Is college a scam or worthwhile?

[Kurosaki]

I always played it straight with my professors and asked them if the newest version of [insert book] is actually necessary. If they said no, then I'd just buy a used book from 2-3 years ago for a fraction of the price.

So to circle back to the original topic asking if college is a scam, no it's not. I had some opinions outside of just sharing my college experience but a few of y'all already said what I wanted to say so no need repeating.

Fucking textbooks are a scam though. I think my Freshman year, my book cost was about 1200 bucks. For fucking books... I didn't know any better and paid it.

 

[mikev]

I had an interesting path through college. Started as a mechanical engineer. Had an internship. Decided I don't want to do this for the next 40-50 years. But didn't know what else I wanted to do. Failed all my classes my sophomore year because I felt like I had no direction. Left college because I didn't think it was fair to keep spending my parents' money over nothing and also didn't really have any friends. Went back to the same company I had my first internship at. They liked me enough they welcomed me back. Switched to a different side of the business that clicked with me much more. Went to a local community college to rebuild my shattered GPA so I even have a chance of applying to anywhere. Failed all my classes that first semester too because I still didn't have any feeling of direction. Did a couple more years taking classes that I knew were transferable and some classes out of general interest like History of Jazz music and Psychology of Women. Then finally went back to the same college I started instead of some other schools that accepted my application. Felt I had unfinished business.

University of the Pacific in the great city of motherfuckin Stockton, California.

It was kinda funny. Some of the classes I took, I sat down with the professors before the first day to explain my situation and why I'm here. A couple of them asked me to not raise my hand to answer questions because they knew I know most of this material because I've already racked up about 5 years of legitimate work experience and just answering shit I already know is kind of a dick move. So the other students that are new can work their way through things. So, part of my 2nd stint at UOP was going through the motions because I needed my degree to keep moving forward with my career. One professor actually called me and told me I have to come back to class. I only showed up on test days and I aced all the tests but he told me you still need to be here sometimes.

Being a college dropout was one of the best things that ever happened to me. It was the first time in my life I had a real problem on my hands that wasn't going away and I realized things aren't going to just happily work out somehow like they usually have before. I was 18 at the time and a bit naive. If I don't do something and change things up, nothing is going to get better.

Sorry but I read the other posts in this thread so now I know you fucked up and did it horribly wrong. Sorry.

 

[cheez]

Are you British or Canadian?

Neither, I'm Cajun, I just choose to use precise terms. Apologies if my life experiences have left me with an unexpected dialect that disagrees with your sensibilities.

 

[ST Guy]

I wondered what it would have been like to have attended college and made friends, but it wasn't in the book for me.

However, I made life-long friends working in the business I excelled at. A couple of them went to college together. Another was a guy who didn't go to college like me. A first class engineer.

College has its benefits, but it's not the only way. And I noticed one thing, sometimes the college guys were dumb as shit and thought that their shit didn't stink. I never ran across that with the self-taught engineers.

In the end, I was happy that I didn't go to college and earned my title through practical experience.If I had it to do over again, I'd take the same course.

 

[Kurosaki]

Sorry but I read the other posts in this thread so now I know you fucked up and did it horribly wrong. Sorry.

The ways I fucked up with college (and then made things right later) to get where I am also helped me get into motorcycles. And part of the reason I know the fucking awesomeness of being on two wheels.

I regret nothing.

 

[Eldritch]

Typically? More like it doesn't at all assuming we're talking about being enlisted versus being an officer. However, if you're officer, you've already got the degree anyway or you wouldn't be there. Of course there are warrant officers which is a different thing altogether but a topic better discussed elsewhere.

The thing is, what most don't take into consideration (but you did point out) is that you're not paying for your food, healthcare or housing, so the small amount of money you actually do make is easily saved...unless you're an idiot and go out and buy a V6 Challenger at 30% interest.

Also, I wouldn't tout having VA healthcare (or even worse, TRICARE assuming you're a retiree) coverage as a benefit. The VA's healthcare system is severely broken and TRICARE is an absolute joke.

