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Location: New Albany, Indiana (Greater Louisville)
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The main issue with Millennials is the huge amount of student load debt owed when we end up getting jobs that pay no more than a 2 year degree would. $13 an hour where I live is fine... unless you're paying $500 a month over 12 years for loans.
Part of that is bad personal decisions. But remember that most high schools were telling kids that graduating college is the key to success. Are you supposed to totally ignore what the older generations say? That's what we were told and it ended up being a lie.
The main issue with Millennials is the huge amount of student load debt owed when we end up getting jobs that pay no more than a 2 year degree would. $13 an hour where I live is fine... unless you're paying $500 a month over 12 years for loans.
Part of that is bad personal decisions. But remember that most high schools were telling kids that graduating college is the key to success. Are you supposed to totally ignore what the older generations say? That's what we were told and it ended up being a lie.
I think most of it is the high school push because it was follow your heart, follow your interests rather than follow the money. Guidance counselors, teachers, principals and even politicians and their own parents pushed for that. Not to mention that follow the money isn't that easy to do over for four/five years while in college. As well as community colleges never really had a counter point to "it's for mouth breathers" for whatever reason.
The main issue with Millennials is the huge amount of student load debt owed when we end up getting jobs that pay no more than a 2 year degree would. $13 an hour where I live is fine... unless you're paying $500 a month over 12 years for loans.
Part of that is bad personal decisions. But remember that most high schools were telling kids that graduating college is the key to success. Are you supposed to totally ignore what the older generations say? That's what we were told and it ended up being a lie.
Sheesh. I graduated high school in 1968. My senior counseler told me I would be a failure without college.........I wound up making more than him and have retired with a monthly payment equal to my pay when working.............You always believe everything your told?
Remember......a lot of school teachers are simply failures at working a REAL job.
The main issue with Millennials is the huge amount of student load debt owed when we end up getting jobs that pay no more than a 2 year degree would. $13 an hour where I live is fine... unless you're paying $500 a month over 12 years for loans.
Part of that is bad personal decisions. But remember that most high schools were telling kids that graduating college is the key to success. Are you supposed to totally ignore what the older generations say? That's what we were told and it ended up being a lie.
This I will grant millennials, the student loan situation is one way they're absolutely worse off. And yes many were just doing what they were told.
This I will grant millennials, the student loan situation is one way they're absolutely worse off. And yes many were just doing what they were told.
Doing what they're told?
For Fook's* sake, they're not stupid. They can see that the decent jobs require a degree. Often, the decent jobs require an advanced degree. And we're not talking about the great jobs. Just the decent jobs. We have quickly gone from being able to build a decent life with only a high school diploma to needing a master's degree for an entry level position (at a tech company).
Millennials don't need to be told anything. The can see that without a sheepskin, they're resigning themselves to a life of "do you want fries with that?" America has raised the educational bar when it comes to employment. And we've put up a financial roadblock to that education that affects most students -- except the rich kids.
There is absolutely no way I would be able to take the college route that I took as a young adult. If I had to do it again, I'd take the free tuition being offered by Germany. There are hundreds of degree programs offered by German universities which don't cost a Euro out of pocket.
For Fook's* sake, they're not stupid. They can see that the decent jobs require a degree. Often, the decent jobs require an advanced degree. And we're not talking about the great jobs. Just the decent jobs. We have quickly gone from being able to build a decent life with only a high school diploma to needing a master's degree for an entry level position (at a tech company).
Millennials don't need to be told anything. The can see that without a sheepskin, they're resigning themselves to a life of "do you want fries with that?" America has raised the educational bar when it comes to employment. And we've put up a financial roadblock to that education that affects most students -- except the rich kids.
There is absolutely no way I would be able to take the college route that I took as a young adult. If I had to do it again, I'd take the free tuition being offered by Germany. There are hundreds of degree programs offered by German universities which don't cost a Euro out of pocket.
Your basic assumption kind of makes my point for me. What kind of PE program gives an A for anything but participation in extracurricular sports? PE should require homework just like any other subject. When I went to school, if you just showed up and got dressed, you got a C, which reflected average work. In English if you passed the grammar and vocabulary tests you got a C, if you added a book report once a week you got a B, and if you turned in an additional short story or essay every week you got an A.
Why should PE require homework and what homework can you apply to it? Is it right to test someone on how to play a game or perhaps how fast you can do a drill test? Remember PE classes include the girls who stand idle, the jocks (both male and female,) the active people who aren't jocks and semi-active people who always put in effort (where I would fall in.) The only thing is maybe the rules of the game. Remember PE is a LOT different than English classes where you had grammar tests, book reports, essay tests, short stories writing, poem writing, etc. because PE is basically dress, follow rules and put effort in similar to chorus or band where you can be graded on specific sight reading or part tests as well as participation.
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Originally Posted by Larry Caldwell
Once upon a time, getting an A meant you were doing really exceptional work. When a college required a minimum 3.25 GPA for admission, it really meant something. Lots of students my age had to go to a community college after high school because no university would let them in. My mind boggles at the idea that half of high school graduates expect to go to college. There is no way that 50% of students can do college level work, unless there has been huge grade inflation.
