'The Biggest Mistake I Ever Made'

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by chrisjm18, Dec 28, 2021.

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  1. chrisjm18

    chrisjm18 Well-Known Member

    chrisjm18, Dec 28, 2021
    #1
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  2. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    I was like, "What the heck did she study that was so... oh, Studio Art."

    I mean, I wouldn't call that "BS", but yeah, there's good reason for the "starving artist" stereotype.
     
    SteveFoerster, Dec 28, 2021
    #2
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  3. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    It is why the country desperately needs a strategic human capital strategy. We're letting 20-year-olds dictate the supply of human capital. I'm all for them having that choice, but how many more people would opt--or be steered towards--studying fields we need if we set up pathways that encouraged it? The Great Resignation is exposing this huge flaw.

    Couple that with a strong national qualifications framework and you could see a tremendous ROI on our educational investment. We pay so much for public schooling and then close our eyes when people--very young and inexperienced people--make the critical decisions that will affect their lives--and ours.
     
    Rich Douglas, Dec 28, 2021
    #3
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  4. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    This was a working person who already had a Bachelor's degree, and the article said she was 28, not 20.

    Rather than trying to centrally plan the labor market, better to eliminate Title IV loans so that people like this person will have more incentive to be judicious.
     
    SteveFoerster, Dec 28, 2021
    #4
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  5. Dustin

    Dustin Well-Known Member

    My fear with that is that it would only send people into the hands of private lenders, but I don't think there's any easy solution here. Maybe better career counseling in high school? My guidance counselor asked me what I wanted to study, and not what I wanted to do for a living.

    No kid is going to say they want to be a Microsoft Dynamics Business Analyst or what have you, but at least if we focused on the kinds of jobs someone wants and worked backwards to the kind of training they need, instead of starting with the subject they want to study and trying to extrapolate that to a job, we could direct more people (not just kids but the adults considering masters degrees like in the article) into the right kind of program.
     
    Dustin, Dec 28, 2021
    #5
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  6. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    I'm unsure why private lenders would be a bad outcome. They have the incentive to avoid risk, and would be more inclined to, for example, reject applications from someone like the subject of this article and approve one from someone going on to do an MS in Civil Engineering. And without Title IV loans, there would be a lot of downward pressure on tuition rates. Ultimately I expect a lot of students who otherwise might borrow money for the four year residential approach would instead work and go to school part time. I don't see that as a bad outcome for students either. I realize that would be very bad news for struggling institutions, but otherwise they're just being propped up for the sake of propping them up at the expense of students (and to a lesser extent taxpayers).

    I agree with you that, broadly speaking, many young people don't consider the possible destinations before deciding on which road to take and that better mentoring for them would be great.
     
    SteveFoerster, Dec 28, 2021
    #6
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  7. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    I was speaking generally, using this example to make a broader point. I'm sure you see that.
    This comment illustrates the differences between our two world views.

    Mine is much more consistent with modern democracies around the world. And because I don't buy into either rugged individualism nor American uniqueness, I'm willing to observe successful examples elsewhere and imagine their implementation here.

    The US is a social democracy. It's just not, comparatively, a very good one. Yet.
     
    Rich Douglas, Dec 29, 2021
    #7
  8. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    This most certainly is true. So much disorganized money chasing a product HAS to be inflationary. But....

    At what cost to society? Assuming we need people with advance education, we can:
    • Manage it as a society (my choice)
    • Fund it and leave it to individuals to manage (current situation)
    • Defund it and leave it to the marketplace (your stance--awkwardly put, I'm sure. Sorry)
    I would point to the "Asian Tigers" as examples of the potential for a strong qualifications framework. I think a laissez-faire approach to this issue benefits the "haves" over society in general.
     
    Rich Douglas, Dec 29, 2021
    #8
  9. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    You're giving me too much credit, because I didn't, and in retrospect that was clearly pretty oblivious of me.

    I'm closer to the second point than you might think. I'd kill federal loans, yes, and I think they've well earned it. But I'm not suggesting killing Pell grants, because while I don't love centralized programs like that, at least they actually specifically help those at the bottom, and I see the problem with yanking them if they're going to be replaced by nothing. And for the same reason I wouldn't call for states to stop funding public IHEs, especially community colleges.

    How about this: the U.S. federal government is such a large employer of such diverse positions that if OPM came out with a qualifications framework for federal civilian use, and did a good enough job at it that other big employers said, "Hey, that looks good, let's use that," and from there it became the de facto national standard, then I can't see any reasonable objection.
     
    SteveFoerster, Dec 29, 2021
    #9
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  10. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    The federal government is horrible at this. On the civilian side anyway.

    But you know who does it really, really well? The military. They screen, select, train, equip, employ, and manage military members in myriad fields under incredibly diverse conditions. They not only do horizontal growth--distributing employees where they're needed doing what's needed--they also manage their vertical development, preparing leaders for the future to take on greater amounts of leadership and the complexities that will come with it.

    Now, that's an organization to emulate.
     
    Rich Douglas, Dec 30, 2021
    #10
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  11. Dave Wagner

    Dave Wagner Active Member

    Hi All,

    Clearly, Kulhanek was "too smart to go to college" in the first place... ;) and imagine how employable she would be without a masters degree? ;) Seriously, shame on Newsweek for publishing such clickbait. My opinion. I don't know much about studio art but I imagine that a masters degree in studio art would make you more proficient and employable in studio art, whatever that is... If you applied for a Python Programming job, which many jobs require, would you expect a degree in studio art to make you more employable? Not normally.
     
    Dave Wagner, Dec 30, 2021
    #11

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