Current Events > As a college student I'm tired of hearing that it's a waste of time

(+) Yeah! (+)

Especially from someone that happens to be working a minimum wage job with no career goals or game plan in life.

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It's only a waste of time for those that make it a waste of time. That is, people who go simply because they believe it's expected of them and bounce from major to major without any direction or how to steer it to an eventual career goal. Now, value to cost may be differently evaluated...

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It's not a waste of time. It keeps you off the streets and out of trouble.

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Darker Cheshire posted...

It's only a waste of time for those that make it a waste of time. That is, people who go simply because they believe it's expected of them and bounce from major to major without any direction or how to steer it to an eventual career goal. Now, value to cost may be differently evaluated...

I understand where youre coming from and its perfectly logical, but I think you not quite getting where Im coming from. Its the trendy new thing to profess your distaste for post-high school education, become an instagram entrepreneur and mimic every one of Garyvees talking points, but college remains the only way our society innovates and advances in math, physics, medical science, and so on.

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I'd say it's not a necessary path like it's been peddled over the last many decades. It can be as helpful as it can be an utter waste of money and time for those who go into it without a plan. I'd say there's very likely a major bloat issue where institutions make themselves out to be necessary, but you could realistically learn everything on your own. You're only blocked from entry by an arbitrary piece of paper. But then there's obvious fields where you need the expertise of actual people studied in it, like doctors. So, I'd say it's ultimately both depending on what you want to do, the validity of the institution, and the necessity of higher education in the field you're pursing.

nemu posted...

where institutions make themselves out to be necessary, but you could realistically learn everything on your own.

I think it's likely that this isn't really the case for pretty much any academic subject. I think students undervalue how helpful it is to have an expert in the field filter information through their lens.

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COVxy posted...

I think it's likely that this isn't really the case for pretty much any academic subject. I think students undervalue how helpful it is to have an expert in the field filter information through their lens.

So damn true. I've been doing some personal studying lately - I'm in a gap year between undergrad and graduate school in order to avoid burnout and for other reasons, but I'm still studying math (my major) out of personal curiosity and to keep my mind sharp. It's a fair bit more difficult to teach oneself in my experience - certainly not insurmountable though.

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its only a waste of time if you picked a major and career plan thats going to leave you still hurting for $$$ while regretting that choice

if your gameplan left you (or is leaving you) painted into a corner with crazy debt, yeah you fucked up...

own it, change it

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My biggest regret in life is listening to adults who told me how they think the world works when I was 20

nobody fucking knows what they're doing, and the vast majority of people are TERRIBLE at money management, which is elementary school level math

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COVxy posted...

I think it's likely that this isn't really the case for pretty much any academic subject. I think students undervalue how helpful it is to have an expert in the field filter information through their lens.

Major fields, yes. Some of the random junk classes you hear about in mocking news articles, not so much. Also, with the prevalence of online courses, I wonder how many give the user a true college experience, and how many cheap ones simply give the equivalence of a comprehensive self-study package.

nemu posted...

I'd say there's very likely a major bloat issue where institutions make themselves out to be necessary, but you could realistically learn everything on your own. You're only blocked from entry by an arbitrary piece of paper.

Learning on your own gets you a very shallow understanding. Having a good teacher will build you a solid foundation, and will teach you things that you didn't even know existed

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COVxy posted...

I think it's likely that this isn't really the case for pretty much any academic subject. I think students undervalue how helpful it is to have an expert in the field filter information through their lens.

This so much. I'm a journalism, and while I could theoretically get out there and just start writing or whatever, it's so valuable to me to have a teacher and mentor that actually ran a successful magazine for 35 years show me the right way to do things. I could feel around in the dark, but why would I when I could have someone show me the way?


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Gary V said its the biggest waste of time ever.

You should be putting your time into TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter and Twitch/Mixer right now
Same amount of time you put into your college studies will get you farther on those platforms and can help you for the rest of your life.

