Posted on 11/13/2016 12:05:08 AM PST by vannrox
November 11, 2016 Dallas, Texas, USA
Bleary-eyed from the 16+ hour flight from Asia, I checked my phone last night once the plane landed to find that riots have broken out across the Land of the Free.
It was enough to wake me from my jet lag.
All the televisions in the airport terminal were showing footage of the chaos along with occasional interviews with some of the protestors.
Naturally there was outcry against racism, sexism, violence, and all the usual anti-Trump arguments.
(Which I found ironic given this video of a Trump voter being viciously beaten in Chicago.)
But one of the recurring themes from these protestors being interviewed, primarily young people, was that Trump wasn’t going to do anything about student debt.
This was a major issue during the election, one that Bernie Sanders grabbed onto with promises of free education and debt reduction.
His message resonated with young people.
I’ve see this same theme all over the world, from Chile to the United Kingdom-- students want free education, underpinned by a fundamental belief that quality education is a basic human right to be provided by the government.
Even if you agree with this assertion, there’s a MAJOR problem with the logic: these students are conflating “education” with “university degree.”
Anytime young people tell me they’re entitled to free education, I always ask the same questions--
How many books did you read in the past six months?
How many times did you go to the local library?
How many free online courses from top universities like Harvard, MIT, and Georgetown did you take at edx.org?
How often have you actually used the multitude of free resources at your disposal to educate yourself?
Most times I just get the deer in the headlights look.
The truth is that they’re not interested in free education.
They just want a free university degree… a piece of paper that confers neither education nor any guarantee of success in life.
Candidly, many of the important things we need to learn in life are not taught in school.
I’ve started more businesses than I can count, some of them spectacular failures, others highly successful. I didn’t learn any of those skills at school.
And everything I learned about farming, for example, was on the land, not in the classroom.
This is true with many other elements that help us achieve success in life-- business, investing, networking, romance, personal health, etc.
Understandably, certain professions do require formal schooling.
But that’s not really the point.
This is ultimately about people expecting the government to steal from others and give them something of questionable value for free when they haven’t yet taken steps to provide for themselves.
One could make the same argument that access to healthy food is a fundamental human right, and that the government should provide organic vegetables for free.
But how many seeds are people planting for themselves? A tomato plant can be grown from a single seed and about one square foot of space with almost no effort.
You’ll eat better (and sooner) taking matters into your own hands rather than waiting for the government to pass some terrible law in order to give you something for free.
It’s the same with education.
Yes, the cost of university in the Land of the Free is out of control. And it really doesn’t make sense for young people to start their lives buried in debt.
But rather than demand a bunch of laws be passed (which, even if this ever happens, will take years), you’ll be much better off taking matters into your own hands.
This starts with expanding your thinking.
Rather than limit yourself to traditional options (i.e. I’m from the US therefore I must attend a US university in order to be successful), consider whether university is the right option at all.
If you truly want to learn a highly valued skill that can pay the bills and provide income security (sales and marketing, business management, investing, design, web development, e-commerce, etc.) you may be better off eschewing university and instead learning directly from someone who has mastered what you want to know.
It’s an extreme example, but you would learn more about investing by working for Warren Buffett than in any university program.
This simple concept of apprenticeship has worked for thousands of years: if you want to be successful, learn from successful people.
Even if you still think that university is the right choice (which it very well may be), expand your thinking to the whole world.
There are plenty of high quality universities overseas that you can attend for almost nothing.
Top universities in Germany and Switzerland, for example, offer degree programs entirely in English, and you can attend for less than the cost of a bus pass.
To boot, going abroad gives you a lot of great international experience and the chance to achieve fluency in a foreign language.
So the end result is that you still get that piece of paper (your university degree), along with tons of other benefits and experiences, with almost none of the costs.
We have a huge problem with the degenerates consider what are privileges and what are rights because they have never worked a hard day in their life before or had to foot someone elses’s bill
Bluto Blutowsky “ Damn! 7 years of free college down the drain!”
The poor little snotflakes are gonna melt when they find out nothing is free in life...
