RaptorWizard
Permabanned
- Joined
- Mar 19, 2012
- Messages
- 5,895
- MBTI Type
- INTJ
- Enneagram
- 5w6
- Instinctual Variant
- sx/so
No more school school school. It's time for the pool pool pool!
Your impression of college's worth seems way to oriented toward vocational training. That orientation is actually part of why it's become so expensive and degrees have become so much less valuable.
There's really no need to call it into question anyhow, because the rising costs of college are quite avoidable. It's a bubble.
It's up to you whether or not you make the college experience worth it. You can learn as much about yourself or knowledge wise based upon what you want.
I spent most of my undergraduate career figuring out what I wanted to do with my life. The general education portion solidified my belief in what I wanted to pursue. I hated the first few years of college because of the GEs and learning about things I didn't want/care to know but when I got to the Upper Divisions I certainly learned a lot. I became focused in my schooling and in my passions outside of the education field. I learned diligence and working hard to achieve understanding of my field but also found another way to approach and understand the external environment outside of school.
I value school and intend on being in school for quite a while. I do think it's quite costly and I feel horrible for people who have to work full time in order to pay the bills and school.
- College/university is not just about study, often its peoples first opportunities to live independently and be part of a community, you could, if you are fortunate about the university you choose and just, perhaps, the happenchance of the generation you happen to be part of, experience much greater community than you have before or will afterwards.
- Consider all the extracurricular activities and clubs and societies..... It is probably one of the only times you'll have a chance to try fencing, a dozen martial arts, see those niche movies, go caving and potholing, bungee jump or whatever.
All this is good on your CV because it can show that you've lived a varied existence and are not likely to disappear or be doing a lot of reckless things....It also can speak volumes about your so called soft skills and be an opportunity to develop those, are you a people person?
Its also an invaluable way to network and make useful contacts for the future, build a reputation and even develop interests which could be common among your future workforce or bosses. I really wish I'd done more in this respect, I did the safe thing and stuck with one club, one group of people, one thing.
College/uni is time and space dedicated solely to you and your development, in every way, I very much doubt that you'll experience that sort of freedom again,
Not necessarily. I was living independantly well before I started uni, and my best sense of community and excitement occurred in my early 30's when I went backpacking for 3 years. Because I was more mature than most bacpackers and had more confidence ( and money) I was able to adventure solo to really interesting places, meet locals not just backpackers and spent less time in drunken stupors. I didnt need a uni campus to enrich my life.
Life doesn't end after uni. I have learnt dozens of new skills, joined many clubs etc all as an adult in the real world. In fact the social mix of clubs outside of unis are better because you meet people outside of your own generation who are often vast storehouses of knowledge. In the four decades of my life so far I've participated in...horseriding, sailing, cob building, wu shu, silversmithing, wilderness trekking and survival, photography, ceramics, motorcycle clubs, sewing, historical costuming, musicianship, guerilla gardening, writing and the list continues. Most of those occurred during my first career break at 30.
Actually an employer can only see those things once they've met you in an interview and it will be pretty obvious at that stage if you have people skills or not. Freaky recluses totally lacking in any social graces attend uni too. In my country whether or not you've held another job for more than 6 weeks is the prime indicator of your employability as a newbie to the working game. Most people here get a part-time job at 15. Once again varied existences happen after uni too and frankly uni is not a very varied existence anyway.
So you're saying it wasn't a great way for you to network then. I don't know about anyone else but none of my future employers were hanging out on campus, they were in offices running companies, thats here I found them. I was never once hired for my social interests or ability to race yachts against the CEO of my company. I was hired for my ability to to a job and I've never found it hard to find a high paying one.
Thats completely up to you. Every 10yrs I take time out to do just this. Not my 4 weeks annual leave but a year or two in which I don't work just for the sole purpose of personal development. People who decide that personal development stops after they enter the workforce end up in deade-ebd careers slavishly paying off mortgages and debt. Living that life of quiet desperation so many fall into. Its a personal choice not a certainty.
To be honest nothing I discovered within the hallowed halls of an institution was halfway near as interesting as what I've discovered in the real world. For $80K in tuition fees you could travel the entire world or several years picking up functional languages, cultural understandings and a great many contacts. Universities are insular places compared to the real world. My advice would be to start work early, save the pennies. If you are good with money by 25 you'd have enough to do the above returning a richer person for it and very employable. Pick up another career, work intensely for 5yrs quit, do it again. You'll have real world skills and experience employers will fall over themselves to hire.
Its unconventional, some might call it risky but my financial stability has only been improved by doing just this. I am debt free, builing my own home mortgage free and my retirement is less than 5 yrs away. I have no regrets apart fom wasting time at uni.