Colleges and universities are more than willing to take your money in order to prepare your child for a career in which he probably won’t be able to find a job.
This article made me so sad because I was once a journalism student. While I don’t believe I was as idealistic as some of the students quoted, I enjoyed every bit of my journalism education, and looked forward to a career in journalism. A lousy economy at the time of my graduation ruined that dream for me back then.
Today, these kids are graduating into a lousy economy and a deteriorating journalism scene (note some of the comments after the article from recent journalism grads who can’t find work). The rise of the Internet and the clear bias of American media have resulted in newspapers dropping like flies. Yes, there are far more writing opportunities online than in print, but they pay less, too. It’s much harder to make a living as a journalist now than it was nearly 30 years ago when I graduated during the Carter years.
Yet the professors quoted in the article let the students believe that “it’s all going to be ok” when they surely know better. Gotta keep those paychecks coming in, I guess. (Same reason so many colleges and universities inflate grades these days, but I digress…..)
The moral of this story? Just because a college offers a specific major does not mean your child will be able to find work after obtaining that degree. Help your child make a wise career choice. Check out specific careers and their predicted futures at www.bls.gov. Most of all, don’t believe the hype of colleges that need to keep a certain number of warm bodies coming through their departments in order to maintain their own employment.
I hope my children will have a clear direction when they enter the houses of “higher” education. For me it was a lot of stumbling. I started, then stopped, and started again. It took me at least 7 years to finish my degree. Thankfully, when training to be a teacher, the only thing they can do wrong is not prepare you enough. I can’t think of any way they actually lied. Isn’t that sad, to think that we should consider whether we’ve been lied to or not! 🙁 Shouldn’t we be able to trust that the truth is what is presented? I wish it were so!
What a great, informative, series you have going here. My eldest is only 5, so I have a few years, yet. But I figure it can’t hurt to learn about the coming years now. 🙂
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Tori, I think you’re going to see an awful lot of changes in college by the time your eldest gets to that stage. Tuition has gotten so high, and one of the main sources of it in recent years (home equity loans) are no longer viable for most people. Should be interesting….