Dirty Jobs Mike Rowe on the high cost of college education

You have disregarded the most important aspect of the entire educational conundrum: Easily over 50% of degrees are meaningless nonsense nowadays. In the past humanities and liberal arts degrees were quite rigorous and provided value to students who wanted to learn to see things from many perspectives and develop critical thinking abilities. Now almost every humanities class and every single social science class is... oppression of women/gays/minorities/etc. The universal human questions which used to define a classical liberal arts degree have all but been done away with in favor of this critical theory BS. That's what is the most unnerving aspect of the whole situation. Parents are paying absurdly over-priced tuition fees so that their children can be indoctrinated by intellectually bankrupt "progressive" professors. If you are classically liberal in most college classrooms you are labeled an extremist conservative. Western Humanism has been declared "oppressive" and it looks like the academy will be completely burnt to the ground by this international cabal of academics before most people even realize it. Ironically, everything that is good with America and the West has been painted as bad and everything that is bad about us has been re-branded as progressive underneath a veil of existential double-think.

Man, you and I live in totally different worlds. I don't even know how someone develops the point of view you have. Would you mind answering some more specific questions? Not trying to troll you, trying to understand where you're coming from because I think we are on opposite ends of cultural thought.

Can you provide a basis for this statement? "Now almost every humanities class and every single social science class is... oppression of women/gays/minorities/etc. " Almost every class? Which schools are these? I could see this maybe if your major was women & gender studies, or Afro-American studies since oppression plays a significant role in their histories, but almost every humanities class? Hmm.

How do you respond to this sentiment (sorry, it's a long one):

For much of the last 500 years, white straight men have been in charge of western culture. They accomplished many great things, and their achievements (until recently) were the basis of how we learned history.

However people are starting to realize (1) that there are a lot more types of people in the world other than straight white men, and (2) by only focusing on the great things they did, we're not painting a complete historical picture.

I completely agree with your statement that students should "learn to see things from many perspectives and develop critical thinking abilities". Therefore, isn't it logical to expand the world of what we teach beyond the minority group of people we've traditionally been teaching about? White straight men are a minority (don't know the % but it must be less than 25%), stepping back for a second it seems odd if 75% of the history is about them, right? It seems logical that important history exists that does not revolve around white guys.

And as far as presenting the bad things they did - we're trying to teach history here, not propaganda. People contain multitudes. Good things and bad things happened in history. It would be weird to only teach the good things, right? That's not teaching true history, it's teaching selective history.

Besides, I think one of the goals of learning history is so we don't repeat our previous mistakes. Can't accomplish that by leaving out the mistakes.

So, I think the history we used to learn was about all the great things that our white straight male forefathers did. Today people understand that there is more history out there - history from more perspectives, and history that isn't always pretty. But it is real history, and paints a fuller picture than what might have been taught previously. How do you respond to that? Feel free to tell me I'm full of crap if you think I am, but I'd appreciate some justification if you do.

Can you also explain more fully what this means, maybe with examples: "Ironically, everything that is good with America and the West has been painted as bad and everything that is bad about us has been re-branded as progressive underneath a veil of existential double-think"

There is only one reason for the high cost of college education, and that is the interference of the Federal government in the form of government-guaranteed student loans. The fact that students have easy access to almost unlimited amounts of credit makes it possible for universities to jack up tuitions to levels far above what they would be able to charge in a free market. It exemplifies how government destroys whatever it touches.

It's hard to know which industries truly have a shortage of qualified workers, since every industry makes that claim. Is there really a shortage of welders in America? Or are companies expecting welders with 20+ years of prior welding experience to be served to them on a silver platter for their "entry-level" job openings?

"Anyway, back to our regularly scheduled conservative, selfish, narrow minded, and short sighted programming..."

See man, why does everything have to be Left v Right or Dem v GOP? There's a lot of people out there that have been left out, they want to and can work, but they are not "college material" either through motivation or ability. Why do you have to take a dump on a topic and turn it political?

