Prepared for college

CarcharOdin said:

To my knowledge the idea of "you must go onto university after high school to succeed" is a relatively recent thing. In the older generations, especially Baby Boomer, you could live a comfortable life (read: own property and have an income that gives you standard quality of life) with a high school diploma because there was more demand for vocational professions and that according to my grandparents, universities back then were REALLY REALLY difficult and so few people used to get in.

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In my high school's case every senior class is called into the auditorium for a presentation about the importance of university, which is then followed by pretty much forcing everybody to apply to CUNY (City University of New York), thereby having you apply to every school in the city. Obviously if you apply for a school you don't have to follow up on the responses but it is this general tactic of misleading students into believing that you NEED to go to uni if you don't wanna end up a bum, that throws you into the fray (and debt). I can't think of any high schools in my city (based on other friends' experiences) that even cover trades as extremely viable sources of income.

I did two grueling years of uni (3 semesters) only to find out it was way too much money and my brain is just not equipped to do this. I am a D-student in high school, there was no way I was cut out for this. I haven't even done homework since middle school. I still believe to this day I made it out of the school system through sheer roll of the dice. That's when I got certified/licensed as a welder and an electrician (about 1 year and 3/4 total 'schooling'). I've managed to escape my debt with the money I make now doing metalwork (which I combine with my electricity background to make automatic doors, roll-up gates, drive-way gates, etc) and I actually enjoy what I do, I have really good hours and really good job security.

I strongly urge anybody in high school who is planning for the future to look up a trade and see if any interest them. If you feel like you're not cut out for school like me then take that step to research. If you're even slightly interested in something learn more about it, trust me, you have options. Not everybody is cut out to be a doctor or a lawyer and that's fine.

You won't believe how much I get for doing really basic shit like welding I-beams together. Which is another good thing about being a certified tradesman, you can be on-call and get side jobs for extra cash.

PsyMaster said:

In my high school's case every senior class is called into the auditorium for a presentation about the importance of university, which is then followed by pretty much forcing everybody to apply to CUNY (City University of New York), thereby having you apply to every school in the city. Obviously if you apply for a school you don't have to follow up on the responses but it is this general tactic of misleading students into believing that you NEED to go to uni if you don't wanna end up a bum, that throws you into the fray (and debt). I can't think of any high schools in my city (based on other friends' experiences) that even cover trades as extremely viable sources of income.

I did two grueling years of uni (3 semesters) only to find out it was way too much money and my brain is just not equipped to do this. I am a D-student in high school, there was no way I was cut out for this. I haven't even done homework since middle school. I still believe to this day I made it out of the school system through sheer roll of the dice. That's when I got certified/licensed as a welder and an electrician (about 1 year and 3/4 total 'schooling'). I've managed to escape my debt with the money I make now doing metalwork (which I combine with my electricity background to make automatic doors, roll-up gates, drive-way gates, etc) and I actually enjoy what I do, I have really good hours and really good job security.

I strongly urge anybody in high school who is planning for the future to look up a trade and see if any interest them. If you feel like you're not cut out for school like me then take that step to research. If you're even slightly interested in something learn more about it, trust me, you have options. Not everybody is cut out to be a doctor or a lawyer and that's fine.

You won't believe how much I get for doing really basic muk like welding I-beams together. Which is another good thing about being a certified tradesman, you can be on-call and get side jobs for extra cash.

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This. Not everyone is indeed cut out for what colleges and universities teach. Unless you're entering a field with immense returns, you're going to be in debt for decades. The shape our collegiate system is in is more than a bit saddening. More than a few times I've often thought to myself why I don't just waltz into a field that'll actually pay.

As you said, blue collar work is work that's needed and rarely goes under, in my experience. Good on you.

JDJacket said:

For students in California, I say forget college and focus on learning the basics, because without them you'll never make it very far. California ranks somewhere between 48th or 49th place in education out of all the states in the US. Yikes.

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I went to school in California and went to college in California. I never saw anything like what those kids wrote in college, but plenty of times in K-12.

So I think when it comes to California, the colleges are phenomenal....the K-12 public schools are horrid. I speak from experience.

It's not uncommon to see a lot of remedial courses in the universities and mandatory "university learning requirements." Cal State Monterey often said that the mandatory classes were to give people some experience in different fields to help them get ready, but the real purpose is pretty obvious...to make freshman retake 9th through 12th grade the proper way a second time around.

Those mandatory classes (most of which I didn't even need) and my part-time work, combined with the fact that Biology was my major and it shouldn't really be surprising it took me 6 years to get my bachelor's.

The field I was looking at was Meteorology and thank goodness I did my research first. The field is currently flooded with people going after few jobs that pay at most $140,000 but your more then likely gonna only find a job that pays $40,000. Funny thing too at age 11 a Warning Coordinator ( The person that issues Warning products) at my local National Weather Service Forecast Office thought I had 2 years of college already, lol! All I got to say is do you homework on the career prospects waiting for you on the other end and don't waste your time with fields of study that won't pay off long term, (I'm looking at you gender and cultural studies)

The problem I have with the American education system is that it has not been about learning or preparing people for anything for quite a while now.

Trade schools/learning a trade is nice, but in most first-world countries the need for those kinds of jobs is becoming smaller and smaller; first-world countries tend to have post-industrial economies, read: ones that are not built on trades. Thing is though is that not everyone is capable of doing/handling the kinds of jobs typical of today's world, but when that's your only option, whaddya do?