Um…that’s all well and good, but does inner enrichment pay off six-figure student loan debt and the feelings of absolute failure when you have to move back in with your parents, or you’re stuck in a dead-end job that can barely pay off those student loan bills and put food on the table for your family? One can argue that the massive amount of loans students have to take out to go to college and graduate school cause more long term unhappiness and mental anguish than whatever enrichment they get in the classroom.
The article shows that college grads still on average make $400,000 more over 30 years than high school grads. Would you like an extra $13,000/year this year? I sure would. That's still real money to most people.
In any case: is a college education really only about the acquisition of money? (Pretend we're not living in the United States of Amnesia for a few minutes.) All things considered, universities have made the U.S. a better place, on balance. Not all students who enter leave it a better place, and there surely is a lot of wastage that the system encourages. But we shouldn't see the value of education as purely vocational.
I like to think that teaching at a university and introducing them to interesting, new ideas and writers helps young people develop rich and complex inner lives in adulthood. Even if we leave aside the value of those inner lives for artistic and creative thought and work, think of the savings in mental health services!
Huh? If this was an attempt to discredit anyone who challenges the higher education industrial complex, it was a pretty weak one. Many of our friends and truth-tellers under our blogroll do in fact think that more education was a big mistake for them because it has caused them unimaginable pain, suffering, and financial ruin. These people should be lauded rather than accused of being racists or sexists. Angel and I are women and have posted many stories on the plight of women, minorities, and the poor during this recession and as victims of the higher education scam. Nando at Third Tier Reality is Hispanic. Cryn and Jobless Juris Doctor are women. A Law School Victim at Life’s Mockery is African-American. Educated people of all backgrounds are beginning to see the inequality and unfairness of the U.S. higher education system and it has nothing to do with seeing women and minorities as social inferiors or dissuading them from trying to have a better life. It is naïve to believe that a college education somehow magically breaks down all the barriers of privilege, rank, and connections – all those things that are most important to finding a good job in our new economy.Is anyone else skeptical of this current rash (h/t Corrente) of “is college really worth it?” (h/t RealClearPolitics) articles, now that women are the majority of college students, and black, brown, and first-generation college students are gaining more of a purchase in post-secondary education? It sure seems like an interesting coincidence to me.
These always appear in a recession, and it’s true that unemployed people with college degrees are just as unemployed as people who never made it to college, or even out of high school. But, seriously? My bet is that the authors and publishers of these articles all have college educations. Do they really think that more education was a big mistake for them, or do they just want to argue that it’s a mistake for their social inferiors?
I think you people are missing the point. The relevant point is, "do we want an America with undereducated people who reject advanced degrees due to financial rape, or do we want an America that wants its citizens to proceed with education as far as they can go?"
Go to any guidance counselor's office in a high school--they will sell you a bill of goods that education is always profitable. Maybe that was true 30 years ago, but now it is just a business used to exploit the intelligent and ambitious. And as a country, unless we curtail free trade and the offshoring of jobs, we need educated people. But when the cost of the education exceeds its value, then how do we get there?
The European model with free education and vigorous testing to qualify, seems the most rational to me.
Grande graduated in 2007, briefly took jobs coaching baseball at Southern Regional and substituting as a teacher for special needs students, and then moved to Florida for an internship at a brokerage, paying off some of his college debt as he went along.Their son owed more than $81,000 in student loans from NJ Class, the state's college loan program. Like the snakes that they are, NJ Class sent the devastated parents a notice less than a year after their sons death stating, "We sympathize with you, but you co-signed for it. Our bondholders want their money." Even the devils at Sallie Mae waived Grande's federal loan debt after being sent a copy of his death certificate. But the monthly $685 bill from the New Jersey Higher Education Student Assistance Authority kept coming.Two weeks before he was scheduled to take his Series 7 exam to become a stockbroker, he hit the back of a truck.
His parents said police haven't figured out what happened that night; they said toxicology reports came back negative. But they were left to pick up the pieces. Among them: What to do about the thousands of dollars in college loans that their son now can't repay.
"Although we are sympathetic to the difficult circumstances involved, under the terms of the bond indentures that finance the NJ Class loan program, HESAA is not permitted to forgive student loans as a result of the death of a borrower since the repayment of the NJ Class loans financed through the bond issues is how the debt service on these bonds is paid," said AnnMarie Bouse, a spokeswoman for the authority.Yes, student loans will haunt many of you for your entire life and your loved ones after you die. If you don't want to take this huge burden with you to your grave and risk passing this financial nightmare to your parents or spouse, do not take out these huge loans to get a worthless degree. I don't care what the mainstream media, Yahoo HotJobs, President Obama, or anyone else tells you about higher education. Nothing is worth gambling your life and family on a degree that doesn't guarantee a job and a wage big enough to pay off loans, some of which aren't even dischargeable in death.
