This is silly.  When I was in seventh grade, I associated college with poontang, booze, sleepless nights(see poontang and booze), and moldy pizza.  What's with all this crap about education they're throwing into the mix!?

Priorities!

By your fruits we will know you, SG!  Your testimony speaks for itself!  If you had been guided and had a sense of  pride in your future, booze and poontang would not have come into the picture!

I never intended to go to college.  College is for people who care about money and a career and fancy stuff.  I'm an intellectual, yes, but my inclination is to simple things.  I'm just a peasant.

Aw, even peasants can be well educated; some can do it on their own, as Abe Lincoln (and it sounds like yourself) are apt to do, but others can't.  So college gives them a set of guidelines, and distinct subjects to take in order to learn what they need to know.

And hey; if your career does not need a degree to do well in, then so be it.  Others may not have it that easy.  A lot of employers look more favorably at someone who has a degree, unfortunately.  So, I guess, in some cases it is a matter of having the piece of paper to show you did the work!

But don't you care at all about money or a career? 

Nope, not at all. I farm, but I'll do anything I need to to get by, from digging ditches to putting up roofing for people.  I'll do things for free, if people want to pay me, that's their business.  I'm not into the whole success thing.  If someone is winning, someone else has to be losing, so I just aim down the middle.

Why can't it be a win-win situation? 

If it is only you to take care of, that is one thing, but to be poor by choice may just be silly!

No.  "Successful" careers are in the service industry these days, which is itself unsustainable, as it relies on the production of others.  In the case if America, that inevitably means importation on a vast scale, far surpassing exports and domestic production.  For everyone making their personal fortune, they are consuming more than they produce, hence contributing both to our national debt(thirty grand per person if you split it up) and the suffering of underpaid workers in the third world.

And anyway, why?

Ever notice that your highest suicide rates are in groups that are otherwise prosperous?

I have noticed what you said in your last sentence, yes, because so much pressure is put upon them to succeed.

Success is artificial and meaningless.

So says one of us

You can't take it with you!

True, but helps while you are here!  We are meant to do the best with what we have, though, and if we are given brains, we should develop them to the best of our abilities.  Some just do it in different ways than others. 

I think you are having fun with this little...discussion...

If Carpentry was good enough for Joseph, it's good enough for me!

Well, go for it then...but I am sure he grew up in a Carpenter's shop and had a lot of teaching along the way.  He did not just get it out of thin air...and that is all I am saying about colleges, that teach people skills.

Apprenticeship is far superior than book learning.

One gets apprenticeship during book learning; ever heard of practicum?
Okay; this will definitely be my last word on this; I think you just like the banter.

Perhaps it will work - educating children about college early on- if this program is continued through out H.S. when kids are most influenced by their environment, peers etc.

i think it's a great idea... especially the whole "…In eighth grade, students learn about how they can finance their education, about dorm life and how to manage money and time." part.  They should start planning for college a hell of a lot earlier than at 18, right before they go there. 

I think it's great that they're trying to give these kids a realistic idea of college at an earlier age, but it's really annoying when 60 or so campus-touring eighth graders and their teachers are sent into our cafeteria to eat when it's already extremely crowded.

I'd rather they maintain education from further away. Keep it in the classroom till they're old enough to act reasonably/clean up after themselves at dinner.

This is where tolerance comes in, shep! I am sure that they may be there one or two whole days out of your whole nine months on campus.  And if you wish these kids to have a well rounded education and idea of what it will be like on campus then you should be patient, and things will get back to 'normal' the next day.  After all; think of how you would have left a cafeteria at that age, had you been the one visiting!

Oh, it's not just one or two whole days. I could handle that.

Ah, but don't you think it would worth the concession, though, if it encourages the youngsters to choose your college, where they may not have before?

If it deteriorates the educational environment, then it's counterproductive.

It doesn't; that is just your opinion.

It's had to pay attention with a bunch of snot nosed brats running around.  Especially if something like this were implemented on a wide, national scale.