Travel is a huge perk of serving...but you have to pick the right branch and the right MOS to take full advantage of it and certainly which MOS you pick can make or kill your chances of having a job lined up when you get out.

FYI...the Army does diving, underwater salvage and welding too. Probably one of the best kept secret careers we offer. We also have more boats than the Navy does.

Well here is a fun fact for Americans that choose to be self employed, or end up unemployed, their Healthcare is NO HEALTHCARE.

The VA may not be great, but it is better than no health insurance and Tricare for oldsters is even better.

Once you are enrolled in Medicare A&B, Tricare exists as a no cost medigap plan. Anything covered by Medicare and Tricare both, like that $110k Emergency room visit you just had for that Heart scare that turned out to be nothing, is covered 100% instead of the 80% that Medicare would normally cover (hello $20k ER bill AFTER insurance).

No need to argue for Service Branch, just listing it as a general option. My family is Army all the way, you better be Airborne, and you should do everything you can to get into the 101st. Also, you should get more jumps than your dad did.

My mention of cost of course does include Officers. In my experience, the best offers join as enlisted, do one Contract, then use the GI Bill to go Officers school and get a commission. If you are real savvy, you can even get some ROTC money in the mix, and there a bunch of career guys who have a major hard on for this kind of shit, so if you look while enlisted, you can probably find some support for a guy with a heap fo chest candy to help it go, but I felt no need to chart it out for folks here.

The point of all that is more, there is a TON of opportunity out there for young people, but options are much more limited than they used to be and more than ever, you need to develop and manage a very good plan.

No figuring it out as you go along shit of yesteryear.

I wondered what it would have been like to have attended college and made friends, but it wasn't in the book for me.

However, I made life-long friends working in the business I excelled at. A couple of them went to college together. Another was a guy who didn't go to college like me. A first class engineer.

College has its benefits, but it's not the only way. And I noticed one thing, sometimes the college guys were dumb as shit and thought that their shit didn't stink. I never ran across that with the self-taught engineers.

In the end, I was happy that I didn't go to college and earned my title through practical experience.If I had it to do over again, I'd take the same course.

WTF is a Self Taught Engineer? I mean, it sounds kind of cool, but last I heard, most Engineering Licenses in CA still require you to have a degree in order to even get a license. Is there a secret back door like with the BAR for Lawyers?

 

[bikewanker]

Admittedly the 101st has a cool insignia but the 82nd invaded Grenada!

 

[Climber]

WTF is a Self Taught Engineer? I mean, it sounds kind of cool, but last I heard, most Engineering Licenses in CA still require you to have a degree in order to even get a license. Is there a secret back door like with the BAR for Lawyers?

The vast majority of engineers don't need to get their PE (Professional Enginner) license, that is something only required in CivE and a few branches of government engineering. Outside of that, not needed.

 

[littlebeast]

WTF is a Self Taught Engineer? I mean, it sounds kind of cool, but last I heard, most Engineering Licenses in CA still require you to have a degree in order to even get a license. Is there a secret back door like with the BAR for Lawyers?

IMO, engineers are a specie (the way certain brains are built). my dude worked as a mechanical design engineer his whole career. he wasn’t educated in it (his education was in fire science). WRT that, he was super particular about where he wanted to work, and while waiting for a position to open up in the right location with the forest service, he took a technician job at an aerospace company (to pass the time and pay the bills). they quickly decided ‘you’re our boy’, and long story short, next thing he knows, he’s designing missile payloads. next up - he’s aggressively recruited by a prominent (arguably, THE prominent) computer company to do mechanical design for them (and earned them many patents for the work he did).

self taught? like i said, i think it has a lot more to do with how a person’s brain is wired. and IME an engineers brain has unique wiring. and yeah - a lot of engineering work does require a license. but a lot doesn’t. and in those areas - talent, and that curious and un-intimidatable engineering brain can thrive.

and WRT that computer company - they almost bit off more than they could chew (he’s a belligerent, foul mouthed piece of work), but they tolerated his shit, and rewarded him handsomely for the work he did for them. the bank he amassed allowed him to retire early, and do what he truly loves - ride. now the only ass he’s a pain in is mine.