You can also add JD, MA, MS, PhD, and LLM along to the long list of degrees that will not lift you out of poverty. So much for the brainwashing from teachers and family my entire life that I could achieve anything with a college education. A study from the Institute of Higher Education Policy shows that an increasing number of low-income youth are pursuing higher education, but remain poor (Hi CLEO Pre-Law Institute for minorities *waves*).Increasing proportions of low-income young adults are pursuing higher education, but some remain poor even with a postsecondary degree, according to a new report from the Institute for Higher Education Policy.
In 2008, among Americans ages 18 to 26 whose total household income was near or below the federal poverty level, 47 percent were or had been enrolled in college, compared with 42 percent in 2000. Eleven percent of them had earned a degree, a proportion roughly equivalent to that eight years ago, according to the report, which is based on data from the U.S. Census Bureau's American Community Survey.
The institute is a nonprofit group in Washington that conducts public-policy research to encourage access and success in higher education.
In introducing its report, the group called into question President Obama's declaration in his State of the Union address in January that "the best anti-poverty program around is a world-class education." Poor students go to college academically unprepared, the report says, and, amid competing family and work obligations, they accumulate debt "that could have been avoided by pursuing a different type of degree or a credential."
None of the 11 percent of low-income graduates should remain in poverty, said Gregory S. Kienzl, director of research and evaluation at the Institute for Higher Education Policy. "If you have a degree, you should no longer be poor," he said.
Across all racial and ethnic groups, greater proportions of low-income young adults were or had been enrolled in college in 2008, compared with 2000. Hispanic students showed the largest percentage-point increase, to 37 percent from 29 percent. Low-income Asian and Pacific Islander and white students enrolled at the highest rates in 2008, 62 percent and 51 percent, respectively; the greatest proportions of low-income degree holders were also from those groups.
The report, "A Portrait of Low-Income Young Adults in Education," is the first in a series financed in part by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The next report will focus on attendance and enrollment patterns among low-income students, Mr. Kienzl said, including that black and Hispanic women more often attend for-profit institutions than public four-year colleges.
The article also leaves out the little inconvenience of having thousands in student loans to pay back, especially for children from poor and low-income families who have no way of helping them pay off those loans. As someone from a working class neighborhood, I can say from firsthand experience how heartbreaking it is for families who invest the time and money to make sure their children are the first in the family to attend college, only to see their children come home with no job and thousands in debt. The higher education system has become a Ponzi Scheme and the people who are responsible for perpetuating the higher education scam and charging hundreds of thousands for useless degrees should be forced to testify before Congress for their crimes.
We at BIDER and other scam bloggers have said this again and again. College and graduate school have ALWAYS benefited the rich who had the money and connections to get the best private school education and admittance into the Ivy League. If they were dumb rich kids, they still had a job guaranteed with the family business or through a business associate. At every level of education since high school, most of the people I know who turn out to be "successful" or at least employed at a well-paying or prestigious job have done so because of their family wealth and connections. The truth is that the degree alone has never helped the majority of people who didn't graduate from top schools at the top of their class. Even a degree from a high ranked school gets you nowhere without connections, unless you are extremely resourceful and lucky.
The generation before me came to the conclusion I was worth the investment. Maybe my generation is a little too selfish.
- From the same Star Tribune article, law school shill Niels Schaumann, vice dean for faculty at third tier toilet William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, Minnesota.The more urgent question is: What do you tell people who are thinking about going to law school? I don't recommend it to people looking to make a lot of money. ... If you're not interested in helping people in some way or providing service to your clients, it's not for you.
How about not recommending William Mitchell College of La- HardKnocks from But I Did Everything Right! in response to Niels Schaumman's dishonest and shameful comment in the Star Tribune.w to anyone who wants to find a full-time job after spending $52,000 yearly tuition? That way, shills like Schaumann would no longer make an average of $104,832 yearly blaming unemployed graduates for being too greedy.
Thanks for posting this article, Hardknocks. I am a WMCL grad - although I have pretty much severed all ties to that place after the Dean sent me a letter begging for MORE money AFTER I had already made a contribution and stated in his letter, "[Insert my name here], would you really be as far as you are today if not for your law degree?" As you can imagine, this irritated me to no end and I decided to never give one cent to that place again.
