Is University worth it?

Introduction

Education is something that is important to all of us. Whether you’re somebody who didn’t finish high school or somebody who did go to University and not only got their bachelor but masters and PhD as well. Our time in education plays a massive role in how we see ourselves, our careers and much of the world around us. It is education where we got some of our first experiences of friendship and love as well as confusion and worry about our future. In this piece, I am going to speak about my own experiences in University and discuss both the pros and cons of attending an institution that can be seen as the most important decision in many people’s lives. Finally, I will finish with a conclusion. 

 

Personal Story

First of all, I have never been and I will likely never be an "A student." For the most part, I am a straight “C” student (55% to 70% ).  In secondary school (6 years between the ages of 12 and 18 in Ireland) I received maybe, 5 As (85% or higher). All of which came in English with one exception. That came in a business class. Those grades have followed me into University where I study Economics and German. Those grades may seem unimpressive to many and that conclusion is fair.  Despite this, such grades have never come easily for me. I am not the most “intelligent” person in the strictly academic sense. I will be the first person to admit that. In order to be a “band average student,” I have always had to work incredibly hard. 

Very often, like so many others in school and even now in University, I have experienced long periods of near unrelenting frustration trying to memorise many facts, figures and dates over the years. To this day the overwhelming thoughts of “This is useless”, “I don’t find this interesting”, “I won’t need this in my future” “I can’t believe I got up at 6:30 for this” and so on, cross my mind. I have always felt that I was learning facts, not to learn about life but simply to pass a test. Many of the reasons I have worked very hard, for good grades are, not positive ones. It is not so I can improve myself but rather, to keep a teacher off my back or be getting told I need to pass a certain amount of credits to pass a year in University. The days of when you are a child and you and I would be constantly asking questions because we were naturally curious about everything is something that is gradually thought out of us in school unless we make a conscious and constant effort to stay curious. 

Despite the previous statements, I have learned a lot at school that I have found very useful. I have for example I have some inspiring teachers that have pushed my interests in ways I could have never imaged. The best example of this is the fact when I was 17, I had the very arrogant view of “Why would I ever learn another language? Everybody speaks English anyway” Now at 21, as I write this I have lived in Germany 10 months. I have spoken German almost every day during that time. On top of this, I am now learning Spanish and a large part of me is starting to feel, that may not be the end of my language adventure so to speak. While the slight majority of this piece will favour the opinion of University is not as important as our society thinks, it would be naïve and narrow sighted of me to say it is a waste of your time and money. 

 

I can say without a doubt that the fact I am educated as a whole has helped me develop so much as a person and I am so grateful is have had the experience. Although I would be lying if I said I felt the same way about University. In fact, I can say for sure if it was not for my Exchange/Erasmus program I would think the whole experience was not worth the time or money I have put in. So now I will argue both cases on "Should one attend University" and then finish with a conclusion.

 

 

Pros of University 

1.    Signalling 

While some jobs require a degree. For example, one could not become a doctor without studying medicine for many years. This is totally understandable, as well as other fields such as psychology and law. As already suggested when it comes to business, humanities, arts and trades, we really do need to ask ourselves is University really required? At a starting point we could at least ask, does it need to be so expensive? This is something that will be spoken about later. For now, we need to ask the question what does a degree give somebody, who could have learned everything they learned alone? In a sentence, a degree is a statement of work ethic to employers. As I University student I can say with great confidence that a University degree is a lot of painstaking work. One has to make many sacrifices to achieve it. For many people, they will follow a career path that has nothing to do with what they studied at University. But a degree is a great signal to an employer. It suggests a certain level of intelligence, a certain work ethic and ability to follow orders well. All in which are qualities employers crave in new employees. Measuring such skills can be difficult for an interviewer. Yes, it’s great to work in a field in which you studied but for some, all a degree is a signal rather than a qualification or key to their chosen career path.

 

2.    Social Life and Personal Development 

University is, without a doubt, a great place to make friends as an 18-22-year-old. It is easy to find people with similar interest and hobbies to yourself. Wheather that is through sports teams, societies or what you study many people make friends for life at University. University for many is an opportunity to move out for the first time and often discover a new city. This space gives one to really discover themselves in an environment less demanding and cut throat than working life. Time studying at a third level institute essential gives much more time to grow up, discover who they are and where they want to go. Very few 18 years olds leaving school and know what they want to do with their lives and studying can be seen as a way of delaying that decision and helping students move in the right direction. 

 

3.    Earn More and Higher Job Satisfaction

For this point, I will point to an informative video I found on Youtube written by Bite Size Psych. One of the main reasons to study at University is the reward of earning more money than somebody who does not and there for living in theory, a more comfortable life. It is reported that people with a bachelor degree earn 60% more than people who left education after high school. Which is $700,000/€613,739 (July 7th, 2017)  more over a lifetime. People with a  bachelor degree are also three times less likely to be unemployed and 16% more likely to be satisfied with their job. These numbers are something to consider when deciding if one should go to University or not. 

