The promise of college for our generation

[Ken Leung]

Let us agree that the best college for us may not necessary the most competitive schools in the country, and let that be that. Jaine, I think you have a good point, one worth standing on, and you shouldn't feel bad expressing what you really think. There must be others out there who believe the same thing (I happened to be one of them).

Getting back to the topic, let me articulate my position further.

While there are many definition for success, for example, getting through a difficult challenge, exploring the world, getting a higher degree, learning how to learn, and finding your passion, which I agree are great achievements for any college students, I think it is more important to look at the flip side of them.

College CAN be many things for many students, but it CAN also be the following things to some students I know:

College is something they want to get over as soon as possible and want nothing to do with afterward.
College is a collection of cutting classes and missing as much work as possible and scrape by with the minimal effort.
School and learning are something they hate, and homework and tests are something they hate worse.
College is something they struggle with, have no idea why they struggle with, and something they don't know how to succeed in.

And here is the worst: College is something someone told them to go to.


I do not disagree there are many cases of success in colleges across the United States. I do, however, want to point out that it seems to me there is a raising feeling of not knowing what the point of college is among the students. I do not yet have any evidence to support this observation, other than observations I made from friends in my school. That's is why I raised this question, becuase I do not know all the facts (I doubt anyone does).

Do you agree, or disagree with this? Is our generation more aware or less aware of the point of college? And is the lack of this awareness the reason why so many students are struggling through college?

[sanddrag]

Originally Posted by Ken Leung

College is something they want to get over as soon as possible and want nothing to do with afterward.
College is a collection of cutting classes and missing as much work as possible and scrape by with the minimal effort.
School and learning are something they hate, and homework and tests are something they hate worse.
College is something they struggle with, have no idea why they struggle with, and something they don't know how to succeed in.

That right there is about the best way to sum up our (what I believe to be) failing educational system.

I do agree, although unfortunately I do not have any answers or solutions.

School is not fun. FIRST is fun. But not every school has FIRST, and even fior the ones that have FIRST, not every class is FIRST. There are more things to learn in life than you learn in FIRST, but something about the structure of it makes you learn while not even realizing; and you have fun at the same time too.

Maybe that is the key: To truly learn something well, you should not realize you are in the process of learning until after you have learned it and surpise yourself in a magnificent display of your skills.

Heck, I don't know. It is late. Sounded interesting for tonight though.

I am kind of thinking though in an extraordinary education, you don't even realize you are learning. Does that make any sense to anyone?

[Taylor]

When was it ever stated that College/High School/Life was supposed to be fun? "Fun" is such a subjective concept - I'm sure there are millions of people in the world that would have absolutely no interest in FIRST, its competitions, or its philosophy. In fact, I'm sure there are many people and cultures that would despise what FIRST is and what it stands for. They would say it is hypocritical at its very core - it is trying to get attention away from glamorized sports and entertainment, but uses sport and entertainment as its foundation for its culminating activity.
Mind, I'm not one of those people. But I hope you see my point.
College in and of itself is not students cutting class, it's not boring professors giving boring lectures, it's not a 24-hour drunkfest at some fraternity house, it's not impossible final exams designed to flunk half the students.
Not to say these things don't happen, but to me that's like saying America is a country of toothless inbred obese people. Which may be a pervasive view of America from the perspective of other countries - the pendulum swings both ways. What stereotypes do you have of citizens of France? Mexico? Afghanistan? Japan? Kenya? Does that mean everybody in those nations are exemplified by a stereotype, true or untrue as it may be?
No, college is an opportunity. College is the chance to better oneself by spending time with the professor after class, to reason through the "boring" lecture on microbiology. Some things just aren't fun - does that mean we don't need these things?
College offers so many opportunities, challenges, rewarding experiences, both in and out of the classroom. It is unfortunate that the view of it is biased by the poor decisions of some of its students and faculty. Some students choose to skip class/sleep through lectures/waste time and brain cells through inappropriate behavior. If only they knew what they were missing.
I was just discussing with a colleague earlier that it's too bad that we don't realize the opportunities available to us until after they have passed. If I had college to do over again, it would certainly be different.
Don't let your college experience be flavored by the poor choices by other people, no matter who they are. Life is what you make of it - what you get out of college is proportional to what you put into it.
"It has been my experience that people are just about as happy as they make up their minds to be." - Abraham Lincoln.

So ends Part One - Part Two to come.

[Taylor]

You are absolutely correct - it is unfortunate that college is promoted as the destination. Many people make career and life decisions during or after their college experience, me being one of them. I went through four majors before I landed on the one I graduated with - and that's not what I do now. But I wouldn't be the person I am today if I hadn't gone on the academic path I took, and I wouldn't trade the experience for the world.
As I look back on college, I see that I learned a ton of academic information. I learned high-level mathematics, conceptual and applied physics, computer programming, psychology, philosophy, journalism, law, public speaking techniques, geology, chemistry, ad nauseum. But the things I learned that affected me most were the things I learned about myself - as a student, as a lover, as a Christian, as a human being, as an American, as a proud alumni. There is a definite maturation process that occurs in the college years, and in my experience, that, as much as the "fancy book-learnin", shapes people and helps them in their careers.
I hate to break it to you, but college is not the pinnacle of the mountain. There is a lot of climbing to get there, and I hope you've got a good sherpa and oxygen tanks. But when you get to the top, you realize it's a springboard to reach new heights.