I think this is a real problem in the US. Since manufacturing is all but gone, there's very little for working people to turn to. In the 50's up through the 70's someone could graduate HS get a job in a factory, and move up the chain, maybe be a foreman or middle manager; that generally doesn't exist now.

We have a under funded, under valued, under served and under worked group out there that could really benefit from a different way of thinking about what education. Pointing that out isn't "selfish, narrow minded or short sighted."

jamin wrote:

It's hard to know which industries truly have a shortage of qualified workers, since every industry makes that claim. Is there really a shortage of welders in America? Or are companies expecting welders with 20+ years of prior welding experience to be served to them on a silver platter for their "entry-level" job openings?

Yeah, that's true, it seems that I've been hearing about a "teacher shortage" for like 20+ years, but then every semester the colleges around me pump out a few hundred certified teachers every 6 mo. Same thing for the "nurse shortage".

jamin wrote:

It's hard to know which industries truly have a shortage of qualified workers, since every industry makes that claim. Is there really a shortage of welders in America? Or are companies expecting welders with 20+ years of prior welding experience to be served to them on a silver platter for their "entry-level" job openings?

I can only comment about my local economy, but yes there is really a shortage. Welders here make above 40 for simple steel welding and much more for more complex welding of various metals with tighter tolerances. A few oil field gigs are paying well over 100k, but the work is highly volatile. Other industries around here that are short are pipefitters, masons, and electricians.

The main complaint I get from contractors on entry level skilled or semi-skilled labor is the type of people that are currently filling these positions. They can't find anyone that cares if they do a good job, is generally responsible, isn't on drugs, and speaks english. If you aren't standing over their shoulder watching they will slack and cut corners, if they even show up.

I have a liberal arts degree and have no major complaints about my job or salary. I graduated in 2006. Many of my peers are liberal arts majors. When I think about the people I know (whether in real life or as Facebook "friends") I can't really differentiate the arts vs sciences people from one another just based on how they are doing professionally. What I can do, though, is separate the people I know with college degrees from the people without college degrees. The ones with college degrees are generally speaking lightyears ahead of the others when it comes to personal finances.

This is the way it is in the USA right now. Perhaps better vocational training could improve this disparity, but right now in America people incapable of pursuing a college degree are going to typically do poorly. Reducing tuition or extending aid are both great ideas for what the nation can do, but if you are a parent the best thing you can do is teach your kid to have half a brain. Student loans may be ridiculous, but tightening your belt for 10 years while employed is better than having no belt to tighten while unemployed or underemployed the rest of your life.

GottaSayIt wrote:

jamin wrote:

It's hard to know which industries truly have a shortage of qualified workers, since every industry makes that claim. Is there really a shortage of welders in America? Or are companies expecting welders with 20+ years of prior welding experience to be served to them on a silver platter for their "entry-level" job openings?

Yeah, that's true, it seems that I've been hearing about a "teacher shortage" for like 20+ years, but then every semester the colleges around me pump out a few hundred certified teachers every 6 mo. Same thing for the "nurse shortage".

The teacher shortage is a real thing, brother. So few students have been pursuing education as a path that many (especially the better colleges) have dropped a path to certification altogether. If you ever wanted to be a teacher, now is the time to go pursue that. Fast-track ways to get certified in many states right now too.

College students are opting for other careers because:

1) Opportunity to make more money lies elsewhere.

2) Teaching is a very thankless job in many ways, and parents expect the moon from teachers when they themselves don't do all they can do to help their child be successful.

3) Government (led by people who are NOT educators) are getting too involved with too much testing. This leads the teachers to teach to the test which is not necessarily they best way to teach.

4) Students are increasingly more and more disrespectful. Not necessarily the most fun environment.

5) Teacher compensation has been restructured in some cases so that the once very good retirement package (and early too) isn't what it once was.

It's really too bad. In many parts of the world, teachers are revered. Not here in the US.

A true teacher shortage would be one of the best things that could ever happen to teachers. But I have to disagree with you, every semester colleges crank out a new batch, there at tons of certified teachers out there doing other things because they couldn't get hired on, so they drift into new fields.