As for the gentleman featured in the story, I actually know him. Ironically, right after I graduated from WMCL with HONORS, I was working as a TEMP for $11/hour at the same place where he was working for the summer doing some humiliating clerical type of work. This was back in the early 2000's. He was going off to Korea to be with his girlfriend. Anyway, the reason I mention this is because there was a legal job shortage even back then, but nobody believed it. This is NOT new, people, so I don't understand why everybody acts like this all happened it the last 2 years. I have been out of school for almost 7 years, and a majority of my classmates are drowning in debt and working piddle a$$ jobs just to make ends meet and pay their student loans. It annoys me that suddenly now this is "news" - why wasn't it news seven years ago? Maybe some of these people wouldn't be in the shape they are in, if the media had listened or cared back then!
We have all had conversations with students who are unhappy in law school or have come to suspect that they won't like practicing law. These are hard conversations. We aren't encouraging a child to stick with piano lessons or the track team; we are helping students decide whether to continue to make a large investment in a professional degree. Although we always say that there are so many things one can do wiith a law degree, the one thing most people think of is practicing law. And many of the things one can do with a law degree don't require one.
However, when I talk to the rare student considering dropping out, the student usually mentions the amount of debt already incurred. Sometimes these are students unhappy with their grades or who fear their aptitude is not mapping on to the practice of law. Other students just don't like the study of law and fear that they won't like the practice of law. But students are loath to change courses because of the money already invested. Yes, I understand the concept of "sunk costs," but I also understand option theory. Yes, we may say that a student should walk away from a $30,000 mistake instead of throwing good money after bad and turning it into a $90,000 mistake. Particularly in a bad job market, where high-income producing jobs are getting fewer and fewer, we might advise the student to cut their losses. But the other side of the coin is that a student might think that paying $30,000 for nothing is worse than paying $90,000 for something. A law degree is worth something, and it might all work out in the end.
Now, having students stay in law school who either don't enjoy the study/practice of law or who may not be well-suited to it cannot be a good thing for either the student or the institution (never mind the loss to the profession the student might be perfect for). So, here's my proposal: free first year of law school. Here's how it would work:
If Progressive Law School costs $30,000 a year today, then starting next year, the first year is free, and the second year is $45,000 and the third year is $45,000. Students are admitted the same way, only tuition is deferred until a student registers for the second year of law school. If after the first year a student thinks this is not for her, then the student walks away with only the lost opportunity cost of nine months. I think few students would choose this option. Most students like law school or at least like it enough for the benefits of a law degree, which they plan to use. There's not a lot of career advantage to having one year of legal study, so few would game the system just to get nine months of fun common law courses! Admissions would still be competitive, so it probably wouldn't work out that students came just for fun.
What's in it for the law school? First, it would give them a comparative advantage over their peer schools because they are offering applicants a hedge. Second, it would probably end up increasing alumni morale and also placement statistics. I was bouncing this idea around to a colleague who suggested that the second and third years could also be increased over $45,000 to subsidize those who took the option, but I still think the number would be small enough that this might be unnecessary (or require a very small increase).
"A four-year degree in business – what's that get you?" asked Karl Christopher, a placement counselor at the Columbia Area Career Center vocational program. "A shift supervisor position at a store in the mall."I know someone with a college degree who now works as a manager at a mall store. She spent years looking for a "respectable" white-collar job, but gave up after a long line of low wage internships that went nowhere and didn't end up in a full-time job offer (sound familiar?). She's actually quite happy at her job which gives her a stable 40 hours each week, benefits, and enough money to support her young daughter. No, being a store manager doesn't sound as fancy as a job working for a non-profit, advertising company, university, shitlaw firm, or newspaper. But being a store manager probably pays as much or even more than these so-called white-collar jobs. At least it beats doc review for the JD crowd, right?
In a town dominated by the University of Missouri's flagship campus and two smaller colleges, higher education is practically a birthright for high school seniors like Kate Hodges.She has a 3.5 grade-point-average, a college savings account and a family tree teeming with advanced degrees. But in June, Hodges is headed to the Tulsa Welding School in Oklahoma, where she hopes to earn an associate's degree in welding technology in seven months.
"They fought me so hard," she said, referring to disappointed family members. "They still think I'm going to college."
Hodges should send her parents over to BIDER. Many of our readers have expressed the desire to work as welders, plumbers, and electricians. Why? Because it sure as hell beats being unemployed or working in doc review. Attending college and graduate school no longer guarantees anyone a decent paying, 40-hour/week job.
The notion that a four-year degree is essential for real success is being challenged by a growing number of economists, policy analysts and academics. They say more Americans should consider other options such as technical training or two-year schools, which have been embraced in Europe for decades.