[Peter Matteson]

Wow, where to begin. I'll try to keep this short and to the point.

The academic side of college is really learning how to learn. Classes are supposed to be structured in a way that forces you to take that next step and work on your own to get further along than you are going in. Look at each of us as a toolbox. College is the store where you go and get the tools that fill the box. High school and some early college is learning some lower level tools that get built upon. By the end you should be fashioning your own tools. I'm the first to admit I don't know everything about engineering, but I know how to learn what I need as the situations cmoe along.

More people are going to college now than in the past. The problem facing many of them is that they have been spoon feed and carried along the whole way. Some schools and majors continue this now through college defeating what I described above. The student populace at large has changed over time and colleges have adjusted for it.

College is what you put into it and by many is looked at as a measure of proof that you can work to a goal you don't need to reach but want to. That is why it is a litmus test used by many employers.

[Richard Wallace]

Originally Posted by Dzdconfusd

College is what you put into it and by many is looked at as a measure of proof that you can work to a goal you don't need to reach but want to. That is why it is a litmus test used by many employers.

This is almost exactly what my first supervisor told me when I was an EE co-op at Hughes Aircraft in 1979. He was actually scolding me for getting a bad grade (supervisors received their students' grade reports back in the day), and said that the only reason he'd hire a college graduate over a similarly skilled person who had spent four years doing something else is that the college graduate had demonstrated ability to persevere through difficulty.

See also: the best twenty years of my life, and are you going to college to get a degree, or an education?

[JaneYoung]

Rudderless is a common feeling during college for many.

In a way you are feeling the benefits of F.I.R.S.T. -it's strengths and philosophies.

There are those who follow choices made by others rather than themselves. And there are those who make easy choices at the time.
And there are those who just don't know.

Education goes hand in hand with self-discovery and exploration. The trick is to engage.

Jane

[thatphotochick]

as a high school student, i can not comment on the struggle of being in college cause i haven't gone to college. but for me, college was pushed on me since i was little. the reason was cause most of my family did not go to college. but ever since i learned what college was, i've never wanted to go. i have my interests and what i like to do, which is a huge list, but college is not for me. i barely work at high school and i don't care for school already, so why waste my parents' money, which they don't have, or the money of the good people who would give it to me. i don't have a clue what i want to do, or even what i am going to do after i graduate. i just feel that pushing college on everyone isn't the answer, cause that is how you get so many people who have no idea what they're going to do in life. encouraging kids to do what they want could fix that. too many people want/expect their kids and students to become the best there is..too many of those people push them to become things they don't want to become. since i was little i have been pushed to become a business manager or run a business, something i've never wanted to be. if people took the time to discover what a kid likes to do, that could stop a few people from becoming something they don't want to be. it might not be the solution, i've never been known to solve a problem, but it could help.

[Charlie B]

Anyone looking for motivation should review the wage earning statistics for college graduates vs. high school graduates.

Don't worry too much about choosing the right career to start off with. Chances are, your career will change three or four times over your lifetime, and you'll wind up in something that doesn't even exist now.

[Jason Kixmiller]

I think that the biggest "problem" is not necessarily encouraging or pushing students to attend college; it's the negative connotation that is associated with NOT going to college. Sometimes it seems that students are subliminally told that people that don't go to college are destined to be unhappy or unsuccessful in. I think a solution might be helping students explore the other options...maybe college is just a way to avoid our fear of the unknown. While the benefits of college are constantly presented, when are the alternatives discussed?

[Chris Fultz]

Originally Posted by boiler

college is not the pinnacle of the mountain. There is a lot of climbing to get there, and I hope you've got a good sherpa and oxygen tanks. But when you get to the top, you realize it's a springboard to reach new heights.

Well said.

College is about individual growth and maturity, and finding a field of study that interests you. I was told recently that many college students change their major 3 or 4 times from their freshman year through graduation. Some might say that was bad, but I would say "AWESOME" becasue the college experience probably introuduced them to a field of study and potential career that they did not know existed before they arrived on campus. You learn to learn, learn to think and learn to be responsible for yourself.

True, college is not for everyone, and even high school is not for everyone. But I can tell you I know many people who dropped out of high school or never made the committment to go to college and regret that decision now, and I cannot name a single person who DID graduate from college and regrets that decision.

There are lots of statements in this thread about "many more" and "nobody" and etc. Does anyone have any DATA to back up those statements? Just curious, since college attendance and graduation rates are on a continued rise.

[Joe Matt]

Life is hard. College is very hard. As some might have noticed with me (or will at Champs), I've matured quite a bit at college. I matured a lot over FIRST, but college put about twice as much into maturing me. You need to be prepared for the fall you'll face. It will happen, and it will be very bad. It's up to you how you handle it. I've thought about if business/communications/etc would be a better fit, but I feel that engineering just hasn't been given a chance yet, and I still feel that this is the way now, even with finals around the corner.