 

[Kornholio]

Neither, I'm Cajun, I just choose to use precise terms. Apologies if my life experiences have left me with an unexpected dialect that disagrees with your sensibilities.

The VA may not be great, but it is better than no health insurance and Tricare for oldsters is even better.

Since you didn't serve Mike, I'll enlighten you...trusting the VA for anything related to actual healthcare is a mistake. They're an overburden poor bureaucratic excuse for health care that was created with wonderful intentions and then grossly mismanaged and underfunded to the point they are today which is now a sorry excuse for a healthcare service. I wouldn't wish the VA on my worst enemy. Tricare is marginally better and that's being generous.

 

[cheez]

You need TP for your bunghole, bruv. There's still a li'l poo on you.

 

[Alan_Hepburn]

No need to argue for Service Branch, just listing it as a general option. My family is Army all the way, you better be Airborne, and you should do everything you can to get into the 101st. Also, you should get more jumps than your dad did.

If you're in the 101st you're not Airborne - you're Airmobile. You want to call yourself Airborne you aim for the 82nd Airborne Division!

 

[Alan_Hepburn]

Admittedly the 101st has a cool insignia but the 82nd invaded Grenada!

The 101st may have a cool patch, but they're still legs!

 

[Alan_Hepburn]

Since you didn't serve Mike, I'll enlighten you...trusting the VA for anything related to actual healthcare is a mistake. They're an overburden poor bureaucratic excuse for health care that was created with wonderful intentions and then grossly mismanaged and underfunded to the point they are today which is now a sorry excuse for a healthcare service. I wouldn't wish the VA on my worst enemy. Tricare is marginally better and that's being generous.

Maybe I'm an outlier, but I've had nothing but great care from the VA - in several VA facilities over the years. Free eyeglasses every year, free hearing aids every 3 years, free prescriptions, excellent care when needed, and very responsive health-care teams that actually care about my health.

 

[GAJ]

Maybe I'm an outlier, but I've had nothing but great care from the VA - in several VA facilities over the years. Free eyeglasses every year, free hearing aids every 3 years, free prescriptions, excellent care when needed, and very responsive health-care teams that actually care about my health.

That's good to hear.

 

[bikewanker]

If you're in the 101st you're not Airborne - you're Airmobile. You want to call yourself Airborne you aim for the 82nd Airborne Division!

All the way Sir!

 

[ST Guy]

IMO, engineers are a specie (the way certain brains are built). my dude worked as a mechanical design engineer his whole career. he wasn’t educated in it (his education was in fire science). WRT that, he was super particular about where he wanted to work, and while waiting for a position to open up in the right location with the forest service, he took a technician job at an aerospace company (to pass the time and pay the bills). they quickly decided ‘you’re our boy’, and long story short, next thing he knows, he’s designing missile payloads. next up - he’s aggressively recruited by a prominent (arguably, THE prominent) computer company to do mechanical design for them (and earned them many patents for the work he did).

self taught? like i said, i think it has a lot more to do with how a person’s brain is wired. and IME an engineers brain has unique wiring. and yeah - a lot of engineering work does require a license. but a lot doesn’t. and in those areas - talent, and that curious and un-intimidatable engineering brain can thrive.

and WRT that computer company - they almost bit off more than they could chew (he’s a belligerent, foul mouthed piece of work), but they tolerated his shit, and rewarded him handsomely for the work he did for them. the bank he amassed allowed him to retire early, and do what he truly loves - ride. now the only ass he’s a pain in is mine.

Littlebeast has got it. The vast majority of engineering positions don’t require a license or a degree. I worked in the field of medical devices. There are no degrees for that specialty as far as I know. And I worked in start ups where nobody cared as long as you could do the work. Creativity trumped any degree. That was my specialty, being creative and coming up with ideas no one had ever thought of. Sometimes we’d meet with a doctor or two and shoot ideas off one another. If something promising came out of the meeting, it might become a new company. The first company I worked for was sold to Boston Scientific. Another was sold to Abbott Laboratories. Similar circumstances with other companies. While I was at Abbott, I’d brainstorm new ideas and one of those was financed into yet another company. So it goes.