 Con’s of University 

1.    Cost of University 

From personal experience, I can say with confidence that a four-year bachelor degree in Ireland will cost you €12,000. Which a similar degree in England will cost you £36,000. Finally, according to TopUniversities.com fees in the USA can range from $3,500 to $35,000 per year depending on where you study. This is even before considering transport, housing, utility and food expenses. The bottom line is, it can be incredibly expensive to study. This can put unmanageable pressure on families. Which must be very frustrating if your son or daughter wants to study something that really could be trained or learned quicker if not better with a work placement. Why does society insist that somebody who is a talented, self-thought musician needs a degree in music? Or why do we insist computer programmers who have thought themselves programs such as Java need a computer science degree? Many people will achieve more on their own than they will from a lecture. As a University student, I don’t think a day goes by where I don’t hear the sentence “I did not go to my lecture as I can learn it better on my own.” Sadly that statement can be backed up by every University student that has ever lasted more than a few weeks. It really makes you wonder.

 

2.    Could I Achieve My Dream Goal Without a Degree?

As already suggested. There are so many people out there who right now are doing a degree that they simply do not need to be doing. For example, nowadays in Ireland, you need to get a four-year degree you want to be a nurse. If you go back a few generations a degree to be a nurse was not a necessity. While the reasoning behind this is fair. Patients do need to be surrounded by the best to help them. Nonetheless, it does highlight the point that much of the reason many of us go to Unversity is not that the skills we learn there for a specific career can only be learned in a University but rather society has decided that is the only way to learn. So often we could learn more by simply pursuing something we are interested in. On a personal basis, I don’t study English in University yet I run two blogs. I have never got any sort of formal training in photography yet my photography is now at a professional standard. Even more impressive than this a good friend of mine has self- thought himself Spanish to the point he could read the first Harry Potter. Writing articles, photography and learning a language can all be self- thought. It goes without saying not everybody can be self-thought and many people respond much better to being thought something my somebody else. But, we have to ask the question. Why has society decided young people need to go to University for almost everything?

 

3.    University kills creativity and intelligence

This point is very much inspired by two Ted talks. The first of these “How School Makes Kids Less Intelligent” by Eddy Zwong and secondly “Do Schools Kill Creativity?” by Sir Ken Robinson. In the first talk, Eddy talks about,  how in schools all students do is “accumulate facts”. They are told what to think and not to “think outside of the box. Yes in schools student’s academic intelligence goes up but the same can most certainly not their creative intelligence. He talks about how entering start up business contests helped him develop real life skills like networking. Finally, in reference to the idea that every student should go to University, he says that “We should redefine what we see as successful”

 

The second talk from Sir Ken Robinson is a very humorous talk that tackles the issues posed by this piece perfectly. With the help of a few personal stories he talks about the world where “We are now running educational systems where mistakes are the worst thing you can make” and with that, makes the controversial statement that “creativity is as important in education as literacy” If we know anything about intelligence, it is that it is “diverse” “dynamic” and “distinct” yet every student is examined and thought the exact same way in the education system. They are thought what and how to think. He argues that “creativity is thought out of us” rather than something we stumble upon. Again students have thought that “mistakes are the worst thing you can make” yet “If kids don’t know they will have a go. They are not frightened of been wrong” I don’t mean to say been wrong and being creative are the same thing, but what we do know if, if you’re not prepared to be wrong you will never come up with anything original” Finally he comes out with a mind blowing statistic which is as follows “In the next 30 years more people with graduate from education than in our entire history” We get the degree to stand out but if everybody has a degree. Does that not just totally devalue its meaning? 

 

Closing thoughts 

I hope you enjoyed this piece. Education is a topic that stirs the pot with most people including myself. It is a very grey subject that will be debated for many decades to come. But what is a certainty is that the education system while useful is flawed. It favours certain types of intelligence and can leave others feeling less worthy and lacking direction. Education is also a golden ticket for many. In the end, every situation is different and that is the key to this. Education is a personal journey and using it to achieve your goals can be done in many ways. As a society, we need to expand the box and possibly shatter it all together. University degree or not, the people who succeed in life are the ones who know what they want to achieve and work their asses off to do it. That’s what I have learned. 

 

 

Below I will put the links to a few articles and videos that inspired this piece and may interest you. 

 

Bite Size Psch: What Every Student Should Know About University

 

Eddy Zwong: How school makes kids less intelligent 

 

Sir Ken Robinson: Do Schools Kills Creativity?

Top Universities: How Much Does It Cost to Study 

Financial Times Are Universities Worth it?

 

The Guardian: More Than a Third of UK Graduates Regret Attending University