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More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

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Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#221

Post by solatic »

pclmulqdq wrote: post #26

College seems to have ~3 uses from students' perspectives: 1. A trade school for technical professionals who actually need specialist education (scientists, engineers, lawyers, doctors, etc.) 2. A finishing school for the elite 3. A blood sports arena for the brilliant to complete for professorships (almost all of whom will lose and be saddled with 6 figures of debt and 7 figures of opportunity cost) A lot of people…

Not just three uses, but also three fundamentally different offerings:

1. If you're looking for a professional trade school, go to a state school for undergrad. Every elite graduate who joins a BigCo after finishing finds themselves shoulder-to-shoulder with ten state school graduates who paid a fraction as much as they did to get to the same exact place.

2. If you're looking for an elite finishing school, well, there's only so many schools at the top. Ivies or Stanford or bust. If you don't get in, or can't afford to go, well, this route simply isn't open to you. Just don't fool yourself into thinking some small land grant college few people have heard of will give you the same thing. Elite finishing schools are what they are because of the connections you form there, not the educations they offer.

3. You have a much stronger head-start on the rest of the academic market if you start at one of a handful of schools, places like MIT or CalTech. You can, of course, still end up in academia coming from a state school, but it's much, much harder to stand out, much harder to get involved with undergraduate research, much harder to put together a strong academic portfolio not for any graduate school but for connected graduate schools.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#222

Post by ouid »

pclmulqdq wrote: post #26

College seems to have ~3 uses from students' perspectives: 1. A trade school for technical professionals who actually need specialist education (scientists, engineers, lawyers, doctors, etc.) 2. A finishing school for the elite 3. A blood sports arena for the brilliant to complete for professorships (almost all of whom will lose and be saddled with 6 figures of debt and 7 figures of opportunity cost) A lot of people…

A university is where you go to be exposed to the most correct way of thinking that we have.

Sure, they offer other services, and the administrations of these institutions have turned them into capitalist hellscapes which warp even the original service, but the ultimate point of a university is an apprenticeship. Just in thinking instead of plumbing.

This is what education should be, and everyone should receive it. I am not convinced of the value of pre-university education, so perhaps we should just do it earlier.

It doesn't scale the way a business typically scales. You can't automate it or fit it under an ever lengthening hierarchy, but it does in fact scale incredibly well.

Everyone who is taught to think better can teach others to think better.

The market is not correcting itself. The market is destroying the premise of a university.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#223

Post by Master_Odin »

azinman2 wrote: post #203
thomastjeffery wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

College/University does not have a monopoly on intellectualism or networking. There is no guarantee that attending a college or university will help you develop more than you would outside that setting. There is, however, a guaranteed cost; and that cost can be debilitating.

You’re right. It’s not a guarantee. But it’s a situation where it’s served to you on a platter. If you’re not capable of receiving it on a platter, it’s doubtful you’ll get it on your own. Not everyone is capable of getting it in either scenario - as such as I said I’m glad more vocational opportunities are becoming in vogue again. Let’s just hope these vocations last another 20-30 years.

I think a number of hands on vocational jobs will last longer than quite a few white collar jobs. The robotics necessary for those jobs is quite far behind where we are with the necessary software.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#224

Post by balderdash »

passwordoops wrote: post #166

As a PhD analytical chemist, about 15 years past graduation I now regret just not becoming a plumber in my early 20s. Basically the same skill set, but the tubes are wider. Also would have been higher life time pay, at least to this point and possibly into retirement

Lol - I have a derivative thought in that I should have just joined my local police department (no desire to be a police officer, but six figure pay, retirement in my 40’s with huge pension/healthcare benefits, and a stressful day is someone’s mom giving you a hard time at the pharmacy lunch counter about giving their kid a speeding ticket)

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#225

Post by jletienne »

dahart wrote: post #207
pclmulqdq wrote: post #26

College seems to have ~3 uses from students' perspectives: 1. A trade school for technical professionals who actually need specialist education (scientists, engineers, lawyers, doctors, etc.) 2. A finishing school for the elite 3. A blood sports arena for the brilliant to complete for professorships (almost all of whom will lose and be saddled with 6 figures of debt and 7 figures of opportunity cost) A lot of people…