...Spending more time in school also means greater overall student debt. The average student debt load in 2008 was $23,200 – a nearly $5,000 increase over five years. Two-thirds of students graduating from four-year schools owe money on student loans.
Angel and I have always said that college is not for everyone. I lean more towards college for good students who can get scholarships and vocational school for the rest who couldn't even get a 3.0 in high school. Really, what is the point of spending money to continue something one doesn't excel in when they can make money doing something else like being a store manager or welder which pays as much as what most college and graduate students end up making these days in an entry level job (if they can find one). Ninety-nine percent of college graduates shouldn't even bother with graduate school unless you get a full scholarship to a top 10 school or your parents are rich enough to support your "funemployment" trip around the world when you graduate. In this new economy, work experience gets you the job before someone with an advanced degree:
"College is what every parent wants for their child," said Martin Scaglione, president and chief operating officer of work force development for ACT, the Iowa-based not-for-profit best known for its college entrance exam. "The reality is, they may not be ready for college."
...Scaglione suggested that nothing short of a new definition for educational success is needed to diminish the public bias toward four-year degrees. He advocates "certification as the new education currency – documentation of skills as opposed to mastering curriculum."
"Our national system is, 'Do you have a degree or not?'" he said. "That doesn't really measure if you have skills."
So you're a community college student working full time and looking for a path to law school.
A college designed for you is close to opening, pending approval by Gov. John Lynch of a bill that cleared the House on Wednesday. The American College of History and Legal Studies would enroll students for their final two years of college and award bachelor's degrees in one field: history and legal studies. Classes would meet in Salem three nights a week, and the $10,000 tuition - modest for any baccalaureate institution - would be cut in half for students awarded a scholarship.
The college guarantees students with high grades admission to the Massachusetts School of Law at Andover, and it allows high achievers to shave a year from their studies by combining their final year of college with their first year of law school. It wasn't a difficult arrangement to make. The dean of the independent law school, Lawrence Velvel, is the founder and dean of the new college.
Velvel began work on ACHLS after seeing bright students shut out of the legal profession because of a modest economic background or youthful inattention to their studies.
"A lot of people think that they cannot go to law school, that there is no way they will be admitted," Velvel said. "It gives a chance to people who otherwise academically wouldn't have the chance."
About 230 people have graduated from the program since the 1930s, about 150 of them since 1984. The Washington State Bar Association formally established standards in 1934.
The law clerk program formalized the longstanding practice of serving as an apprentice under an attorney in order to become a practicing lawyer.
In order to qualify for the program, candidates must have a bachelor’s degree and a full-time job with their sponsoring attorney. Monthly tests are given by the tutor.
Unlike full-time law school, which takes three years, the law clerk program takes four years.
Accepted students pay $1,500 every year to the state bar. The expense is far less than that of part-time or full-time law school — anywhere from $20,000 to $42,000 a year.
The state bar says the goal is to have students study and learn the same things law students receive in the classroom — such as constitutional law, torts and criminal procedure.
Alumbaugh, who earned a bachelor’s degree in law and justice from Central Washington University, started with the prosecutor’s office in 2002 and was promoted in February to become a deputy prosecutor under a legal rule that allows law students waiting for the bar exam to practice under supervision.
She previously worked as a secretary, attended Yakima Valley Community College and ran a day-care center from her home. She had considered law school, but it wasn’t realistic since she wanted to stay in Ellensburg, where family members have helped with her children. So she pursued the alternate route — formally known as the law clerk program — and got Zempel to be her sponsor.
“It’s been a really great experience, and I’m glad I did it. It’s definitely an option for people who are looking to become an attorney,” Alumbaugh said.
She expects to stay with the Kittitas County Prosecutor’s Office for the near future and then see where her new legal career takes her.
Did the University of Colorado pay the person who wrote this article? Despite that tuition at UC Law will go up by 15 percent, the law students interviewed seem fine and dandy with paying the increase and owing $200k in student loans:Maybe these incoming student haven't been hit by reality yet or maybe they just come from rich families. But where is the outrage from students with the foresight to understand that they can't afford the increase in tuition without a job or if they plan to work in public interest? We need someone like Harlan Ellison to set these kids straight, aka tell them to drop out of law school before they take out another loan from Aunt Sallie.When he finishes law school at the University of Colorado, Sean Dormer expects he'll be saddled with $200,000 of student-loan debt.
The first-year law student is leaning toward a modest-paying, public-interest field and says "there are more important things in life than money." His in-state tuition tab next year will be $24,264, up 10.5 percent from this year's rate.