I'm comfortable to admit that I'm going to re-take intro physics for engineers over the summer. I FAILED the course, I want to admit that. I've never failed a class before. NEVER. Why am I telling you guys this? Because if it helps one kid who realizes that he/she's not the only one, then I'm happy. I know one kid who has retaken Calc 1 and will retake physics again. He still wants to be an engineer.

Just because you don't go to college, you change your major, change your school, etc, DOESN'T mean that you fail at life, and it doesn't mean you will not change the world. Steve Jobs & Bill Gates are two PRIME examples of this. The longest running CEO of all time, Michael Eisner of Disney was an english major out of a small liberal arts college in Ohio, not some Ivy league or major college. For every Lary Page & Serji there is another guy who graduated from a small college who has impacted the world greatly, or, never even graduated college, such as Steve & Bill.

The promise of the future is hard. Right now we're fighting an uphill battle against other countries. While we're focused on war and American Idol, they're focused on science, technology, and learning. Not much motivation now, eh?

[JaneYoung]

Originally Posted by Joe Matt

Life is hard. College is very hard. As some might have noticed with me (or will at Champs), I've matured quite a bit at college. I matured a lot over FIRST, but college put about twice as much into maturing me. You need to be prepared for the fall you'll face. It will happen, and it will be very bad. It's up to you how you handle it. I've thought about if business/communications/etc would be a better fit, but I feel that engineering just hasn't been given a chance yet, and I still feel that this is the way now, even with finals around the corner.

I'm comfortable to admit that I'm going to re-take intro physics for engineers over the summer. I FAILED the course, I want to admit that. I've never failed a class before. NEVER. Why am I telling you guys this? Because if it helps one kid who realizes that he/she's not the only one, then I'm happy. I know one kid who has retaken Calc 1 and will retake physics again. He still wants to be an engineer.

Just because you don't go to college, you change your major, change your school, etc, DOESN'T mean that you fail at life, and it doesn't mean you will not change the world. Steve Jobs & Bill Gates are two PRIME examples of this. The longest running CEO of all time, Michael Eisner of Disney was an english major out of a small liberal arts college in Ohio, not some Ivy league or major college. For every Lary Page & Serji there is another guy who graduated from a small college who has impacted the world greatly, or, never even graduated college, such as Steve & Bill.

The promise of the future is hard. Right now we're fighting an uphill battle against other countries. While we're focused on war and American Idol, they're focused on science, technology, and learning. Not much motivation now, eh?

Wow Joe Matt!
Is the word - perseverence - anywhere in this thread? I think it just got put here by Joe.

[sciguy125]

It seems that my friends and I (maybe there's a connection here) are in college because it opens doors to various professions. I realize that there's more to it than that, but thats why many of my friends and I are going to college.

To the point of not having a direction, however, several of my friends are in that position. They're in school to get a degree. Not to get a degree that will help them with their career goals, but simply to get a degree. The reason is that they still don't know what they want to do, so they don't really have any career goals to work toward. Actually, I know someone that changed their major because they weren't happy with their academic career, not because they didn't like the jobs it was going to give them. To me, being in school just for the sake of being in school seems like a waste of energy. There's plenty of more productive things you could do while you try and figure out where you want to go with your life.

A few have mentioned that college gives you an opportunity to see new things and possibly find a direction. Coincidentally, I had one of those "this is what I want to do with my life" moments a few days ago. Apparently, my school has a microelectronics processing lab - it's in the heart of Silicon Valley, so of course it does. There's enough equipment in there to start with a raw silicon wafer and end up with a working IC. My class was only there for some simple stuff (not IC related), but while we were there, we got a tour of the lab. And you know what? That place is so awesome! I've been wanting do do something in the neighborhood of control systems, but after being in that lab, I'm seriously considering IC manufacturing. That decision is a little impulsive for me, so there's no guarantees. But I'm going to at least try to take the IC processing and design class. So, I'll definately agree that college can show you new things you might be interested in.

[KathieK]

I have worked in a college for the last four years and many of our graduating students are graduating with no idea what they want to do with their lives (or their degrees) - it is not unusual any longer.

Many students switch majors more than once because they discover new areas of learning that were not presented to them while in high school. The downside to this is that they are no longer graduating in 4 years.

I went to college not having a clue what I wanted to do, took a class that interested me and discovered a career that I had never heard of, one that I ended up working in for 25 years. Along the way a whole new world opened up, that of the Internet (yes, I am prehistoric and existed before the World Wide Web), and I discovered another new career - one that didin't exist when I went to college. Keeping your options open to new ideas and new interests and new careers is what is important as you head off to college (or any other pursuit in life). Visit your college career center in your FRESHMAN year. Use their tools and experience to guide you.

Consider taking a year off between high school and college. Explore other things. It might help you focus on what you want to do with your life.

And finally, don't beat yourself up if college "isn't for you". The world still needs retail sales associates, mechanics, plumbers... (just ask my husband).