This pessimistic view doesn’t seem that well supported by the data. In the US, we’re pushing nearly 40% of bachelor’s degree attainment, which is far broader a population than you suggest. There’s also the problem that degree holders earn an average of 2x more than non-degree holders. I was very surprised by this! The St. Louis Fed published this statistic in an article arguing that the wealth advantage of college wa…

it's unclear if the causation here is having a degree. but it is correlated to a very large degree

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#226

Post by twblalock »

alsaaro wrote: post #88

As someone who has worked two of the most intensive blue collar jobs, people should be wary of romanticizing blue collar work. Blue collar workers are expected to really work at their jobs. White collar workers can chill if there is no work to be done, or be sent home early with pay, or take a relaxation day and just browse the internet and listen to podcasts. They have perks, you see white collar workers leaving wor…

Exactly. This is why every tradesman I know wants their kids to go to college.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#227

Post by FooBarBizBazz »

zoogeny wrote: post #65
azinman2 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also grows the intellectual souls, exposing people to far more depth of thought. It also builds professional networks. If a person is smart enough to receive it, more education is almost always good. Of course money is a factor, and schools have gotten insanely expensive. I’m glad to hear that more people are finding alternative routes - it shouldn’t be that everyone needs college because quite frankly many career…

Your post makes me consider what other avenues to achieve the growth of intellectual souls and exposure to depth of thought could exist other than paid-for highly-structured institutions. I think people wax poetically about their own experiences without really considering the experiences of others. We've had free public libraries for centuries now. We've had a pretty open Internet for decades. There is literally noth…

I hear it used to be that there was a culture of serious working-class learning in England. Like, the barbers in the shop would pay some street-kid to read them books -- there was no TV -- while they cut hair. And the cabbie could get into a conversation about Kant or something with his passenger. Maybe just to mess with them, but still.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#228

Post by snerbles »

azinman2 wrote: post #187
lotsofpulp wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Keep in mind college is 4 years of education on a daily basis. For some, but for most, I bet it is a lot less. There are entire degrees (and schools) designed to require little more than for people to show up somewhere a few times per week.

What degrees and which schools?

In the US, full-time minimum is typically 12 semester hours (credits) - that is, 12 hours in the classroom per week. In practice students often take 12-18 credits, and are considered overloaded at 20+ hours - some institutions require approval to exceed a certain enrollment.

I had multiple semesters while attending a California State University campus where my classes stacked up on Monday-Wednesday-Friday, and depending on lab schedules I'd wind up having Tuesdays and/or Thursdays "off", usually taken up by part-time work or projects. Most of my classmates in the ECE department spent their spare days in a similar fashion.

So, no, I was not attending class on a "daily basis". And personally, I've learned far more from professional development, personal projects and self-teaching than I ever did in the coursework for my engineering degree.

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#229

Post by chitowneats »

papito wrote: post #97

This is great news. Especially for men. It gives their lives more meaning and a sense of self-worth. Great new podcast episode from Ezra Klein about this.

Ezra Klein lost his credibility long ago. Sad. Vox is a rag.

Anyone here remember Wonkblog? I often miss the heady days of the early 2010's.

Funny how we thought we were living in tragic times back then after the 2008 financial crisis. And sure, we were. But there was so much more in store for us, wasn't there?

Re: More students are turning away from college and toward apprenticeships

#230

Post by quags »

hgsgm wrote: post #79
varunjain99 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd also add 4) A social / networking experience. As an adult, rarely will you interact so often with so many people of your age. 5. A signaling mechanism. I have X credentials so give me job Y. This is far from ideal because the signal can be noisy. But it is a data point. It's similar to how physics PhD's are targeted for quant finance roles - they've signaled they can solve hard problems!

4) if everyone wasn't locked up in college, they would meet other young adults in their neighborhood and social/hobby clubs and entertainment venues 5) in the modern day that can solved by testing regimes. A self-educated quant could take an online qualifying test, and in-person final exam, to get a job in finance.

I dropped out of college after 2 years about 20 years ago. I have never come across the same social interaction since then. The value of education on some degrees is certainly over stated , and there are areas that can be self taught. There is a lack of social learning though that doesn’t come outside of education and school.
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