A benefit of being successful was I never had to look for work. I frequently had to turn down offers.

 

[Climber]

Littlebeast has got it. The vast majority of engineering positions don’t require a license or a degree. I worked in the field of medical devices. There are no degrees for that specialty as far as I know. And I worked in start ups where nobody cared as long as you could do the work. Creativity trumped any degree. That was my specialty, being creative and coming up with ideas no one had ever thought of. Sometimes we’d meet with a doctor or two and shoot ideas off one another. If something promising came out of the meeting, it might become a new company. The first company I worked for was sold to Boston Scientific. Another was sold to Abbott Laboratories. Similar circumstances with other companies. While I was at Abbott, I’d brainstorm new ideas and one of those was financed into yet another company. So it goes.

A benefit of being successful was I never had to look for work. I frequently had to turn down offers.

Along those lines, I was thinking about doctors and how a bunch of them think along a flow chart methodology with it's strengths and limitations. I was thinking that an engineer's natural way of system based thinking could be a big plus in medicine.

People are right about engineers, whether trained or not, have a different way of approaching problems. I always had a curiosity to figure out how things worked, when something broke around the house I was always happy to figure out how it worked and fixed it, that came from a very young age.

 

[ST Guy]

I, too, would always try to fix things. And when I was growing up, I had a drawer full of old clocks, food mixers, and the like to fool around with. And I dabbled with electronics. I built my first engine when I was 17. A hopped up flathead Ford. I didn’t even have my drivers license. I always seemed to be taking stuff apart and putting it back together. I once built a tiny radio that would fit in my shirt pocket. That predated transistors.

 

[Holeshot]

A couple of things...

Firstly, I don't know where you went to high school, but where I did in Southern California, there absolutely were "two paths" that the district had in place in all of the high schools that were under it.

Secondly, I'm not necessarily an advocate of 14-18 year old kids being expected to know exactly what they want to do with their lives and thus moving into a curriculum pattern that defines their life's career at such a young age.

HS outside Phily. Career day was a thing then and there, but nothing about preparing kids for anything but college (prep schools) or graduation (public). My Nieces and GF's sons; same thing. This is CO and CA, respectively. I don't know anyone who's had the kind of good experience you described, and it looks as if there was a concerted effort by the school system. Bravo for that.

Not 14-18. 16-18 and I did not describe any definition of life going forward. I said "learn a skillset". That skillset can be anything that'll put food on the table. At 16, I was bussing tables and detailing cars (for free) when I wanted to. Made money waiting tables and have a skill I could still use. My GF's son took similar track and talks about going back part time on top of his day job.

If we can get to a point where every HS graduate has a marketable skillset, we'll have slayed a bear.

A degree isn't necessary for success in life; it's helpful, however, to attain higher levels of affluence. One can succeed working on a road repair crew one's entire life (cheers to my stepfather) and make an income on which one won't starve. If you want a more comfortable life, a degree can definitely help you attain that.

And THAT is the scam right there. Everything learned in a university now aside from socialization can be learned from independent, self taught resources. It's insane. My sister has been the chief at-distance-learning curriculum designer for her department for several years. She developed the standards from well before Covid. Her stories of the typical college student are hysterical. I know many of us were just that, but it goes to show: like yourself, you SHOULD excel beyond the artificial glass ceiling Dan. But, to keep the system of pay/play in place, you can't let people just hop over the fence into a 3 piece tux cocktail hour.

Students pay for the piece of paper, at the end of the day. There's so many cheaper ways to get the same result, at a minimum.

Since you didn't serve Mike, I'll enlighten you...trusting the VA for anything related to actual healthcare is a mistake.

The VA is in one of my buildings. I've had some interesting conversations with piers who work there and learned a bit. I've concluded your region of care makes a difference.