Oh, are your future wait-staff/barista’s acting up again down there?
This writer doesn’t get it. Students don’t want a free education, they want to be paid to go to college.
Colleges and universities have become a students worst enemy. They have become Cultural Marxism recruiting station for brainwashed Zombies who after completion will not be functional adults. If the PC classes were stopped and classes were actually focused on the students chosen field the tuition would likely drop by half. If such things as text books were standardized that would be another huge savings.
There are ways to get a free college education or at least earned assistance. Military service enlistment comes to mind and I would like to see the old GI Bill restored like the one I was under when I enlisted in 1976. After my discharge I took Voc/Tech classes to help me further expand my skills I learned in high school and the Navy. There are also many scholarship programs in academics and athletics. My grandson is a freshman in a conservative southeastern university. He is there tuition free on an athletic scholarship in Track something which larger universities do not offer. His intentions are to become a surgeon. He has the grades for it as he was an honors student in high school.
The colleges and universities need to end Tenure for all but the necessary professors, assistants, and other instructors. A lot of the extras need to be cut as well such as the safe place nonsense and diversity departments. I kid you not a major university near me spends a week devoted to Sex Week. This at a university where a frat house was closed for butt chugging which is booze enemas. Do such morons need a free education?
My great grandfather became a doctor without medical school. His father in law trained him. Before that he was a store keeper. His brother was a pharmacist and bail bondsman.
College is overrated and is being pushed off on students without the aptitude nor even need for it. High Schools are pushing it to appease idiotic federal mandates about test scores with federal funding tied directly to college prep test scores. Most high school students would be better served being able to after their sophomore year be allowed to work in an OJT environment or take Voc/Tech courses all day.
In 1976 I worked full time 8-5 most of my senior year of high school in my chosen field. I had no classes to attend and did the mandatory English at home. Four years of English is also another waste as is mandatory advanced Math classes such as Algebra many will not need and can not pass. You'll see persons who pass Algebra test buying items one at a time at Walmart because they never learned true basic Math. But they can pass the Algebra portion of their SAT.
... colleges have become a place for the kids to hideout for 4 or more years running up debt. Most of them know how to game the system and have more discretionary income than the average working stiff, and all the while whining about their college debt — thinking in they’ll never have to pay it back. They are getting paid to go to school — it’s a job. Most of the kids know how to get food stamps too, and child care, cost of living expenses.
This is ultimately about people expecting the government to steal from others and give them something of questionable value for free when they haven’t yet taken steps to provide for themselves.
This about sums it up — not only in regard to free education, but to All of liberalism.
Amazingly,they have to take out student loans for their brainwashing. But no mention of their recent electorial college education not costing them a dime.
They don’t want to read complex books and study hard. They want to be paid to party for 4 years.
I’ve said for a long time that all fluff college courses should lose federal funding. Colleges should offer courses ONLY in subject that people can make a career from. Nursing, engineering, etc. Otherwise, trade schools should be the option.
Unfortunately, there are now employers that REQUIRE a four-year college degree in SOMETHING to get your foot in the door. I work at a call center; they now require the entry-level customer service reps to have a four-year degree.
I myself do not have a college degree of any level, but I have attended some college. I’ve been promoted 3 times since starting in 2008. Because of the requirement for a college degree, I can go no further, even though the next level (manager) my current managers freely admit I’m totally qualified for. That piece of paper is keeping me from any further promotion.
Which is actually fine by me; I don’t have the temperament to be a manager, and I’m 8 years from retiring. And I don’t want the stress!
The neocommies,including many in the msm, need to be investigated. Can we reanimate McCarthy?
That's the essence of it.
Many kids believe the world owes them something.
The crime is that their parents didn't prepare them and teach them that they have to earn what they want. The child throws a tantrum and gets rewarded. It's learned behavior.
The outcome? The college degree has become a participation trophy.
It seems that an education would be wasted on them as well.
My thought was that the liberal’s first step to giving free tuition would be followed by the next step of mandating all of our children to attend college so all could be indoctrinated by them.
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