salary you will get.

Instead, there are plenty of value options out there that will give you the same earning potential for those fields.

Getting an undergrad does not have to be expensive at all. We discuss this all of the time on this forum. There are options like local community colleges and WGU. You can go to school part-time. You can take courses from home or work. You can get tuition reimbursement. They exist.

If this is worthy of locking the thread, then I am sorry to those that want to seriously discuss the subject. Beyond that, have fun.

I have said it many times... if you value yourself, then you will invest in yourself... a big part of that is education. Unless you are working non-stop and earning so much money that picking up a dollar on the street causes you a net loss, there is no sense in being so pompous about not having a college degree.

TeKniques

In my opinion a college degree is only worth as much as you put into it and what it is you're studying. I find it very strange that most of the people I talk to that are going to college tell me that they either A) Don't have a major or Are majoring in Psychology. A college degree can be very useful, and is most definitely not useless unless you make it that way. Choice of study and commitment are conveniently left out at times.