Law students said they're resigned to taking out more loans, and some plan to graduate with debt in the six figures, contending with their aspirations to pursue careers in service-oriented fields.
Nearly nine out of 10 law graduates are employed within nine months, according to the law school. Of those students, 14 percent worked for government agencies with pay ranging from $43,000 to $102,000. Seven percent worked in public interest and nonprofit fields, with salaries ranging from $35,000 to $50,000. The highest-paid graduates worked in large firms, starting at up to $160,000 a year.
Second-year law student Elise Aiken said she expects to graduate with $100,000 in debt, which wouldn't be such a daunting figure if she had aspirations to work for a big law firm. Instead, she said she wants to take on a career in environmental law, which she doesn't expect to pay a colossal salary.If she finds a job at all. Working off a $100k loan wouldn't be so bad if we still lived in the 90s. At least most of the students could be assured that they'd get a job that would keep them from moving back home with the parents and allow them to slowly pay off their loans for the next 20 years. Graduates today aren't as lucky. When will students get it through their heads that the jobs aren't coming back and the economy will never recover to 1990 levels in our lifetime. Jobs have been permanently outsourced. There are no jobs.
The Big Lie About the 'Life of the Mind'
By Thomas H. Benton
A year ago, I wrote a column called "Graduate School in the Humanities: Just Don't Go," advising students that grad school is a bad idea unless they have no need to earn a living for themselves or anyone else, they are rich or connected (or partnered with someone who is), or they are earning a credential for a job they already hold.
....
One reason that graduate school is for the already privileged is that it is structurally dependent on people who are neither privileged nor connected. Wealthy students are not trapped by the system; they can take what they want from it, not feel pressured, and walk away at any point with minimal consequences. They do not have to obsess about whether some professor really likes them. If they are determined to become academics, they can select universities on the basis of reputation rather than money. They can focus on research rather than scrambling for time-consuming teaching and research assistantships to help pay the bills. And, when they go on the market, they can hold out for the perfect position rather than accepting whatever is available.But the system over which the privileged preside does not ultimately depend on them for the daily functioning of higher education (which is now, as we all know, drifting toward a part-time, no-benefit business). The ranks of new Ph.D.'s and adjuncts these days are mainly composed of people from below the upper-middle class: people who believe from infancy that more education equals more opportunity. They see the professions as a path to security and status.
Again and again, the people who wrote to me said things like "Nobody told me" and "Now what do I do?" "Everybody keeps saying my doctorate gives me all kinds of transferable skills, but I can't get a second interview, even outside of academe." "What's wrong with me?"
The myth of the academic meritocracy powerfully affects students from families that believe in education, that may or may not have attained a few undergraduate degrees, but do not have a lot of experience with how access to the professions is controlled. Their daughter goes to graduate school, earns a doctorate in comparative literature from an Ivy League university, everyone is proud of her, and then they are shocked when she struggles for years to earn more than the minimum wage. (Meanwhile, her brother—who was never very good at school—makes a decent living fixing HVAC systems with a six-month certificate from a for-profit school near the Interstate.)
Unable even to consider that something might be wrong with higher education, mom and dad begin to think there is something wrong with their daughter, and she begins to internalize that feeling.
Everyone has told her that "there are always places for good people in academe." She begins to obsess about the possibility of some kind of fatal personal shortcoming. She goes through multiple mock interviews, and takes business classes, learning to present herself for nonacademic positions. But again and again, she is passed over in favor of undergraduates who are no different from people she has taught for years. Maybe, she wonders, there's something about me that makes me unfit for any kind of job.
This goes on for years: sleepless nights, anxiety, escalating and increasingly paralyzing self-doubt, and a host of stress-induced ailments. She has even removed the Ph.D. from her résumé, with some pain, but she lives in dread that interviewers will ask what she has been doing for the last 12 years. (All her old friends are well established by now, some with families, some with what seem to be high-powered careers. She lives in a tiny apartment and struggles to pay off her student loans.) What's left now but entry-level clerical work with her immediate supervisor just three years out of high school?
She was the best student her adviser had ever seen (or so he said); it seemed like a dream when she was admitted to a distinguished doctoral program; she worked so hard for so long; she won almost every prize; she published several essays; she became fully identified with the academic life; even distancing herself from her less educated family. For all of those reasons, she continues as an adjunct who qualifies for food stamps, increasingly isolating herself to avoid feelings of being judged. Her students have no idea that she is a prisoner of the graduate-school poverty trap. The consolations of teaching are fewer than she ever imagined.
Such people sometimes write to me about their thoughts of suicide, and I think nothing separates me from them but luck.
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