Was this the case with say a home economics, shop class, etc.? The only course that was an "elective" that I had outside work in was health class. Otherwise it was work mostly in class and not even if it wasn't senior year. If that is the case, I can imagine the thing.
The amount of kids going off to college is partially going back to the G.I. Bill using silents and greatests as well as boomers who went to college and having that work for them so they press that onto generational children. I'm sure it was important to finish off high school as it is now to go onto college.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Larry Caldwell
One of the primary functions of an educational system should be to weed out the incompetent and incapable. It's apparently failing miserably. A college degree means no more than a high school diploma did 50 years ago. One of my buddies went to work for Union Pacific right out of high school, which is what so many millennials are complaining about, but he could do full cycle bookkeeping, keep meeting notes in shorthand, type 100 wpm and had studied business law. They tell me high schools don't even offer business law courses any more.
Three problems with the weeding out incompetent and incapable:
How do you figure out who exactly is incompetent? is it by test scores, effort?
What do you do for them? do you try to teach to them rather than the good students? do you just forget about them?
Is it the system that makes someone incompetent? I hated the regents and so I didn't put in effort because despite my dislike, I could information dumb and get 80's or 90's on most tests. I didn't do homework because I knew no matter what I'd pass the regents or even the normal final and pass for the year. I was burnt on the school system and learning about simple algebra for example for an entire week and nothing new each day.
This said, there is business courses that were an elective to replace government and economics for your senior year "social studies" credit at my school and I would imagine they still do it. No idea what they do in Arizona other than shorter days for seniors rather than give electives...
Quote:
Originally Posted by Larry Caldwell
The honest thing for the educational system to do would be to weed out the deadwood and load work on the students who can take it. The world has become so much more advanced in the last 50 years that they need to finish up the old degree requirements in a couple of years and add the equivalent of a couple of years of grad school just to get a bachelors. They don't. Instead, they have run the other direction.
Kind of going back to my second point, how do we do we figure out the deadwood and what do we do with them? I am sure that people don't want to hear their son is one step away from becoming soylent green.
Every generation has its obstacles to overcome. Looking at previous generations and trying to compare their wealth or living conditions is like spitting in the wind, it's useless and will just come right back in your face. Then was then and now is now. Young people have to look to the present and not the past to prepare for the future. Anything else is a waste of time.
I agree that each individual has to bring their all to their career and learning, for a lifetime, but, structurally, the US Economy is markedly different than it was for the boomers or silent generation(Born 1928-45).......There were manufacturing jobs for the taking from '45-late 70s......essentially zero was outsourced to Asia, and even "Made in Japan" was a negative, pejorative term....
This generation is competing with the entire world now, a world which pays its employees far less than the US, for high-tech as well. All goods in stores were made in the US back in those boom times I mentioned, for all intents, except trinkets.
I think the current young generation will survive(aged say 18-38), but they will have to redefine the world they live in, and use tech to their advantage, perhaps even creating their own currency, getting out of the feds crosshairs, along with the IRS. A sharing/local/self-sufficient economy is definitely doable, and will make national and world GDP just numbers......will have no meaning, when they create their own jobs and world, and that much for the better....not to mention self-sustaining..
I am 32. I am working harder than ever, and still can't pay my bills. I'm not out doing drugs. I don't drink, smoke, do drugs, or gamble. I'm not going out to eat. I buy generic food from the grocery store. I wait for sales. I lost my phone plan. I lost my credit card. I am losing my truck as soon as they come get it. I had to sell all of my valuables. I am down to basic bills. Rent, food, utilities. I am not in a mansion or anything. I am in a lower end house, at the edge of town, in a less desirable area. Any and every setback just wipes me out.
I have a blue collar union job. It's not enough. Everything is too expensive. I am an apprentice now, but even when I hit journeyman pay, it's not a lot of money. I make more per hour now than my dad did when he retired from GM, yet he managed to buy a house on 7 acres, cars, a backhoe, put up a garage, and put money into savings.
The entire system we have in this country is in need of a radical change.
Also, there are two-tracks in UAW union hiring..
New hires make far less per hour than the union hires, with no pensions(just 401Ks), and less benefits...
That was the deal they made.....they sold out the new, young workers to keep the older workers flush with the old union benefits......
The USA will have to restructure the economy if they want to start "tracking" people and being more selective in college. Part of the reason for having so many in college is to at least have the illusion that they have a chance at becoming part of the economy. And some people actually find their niche in college even if they are only average students. However, without college the mediocre students would not be engaged in anything productive, they would simply not be doing anything at all.
China can afford to only send their top students off to college because there are millions of factory jobs and infrastructure jobs for the non academically inclined. South Korea and even Japan can do this to some degree, too.
Germany has an extensive mid range manufacturing sector comprising of over 100,000 smaller companies that employ 70% of the workforce. Thus they can track non-academic students into apprenticeship programs.
USA has no such options. We do not maintain our infrastructure, have low end manufacturing or have middle range manufacturing. There is a lot of high end service work, a service sector, highly automated high end manufacturing, and small resource extraction economy. We are more like Mexico, Russia and Brazil than we are like Japan and Germany.
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