Simmermon: What’s the point of going to college?
Many students who go to college find themselves partaking in academic conformity and sheepish study-habits.
Monday, April 7th, 2008
College. Once in, it envelopes you completely. You work, you go to school, you study, you party, and then you study some more.
But for what?
I thought the answer was easy. You come to college to learn.
But has society corrupted the real principle and replaced it with an idea of conformity and social acceptance? Now if you don’t go to college, it is assumed that you won’t succeed. Sometimes it feels like youth are being intimidated into higher education.
There are holes in the system. Just because you went to college doesn’t mean you’re smart.
I know a lot of kids who pissed away their education doing just enough not to fail and getting wasted every night.
A widely used credo around this University is “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.”
If we have this mentality, why even go to college? If your education isn’t going to mean anything, what’s the point?
My head starts to spin as I point my clicker up at the giant overhead, and I wonder if sitting in a lecture of 500 people and jotting down notes is really learning.
Learning is not about blindly accepting what is up on the board. It’s about asking questions and challenging these supposed truths.
How much of college is about actually learning, and how much of it is about getting the “A”?
If it’s just about the grade, that’s academic conformity. Do what the professors say, and they’ll give you a good grade. That’s really worth your money.
We have been graded and evaluated our whole lives, from the time we could form sentences until laying out career goals.
I used to say I wanted to be a roller coaster tester when I grew up. It was a fake job, but I just said it so people would stop asking the question.
Now people ask what I’m going to do after I graduate. I’ll start off by giving them the finger and then saying I am going to be a roller coaster tester.
After four years at this University, I still don’t know if it was worth it. I question my education every day. I worry that I won’t succeed.
I thought college was supposed to give me that reassurance, I have gained a lot of knowledge, but I still don’t feel like an intellectual.
I want to feel like my time an money were worthwhile and that I was not just a sheep coming here.
I’ll make it my own way. If I struggle, then so be it.
Simmermon is a Leawood senior in journalism.
Discussion
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This is so true. I constantly hear fellow students speaking about how wasted they became the night before. Where do they find the time? I wish I was able to make the day eternal so I could get all the things needed to be accomplished within a day.
College is like anything else you do -- you get out of it what you put into it. If you spend your college years getting wasted and chasing the opposite sex, then the type of job you deserve when you get out will probably reflect that. However, if you truly work on learning, acquiring knowledge, improving yourself and making the world a better place, then everything else will take care of itself. You must know discipline and patience, however. KU's 2008 National Championship seemed doomed many times, but the attitude, belief, faith, perseverance and diligence carried them through. Give up your pride and ask help from others, in addition to helping yourself and society and you'll find college worthwhile and rewarding -- even if the rewards don't come until 4-5 years after you graduate. Humility paves the way for wisdom. Arrogance leads to the great fall.
People do not go to college to learn. The best jobs require it, as do most parents, and so that is what people with the wherewithal do. People who actually appreciate learning and acquiring knowledge, while more common on a college campus than in the world (or country) as a whole, are in the minority.
College, and the classes that comprise it are viewed by most as requirements for life thereafter. There is no reason for you or anyone to lament this. It is not new. Do what you like, now and later, and never mind anyone who sees it as less than it should be.
You can live to learn or learn to live.
As someone who has been in the business world for some years now, I would say that college does not determine your success. College is a stepping stone to get you on a better path toward achieving success whatever the word success means to you. College should teach the ability to solve problems, how to research for appropriate information, how to present your information to others in an intelligent fashion and how to actually work efficiently which is the basis of study habits. Your success is soley determined by your talents, abilities and effort. Nothing will just fall into your lap. These are the lessons college should teach you. A degree gets you in the door. What you do once you are in the door is entirely up to you.
It is not college that determines if somebody is smart or will succeed. It is what you do IN college. So many of the majors offered on this campus are utterly worthless when it comes to getting a good job or getting the education you pay for. People complain about their classes being a waste of time, but then say "but math is not my thing" and "engineering is too hard." Put the work into it. If your too lazy to put the work into a difficult, high demand degree, then you do not deserve a high paying job. My classes ARE worthwhile. Every single thing I am learning in my electrical engineering classes will help me when I graduate, no matter how boring some of it may be.
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