I come from a low income family and we were "encouraged" to go to college as early as nine years old (this was back in the late 70's).  It was great.... until reality hit the fan.  The sad reality is that most, if not all, low income children will be in debt for most of their lives paying off their college loans.  I still think it's unfair we have to pay for a higher education.  I never finished my degree.  I couldn't pay bills and stay in school.  Some people who are still in class also have full time jobs.  That means less and less sleep and long commutes even.  Sure, low income kids will get some grants and government aid, but there's also a BIG push to get recruited by the military to pay off loans and/or just max out your loans so that you can live on something as well as pay tuition.  It is easier to get into college these days, but harder to stay in.  And once you're out for a few years or months to pay bills and/or save money for college, the harder it is to get back in.  

I know that this is one of the issues, V! Two of my children went to college, and they had to get student loans and help to go, as we were at the low end of the income spectrum as well.  And yes, they are not liable for the loans and have a hard time paying them off.  But, the education they received and the jobs they now hold because of it, is worth the effort they have to go through in order to pay the loans off.  It is going to take them years, but the interest rate is very low and they are tolerant of one if you can only pay the minimum off.

I know it is very difficult, but I think it is worth it in the end!  I was fortunate not to have to pay anything for my college, as I went when my husband was unemployed and I received a special concession from an organization who paid for people like me who depended on my husband's income to survive.  So, I grabbed the opportunity while I could and got a two year degree, for free.  But my children know what it is like to have the loans looming over their heads.  One is going to be a teacher in the fall, and the other is a radiology tech, and I am so proud that they went to the effort of going, and staying in college!

Thanks for the reply!  I agree it is worth the challenge.  I'm hard at work trying to get back in.  Now that I'm on disability and consolidated my loans, it'll be easier.  I may never get a high paying job, but the experiences I've had are worthwhile.  Still, I wish higher education didn't cost so much!

I agree that they should make it easier to go.  It is difficult with such a financial burden to bear!

It's also unfortunate that we're not really pushing higher paying careers on those with low income families.  Because they are low income families, social scientists seem to all agree that "job security in the labor force," or really a happy phrase for "dead-end, low-wage jobs," are the only things that should be pushed on low-income families.

So, we push college, a very expensive investment, onto people with little money, then we tell them that they won't amount to much other than a $20-40k salary after about 5 years, maybe $30-60k after 10-15 years of working.

But, when it comes to 21st-century-education, it seems that fantasy is more important than reality.  *sigh*

There's a lot to be said for dead end low wage workers.  Most of it is at least honest work, which can't be said for most of your higher ups in the corporate world.

Wow, SG.  You really did not follow the context there at all, did you?

When you tell someone that X is all they can hope to be, and X happens to be rather low-tier in the career industry, the person more than likely becomes "trapped" in the low-wage cycle, and this can probably extend to families (don't think this is an isolated scenario I pulled outta my ass.  This happens.  A LOT.  It's part of why the lower class can't escape the lower class when you factor in only things they can directly control).

Rather than give the lower class something to be hopeful about, such as, say, being an engineer and popping out a $50k paycheck on the first year after college, you give them a low job.  This is actually a clever phenomenon "higher ups" are using against "do-gooders."  Business gurus who want nonthinkers feed a lot of interesting information to people who want to genuinely help those less fortunate, and those less fortunate wind up receiving rather bad help.

Of course, this isn't something being looked into.  We're more concerned with nonsensical issues like filling prisons with drug users or someone not taking my friend's wedding pictures 'cuz my friend is gay.

You're right.  There is a lot to be said about dead-end low wage workers.  They are almost always going to be stuck there, they generally live paycheck to paycheck, and aren't too happy because they're doing it primarily because they have no other choice.

Engineers are all well and good, but give me an experienced good ol' boy with an arc welder who hasn't seen a text-book since dropping out of seventh grade and I'll get the job done.  Life and experience are the only schools worth a damn.

...I can't tell if you're really missing the point of what I said and are just that stupid, or if you're just deliberately doing this.

Neither or both, I'm not sure which.  One thing I know about engineers is that whoever designs farm equipment, tools, etc. are not the people who have to use them, because if they did, the world would be a whole lot different!