[SeekAndFind]

Why push students down educational paths that will likely result in them dropping out? We should give everybody options that will help them succeed.

[TexasFreeper2009]

Another cause and effect mistake

The smartest kids graduate from college and then go on to earn more money... but going to college didn’t make them smart, they were smart to begin with and would have been more likely to earn more anyway.

Anyone who believes that sending a retarded kid to college will somehow magically transform him into someone smart who will earn more is a sucker who is going to end up with a lots of loans to pay back and nothing to show for it.

There are lots of jobs that earn good money that dont require much college if any. You just have to be willing to get a little dirty, sweat, or travel.

[Amagi]

Modern colleges are largely not college material.

[Bob]

Heaven forbid!!! Telling a student that he’s not cut out for college will damage his self-esteem which will traumatize him forever. (Do I really need a /sarcasm tag here?)

[Born to Conserve]

I think every high school graduate should go on to learn reading, writing, and arithmetic.

[ex-snook]

"Here’s a stark fact: According to research by Georgetown’s Anthony Carnevale and Jeff Strohl, less than 10 percent of poor children now graduate with a four-year college degree."

Is it because they were money poor or intellectually poor? I believe that high schools teach the same material to the money rich and the money poor. Colleges should loan good students the necessary money and teach them well or they won't get their money back.

[VanDeKoik]

As if “College Material” is better material than anyone else.

[Political Junkie Too]

George Bush's mistake was that he should have named his education reform bill the Every 5th Child Left Behind bill.

-PJ

[dfwgator]

[Cyber Liberty]

Mike Rowe has a lot to say on the subject.

Mike hosted "Dirty Jobs" on the Discovery Channel, and he's a big booster of vocational education. He's set up a foundation to help people get on that path, and make plenty of money at it. There are a lot of jobs in the trades available, and employers are having trouble filling them.

[I want the USA back]

Now the libs want college to be “free.” Combine that with a different set of standards for people according to their membership in an appropriate victim group, and college will have absolutely no value at all.

[uglybiker]

I have three nephews.

The youngest said, "%&$# college" and went into the Air Force and is currently having the time of his life stationed in Germany.

My second nephew said "%&$# college", got a plumber's certificate and now runs his own business, supporting a wife and two daughters.

My oldest nephew has a Masters Degree........and no job.

[Hot Tabasco]

Other research indicates that low-income students in particular benefit from college, becoming nearly three times more likely to make it into the middle class than their peers

That's solely due to "affirmative action" in both the college and the work force which still prevails today........And one could certainly argue that B. Hussein Obama is a product of that racist and failed philosophy........

[blueunicorn6]

“You come to this institution with a head full of mush, and after four years, you leave here with a piece of paper, a $100,000 school loan debt, and a head full of oatmeal.”

[x]

What if our own hyper-credentialed life experiences and ideologies are blinding us to alternative pathways to the middle class?

"Our own"?

[virgil283]

College is no longer an education but now is indoctrination.

I went to college right after high school and then dropped out but a few years ago I went back and 80% of the young students were so inept the could hardly write a coherent sentence. And every class had some element of politically correct nonsense from enviromenalism to misogyny. It was so bad.

[GAFreedom]

Problem is, most BigCorp are like my employer. Do we have positions that do not require a degree? Sure, plenty of 'em, especially for field technicians. Will you ever be promoted? Receive a significant pay raise? Get new bennies? No. Will you be looked down upon by the office peeps? Will you be referred to as "low-rent" and "not suitable for promotion"? Will executives openly discuss replacing "obsoletes" with robots and software and automation in your hearing? Absolutely. I try to get my co-workers and superiors to take a different view, but it's a battle that's long been lost.

I believe that high schools teach the same material to the money rich and the money poor. Colleges should loan good students the necessary money and teach them well or they won't get their money back.

Not a bad idea. Needs to be some accountability on the college side.

[potlatch]

College entrance USED to depend upon taking certain courses throughout high school - with good grades, and then passing college entrance exams.

You either ‘made’ it or you didn’t!!