I had a person come into my place of work yesterday with a resume. He wandered up the to counter and proudly handed me his resume. I work in a computer shop, one of the small outfits that does a steady stream of repairs.
His resume said he had a degree in English, basically a Fine Arts Degree. That is cool, University degrees are important...
Or so I was lead to believe.
I hold a BoCS degree from a nice university. 17% of Canadians apparently finish their post secondary education and recieve some sort of degree. The most part, they are degrees in things like Fine Arts, which is a miss-mash of courses, and education, and 'Woman Studies". No bull, that is a degree.
Now, I know lots of people that have university degrees, or college degrees. Most of these souls, that showed up and at least put up the minimal effort to attend class, past tests, etc etc, are still living in small housing, or furnished apartments, working at Starbucks or your local Blockbuster Video.
What did their degrees do them?
I, fortunately, have had the honor or luck * luck, most likely*, of working for IBM and Microsoft. Good, solid contracts, and sure, while they were limited, I was putting my degree to use, not slinging coffee and donuts at a Tim Hortons, not that I didn't do it in the past. I don't want to sound like I am a elitist because of my education, but after all the work I put in, I would have liked something better if I hadn't gotten lucky earlier on. Hell, I managed a Tim Hortons AFTER I got my degree, working two jobs to get rid of my student loa ndebt.
But, more and more, I see these university students running the guantlet and ending up behind the register of a McDs. Specialized schooling became important in the past, mid, 90s, then the market glutted, at least in my field. There are triple the amount of lawyers in school then there are practicing. We have a shortage of nurses where I live, yet there are hundreds of nursing students to fill the need, but don't get hired.
So, what is the use of this degree? A friend that attended UVIC at the same time I did said " It shows that you can show up for four years". It's a foot in the door. But is that foot in the door worth enough to dive into debt. In Canada, the Student Loans Service put out a statistic that only 30% of all students that are granted don't get paid back. This is because people can't get the jobs they trained for and therefore can't pay back full.
Vicious cycle. "