Outside a handful of majors -- engineering and some of the sciences -- a bachelor's degree tells an employer nothing except that the applicant has a certain amount of intellectual ability and perseverance. Even a degree in a vocational major like business administration can mean anything from a solid base of knowledge to four years of barely remembered gut courses.Whether you agree with the solution or not, it would be very difficult to argue that everything is fine with higher education. The proof in the pudding is that pretty much every single social science/humanities major in the country feels the need to apply to law school now. For the outrageous costs that are required to obtain a BA, it should definitely be providing young, intelligent people with more opportunities and open more doors than it actually does.The solution is not better degrees, but no degrees. Young people entering the job market should have a known, trusted measure of their qualifications they can carry into job interviews. That measure should express what they know, not where they learned it or how long it took them. They need a certification, not a degree.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Law School: A Necessary Evil??? [Eugene]
Yesterday in my introductory post I explained why I felt that law school was a necessary evil. It was an incredibly sobering experience for me when I began searching for a job and realized how tough it was for a social science/humanities major to find "good work", and really even any work at all. The BA just doesn't mean that much these days. The way the current educational system is set up, more education, i.e. law school, is required. In the Wall Street Journal today, Charles Murray of the American Enterprise Institute opines that the entire higher education system in the US is broken. I happen to agree. Money quote:
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3 comments:
Good points. Perhaps the lack of "reverence" for a BA (or certain BS's) is that the amount of people going to college has increased dramatically compared to previous generations. When "everyone" has something or can get it, it is no longer exclusive. Perhaps thats why there is so much emphasis on "general education" classes in undergrad as opposed to work in your major...undergrad is becoming more like advanced high school than advanced education.
There is really just not enough emphasis on "hands-on" experience at most undergrad institutions. Sitting in classes, for the most part, is just not the path to becoming an attractive job applicant. There are some schools like WPI and Northeastern that have co-op programs that make internships a part of the curriculum. Frankly, if you are determined to enter the job market immediately and delay (or avoid) graduate studies, your resume needs to have work experience on it. No one cares what homeless shelter you visited twice the first semester of freshman year, or the fact that you got an admirable B+ in sociocultural anthropology - you've gotta do some real work!!
Excellent post Eugene! You are completely right about undergrad. In class today they asked who was going to law school and didnt want to become an attorney/lawyer. I was surprised to see about 5 people raise their hand and say no (out of 175 students). These people are going to law school because they see the value a law degree has in the real world. In today's world, an undergrad degree is not enough and as a result more and more people will be going for their J.D. to provide them with an advantage in the workforce.
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