Not once did I argue against education. My argument is against dropping a hundred grand and believing what you ended up with is an actual education.

The Internet provides information, as you mentioned. Textbooks provide information. In many schools today, the textbooks you read and powerpoints you view are the extent of the “educational” process, rendering no further value to the student than could be attained by simply purchasing the textbook, as I explicitly stated in the article.

I’m all for education. I’m just as dismayed as you are with the lack of awareness and understanding possessed by high school and college grads today. And this is precisely why the system needs to change.

Entrepreneurship is certainly the answer to the question, “How can I succeed without college?” I would question whether entrepreneurship is, in fact, “on the rise” as you suggest. If you have statistics on this, I would genuinely love to see them. As far as I can tell, entrepreneurship has always been and always will be something that appeals, in theory, to most people, but will only be ventured into by a small percentage of the populace.

If the jobs were still here then the author would be saying how important it is to get a college education. It’s a circular argument.

Conversely, the damn fool Ivy League economists who said it was good to send our manufacturing jobs overseas should be sent to the school of hard knocks. And kept there until the economy improves.

I regret my lack of college, not so much for lack of the degree, per se, as for the lack of exposure to a randomly broad variety of *other people’s life experiences*.

One other angle in support of your argument is that the need to impress your boss with your degree becomes less relevant when you are an entrepreneur. (And entrepreneurship is on the rise.) No client has ever asked for my transcript. All they want to know is whether or not I can help them solve their problem.

That said, a huge benefit of college is the network of peers, professors, and alumni you gain access to.

The world needs thinkers and artists – but unless that thinking and art results in some benefit that others are willing to pay for – it doesn’t *reward* them. (I’m not making a value judgement here, just an observation.)

Those philosophers you mentioned had influence because they had an audience.An audience that today can be available to anyone – with or without a degree. Let’s face it – if after 12 years of elementary and high school, someone doesn’t know how to learn, or to validate the truth of something – the problem isn’t with college – it starts much earlier then that.

We fought hard for education. Now we’re telling ourselves its not worth our time unless it’s in a STEM major? Think of Confucius, Cicero, Sir Thomas More, Rosseau, so forth. They’re legacy is being trampled on in the name of technological progress.

I can anticipate the argument, “the internet makes knowledge available to everyone”. This is not true. The net provides information. But without the necessary skills to properly engage that material and determine its validity, what’s the use? Mis-information abounds and is accepted as fact because it’s on wikipedia.

A world where knowledge is considered a waste is a true dystopia. This can’t be the future, can it?

I enjoy learning but I like to learn on my own or with the help of someone who isn’t grading me. I am finishing up my first book and am working on being a writer. The main criteria for that is to just sit and write and read a lot.

Plus with the internet today you can just look up most information at the click of a button.

The main use of college is developing critical thinking skills. Learning how to analyze problems. In that regard college did its trick. It has made me somewhat cynical and I question everything. Yeah to college!

I didn’t mention this in the article, but I think the single greatest benefit to college is that it forces young adults to focus and learn at a time in their lives when the temptation to simply have fun (or worse) is at it’s strongest. It’s easy for me to point out that college textbooks can simply be purchased and read without having to pay tuition, but without the external motivator of an upcoming test, how many 20 year-olds are actually going to do that?

The most helpful thing I learned in college was improving my social skills and learning some life lessons, but easily could have been learned on my own without spending the money.

http://www.findingonespath.com