Internet is growing
irl education is diminishing

internet fame, popularity growth is going to be extremely important in the next 50 years so thhe more you know and do on there now is better for the money you will make.

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Most people I hear making that argument have either been drinking Mike Rowe's Kool-Aid or are struggling with an inferiority complex.

You don't need an education, but it's never a waste.

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All you have to do is talk to people who have "taught themselves upper level math" to see what a difference there is between self-teaching and actual teaching.

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AwesomeOSauce posted...

Gary V said its the biggest waste of time ever.

You should be putting your time into TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Twitter and Twitch/Mixer right now
Same amount of time you put into your college studies will get you farther on those platforms and can help you for the rest of your life.

Internet is growing
irl education is diminishing

internet fame, popularity growth is going to be extremely important in the next 50 years so thhe more you know and do on there now is better for the money you will make.

I cant tell if this is a copy and paste meme lol but Ill play along. Gary Vs model for success is not sustainable on a macroeconomic level. Not every can be an entrepreneur. We need doctors, lawyers, chemists, physicists, and mathematicians more than we need the next one of a kind pop-up smoothie cafe.

I feel like hes specifically targeting business majors who could just as easily save money on school and invest those savings into a start up. My concern is hes not making this clear to the masses, so the uneducated part of his fanbase conflates this with school being a waste of time in general.

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For me collage was a waste becuase there wasnt a single career that interested enough to invest, didnt help that I dispised school in general. Fortunelty I realised my aptitudes lied more so in trades. Where could hop into my career of choice, am taught only what is essential toward said job and am put to work and making good money in very little time.

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Mr Hangman posted...

Even if you pick a major that opens up a good career financially, it will still feel like a waste of time as you struggle to think of a single thing you studied over all those years that has any relevance to what you actually do. College is gate-keeping. If you want to learn something useful, take spreadsheet courses. Lots of them.

My courses right now literally involve me going out and conducting interviews, doing research, and putting together articles and other media that my professors, all of which come directly from the world of reporting, critique and help me improve. Everything I'm doing today is what I'll be doing every day in the future. I might not remember details from a freshman anthropology class or calculus formulas, but I don't see how that's a damning critique of college when everything else I do is directly applicable to my career.

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About half of it is, when you're doing Gen-Ed classes for no particular reason other than stretching about 18 months of meaningful training into four or five years.

This is why we need to de-stigmatize vocational schools.

I had a free ride to a community college bit couldn't afford the other 2 years at university. I have done pretty well for myself on an associates. I am making the same as the top employees who did and are still paying off loans.

The issue is when people look at college exclusively as a financial investment. For Gods sake, its a way to dive into something youre interested in, even if you dont necessarily get a 6-figure job afterwards.

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People tend to conflate "not for everyone" with "waste of time".

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Mr Hangman posted...

It shouldn't be exclusively a financial investment, but today, if it isn't one, then it's a trap which will leave you in a miserable debt spiral.

The exact reason it's so ridiculously expensive is because we set up the means to finance college out for forty years, back in the early 90s.

If nothing else, graduating makes you more visible in a sea of nobodies. You can use that degree to say "Look, I finished college, can they say that?" when you're applying for a job.

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I always hear about college being so expensive (and it is if you go to a private institution or an out of state school), but if you look at all your options theres many cost-effective ways of attending school without going into massive debt.

For example, at community college I received a waiver when I applied for financial aid which allowed me to go to school for free in California. Now Im attending a university in California and my university grant alone pays for my tuition, books, fees, AND my student health insurance. On top of that, Im receiving a subsidized loan each quarter which allows me to pay for rent amongst other things. In total I receive around $2.4-$2.8k every 3 months (beginning of each quarter) as a direct deposit. $1800 of which is a loan each quarter, but the interest doesnt begin accruing until 6 months after I graduate.

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In my personal experience, college isn't necessary, in the sense that your degree won't help you regardless of what you study. The issue is that not having a degree will still hurt you, because thanks to ATS programs, college is used as a filter to eliminate the excess of applicants.

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