Posted on 05/01/2011 9:43:22 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Interesting my 10th grader has been told he’s on track (if he works a little harder) to be Div.-1 baseball player. As a dad who’s taken an active role in shaping the kid, pitching to him, filming every swing, etc. it’s a helluva payoff.
However as I start to look at things I wonder if it’s even worth it. The baseball teams even if fully funded only have 11.7 scholarships. So in general a stud pitcher or catcher might get a full-ride but that’s about it. Everyone else is getting partial’s and there are plenty of walk-ons.
Yesterday they toured a D-1 school’s baseball facility and the head coach talked about some of the perks of being an athlete (meals twice a day most of the time, laundry etc.) so certainly it’s worth something. If you get get .25 scholarship I also assume that to be covering room/board/tuition, so I still plan to pursue it, but really look into options.
I personally think starting out playing at a JUCO might be best (here in Fla. the brand of baseball is very competitive) and they are not under NCAA rules about scholarship limits. While JUCO is lesser education like another poster pointed out you get two years to figure stuff out. Maybe at the end of that he decides being a college athlete is way too burdensome. Maybe he loves it, and wants to go D1 at that point. Hell maybe he gets drafted I don’t know but the point is that can be two full years of not paying out too much and lets him grow up a little.
Disclaimer: 97K student loan I am paying on. Dumb-dumb-dumb and I don’t want the kids to do what we did.
“Almost all HR department heads want to see that you have that “BA/BS” of a’ticket’ before they even consider you for a meaningful position.
Well there’s a reason for that, which is accreditation (something you don’t find in high schools). The degree shows that you can read, write, and do at least basic math (pre-Calculus, at the one school I just checked on - for an English degree). There is no way in heck I would hire someone for any job that involved those subjects unless they had at least an Associate’s Degree...as getting even that requires that you, essentially, learn what you should have in high school (typically a 2-year effort), and then take two years of classes beyond that (4 years for people who have been pushed through the public school meat grinder). For any job that requires the use of computers...then definitely a 4-year degree.
It’s not the fault of the employers, it’s not the fault of the kids, it’s simply due to “Sight Words” and “Fuzzy Math” going on the public schools - and parents who trust those schools so much (due to their outstanding propaganda machine) that they end up crippling their kids for life.
“Yup. That is a scam. They have all of that real-estate to pay for so why not force students to live on campus. “
Actually, I’ve concluded that making the kids live on campus is part of the weeding out process. They want you to show that you can cut through the distractions of a dorm (which, of course, are huge), and still get decent grades. It’s not a bad process, from the view of an employer.
I only recently figured that out. When I was in college 20+ years ago, no video games, no internet, but still LOTS of distractions (in my case, spending 2 to 3 hours a day reading newspapers). I knew it would be trouble for me and I was right...but once you’re in a dorm you really don’t want to leave, as all of your buddies are there. If I had lived off campus the entire time, I probably would have graduated a year earlier. Instead I figured it out (by accident) and wound up living in was practically senior citizens’ housing. Worked great for me, I finally, more or less, caught up in my classes, and graduated with a respectable average.
“You want education? That’s free. Complete MIT curriculum online: http://ocw.MIT.edu
You want certification? That’s what’s expensive.”
The MIT courses are great!
Also, http://www.khanacademy.org/ is really good for the remedial stuff. I’m going back over the calculus which I neglected to study 45 years ago.
Work through all of these and a few other online courses then try to find a school that will give credit by examination. Good luck on that, though.
Back in 1997, I returned to college. My adviser was of Indian extraction and had a Tanzanian calendar on the wall. After I greeted him in Gujarati and a bit of Kiswahili, we had a good old time talking about Tanzania, East Africa and India. During this first meeting he suggested that I see the head of the Anthropology Department about getting “life credit” for the “Comparative Cultures” requirement in the core curriculum.
When I visited the Anthropology head in her office, she asked why I thought that I should receive credit. I told few of the places where I had lived & worked, mentioning living with an unreached tribe in a remote part of Uganda. She asked, “Which one?”, and when I told her she said, “Oh, you must come & speak to my classes!”
She wrote me a note for the Registrar’s office, saying” If you have any trouble, let me know.” Two weeks later with the Registrar still dragging their feet, I returned to the Anthropology department head. She wrote the Registrar a lengthy letter on department stationery which finally convinced them to give me credit.
All the registrar was concerned was the cash per credit hour I represented.
Yup. Tons of distractions. And many more today. Don’t know how kids manage. It would have probably been the end of me. The temptation would have been too great.
Many of the students at my school were professionals who worked during the day. Some of the professors were professionals, too. Gave us an interesting perspective.
And I think that it made it a little tougher. No frills, no BS.
Then again, I missed out on the “Campus life.” :)
Yep. I have 20+ of success in my field but can't get an interview (we're trying to move south) because I don't have a degree.
“It would have probably been the end of me. The temptation would have been too great.”
In my case, I replace the word “probably” with “definitely”. There is no way I could have gotten through.
Unfortunately, I see the same thing with my oldest boy...easy to distract, have to ride on him to do his schoolwork and study (in lieu of video games...that almost sank him late last year, when we tried easing up), and needless to say, Facebook.
So, I have two choices, drug him (Ritalin) or stay out of the dorms. Since he’s never been drugged in his life (we chose to spank him instead, much cheaper), you know my decision.
He has stated that he would like to be able to still come home on the weekends. He’s been heavily into theater at his high school, and he has little sisters that will also be in theater. He really wants to be able to see their shows and come home easily for the holidays.
I’m guessing he’ll go to a UC school. It will be liberal, but he’s not easily swayed. He went to a very liberal public middle school and hated it. I think his private Christian high school has really trained him up for college and beyond. (I think they’ve done better than his dad and I).
My daughters are totally different. One of them has special needs. She’s doing well in school and will go to college, but she’s looking at our local college (San Jose State). I don’t think she would like living in the dorms. It would be too loud and crazy for her. She likes calm and quiet.
My other daughter thinks she wants to major in music. I’ve told her we won’t pay to send her away to get a major in music because it is too hard to get a job. There’s a good flute teacher at San Jose State, so my daughter is thinking she may just live at home also and go to school. I’d be okay with her doing that. I’m not convinced she’ll end up majoring in music and she’ll can still take her core classes.
Carnegie Mellon is unbelievable! Apparently they don't give money to ANYONE. Several of my son's friends got in there but none are goung there because of the cost. One of them got $25k from NYU and is going there.
My son is going to Belmont University this fall. He wants to be a music composer for films, TV, video games, etc. Belmont has one of the few commercial music programs in the country and is the most affordable of those that do. He also got accepted at Berklee College of Music, which is nearly $50,000 a year. We will end up paying less than $10k a year for him to go to Belmont. And it is a small Christian college with no liberal indoctrination.
UCLA has a fantastic school of music too. But with music it is most important to visit several schools, and try to get a sample lesson with the instrumental instructor. Do not pay a lot of money or go into huge debt for a music performance degree! There are substantial music scholarships at most colleges based on auditions.
School requires a bit of maturity. It is a very long haul with many sacrifices. It is overwhelming if you are not prepared.
It gets very old towards the end. It is a four/five year marathon. The boot camp analogy works, too.
Distractions need to be minimized. Does he have a quiet place to study?
And maybe working Summers in low end, minimum wage, jobs will motivate your son. That is the quickest way for someone to mature.
Good luck.
“Wonder how many people work while going to school.”
I’d think a lot more than previously, since we’re in a horrible economy where there is no other help available, but at the same time that makes those jobs more scarce (or taken by illegal aliens - I was a janitor).
We Taxpayers paid for Obama’s Education and look where it got us.
I don’t disagree with some of the responses I received to my posting, but to put forth my thoughts on this a bit more clearly:
- the ‘college degree’ does not guarantee anything (it’s only a ticket) only a chance to get your name into the sorting. It’s still a ‘ticket’ - which really does not provide anything meaningful to what you need to do to earn a living, considering the $60k to $100k you need to pay to get it.
- I would rather hire a “HS” degree graduate with a verifiable “4 years” on the job experience for the position I am hiring-for, than having to train an ‘unproven’ individual with a 3.5 GPA from You Name It University.
I just think that unless you are going for a ‘Science’ or ‘Specialized’ field requiring additional technical knowledge, the 4 years of additional schooling versus ‘real on the job experience’ is not worth it.... looking at it from a functional perspective.
Yes, it not only possible- but simplistically easy. First, you have to decide whether you want an education or a social experience.
My son is just completing his first year of college. He is not going away to college at a cost of $20,000 per year, Rather, he is attending the local community college. The tuition cost is $2,700 per year and the federal government gives a tax credit of about $2,500 to cover that. The net cost is $500 per year plus books. Meanwhile, he is living at home and has a part time job which earns him about $10,000 per year. He is banking most of this money to pay for the final two years at a local university. (all of the credits he is earning at the community college transfer to the four year university.
If he decide to go to the local university and continues to live at home, the tuition will be about $9,000 per year instead of the $20,000 for the privilege of living in a crappy dorm. If he continues to work part time, the tuition is just about covered and when he graduates he should have more than $20,000 banked as well as real world job experience.
A highly trained cat is not gonna pass engineering classes.
That is not the real reason. Duke Power vs. Griggs
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