All your life you are told you need to go to college to be successful. In reality college is a chance to be successful but, doesn’t mean that you will be. In his article “Americas Most Overrated Product” Marty Nemko talks about college student statistics stating, "College is a wise choice for far fewer people than are currently encouraged to consider it” (527). Nemko states, “Among high school students who graduated in the bottom forty percent of their classed, and whose first institutions were four-year colleges, two thirds had not earned diplomas eight years later” (523). People who end up getting college diplomas hardly ever work in the career that they have a degree in, let alone can get jobs that require a degree.
Throughout his article, he speaks about education. “The Upside of Income Inequality” makes two basic points to support the conclusion noted in the title of the article. First, the correlations between educationa and income; that the value of a college education has risen as income inequality has risen. And second, that therefore the rate of Americans who attend college has increased. The article provides multiple graphs that correlate different principles with education and income.
“Education is the key to success” is a common phrase said by many of our millennial cohorts. The idea that education is a critical component of acquiring an eminent lifestyle has dated back since premodern times. Individuals are now constantly enrolling in postsecondary institutions in hopes of attaining endless opportunities along with the implied benefits that results from a college degree. Nevertheless, a college education is, unfortunately, not accessible to all people. In “The Diploma Divide,” Kassie Bracken explores the major disparity among low income students and their affluent counterparts on obtaining a postsecondary degree in the U.S. With the employment of an alluring appeal to one’s emotions, a use of despondent word choices to establish a dispirited ambience, and a distinguished platform to elucidate the author’s thoughts, Kassie effectively promoted her argument on how a college education is not attainable for all individuals.
However, if the government cuts financial support for universities in the twenty first century, their research departments may suffer, and they may not provide students with four years degrees. Crow and Dabars write that “Public investment in high education during the twentieth century produced a level of education attainment unmatched anywhere in the world. Accessibility to our nation’s colleges and universities served as a springboard to intergenerational economic mobility and a catalyst to innovation, which in turn brought prosperity to a broad middle class.” Here, the author argues that, in the twentieth century colleges and universities used to get government support, and the support made accessible that higher education for all social classes. Since state funding has gradually declined, it has become more difficult for lower income students to get high education.
According to Henry Bienen, president emeritus of Northwestern University speaking as a panel member in an Intelligence Squared debate “Too Many Kids Go To College, “. . . more years of school, post-secondary, are positively correlated with earnings over one’s lifetime, and also correlated with lower rates of unemployment and shorter duration being unemployed when a higher degree is obtained. ” (8) The American middle class is rapidly shrinking. More and more people are dependent on their own earnings in order to just be able to meet their expenses and survive. They have no family that is able to support them if they don’t make it on their own.
Currently in America, the popularity of attending college is increasing, but so are tuition costs. Stephanie Owen and Isabel Sawhill, in their essay, Should Everyone Go to College?, refute the idea that college is a necessity to live a prosperous life. Their purpose is to inspire a change in legislation to make information on the drawbacks of college more accessible to high school students. Owen and Sawhill effectively appeal to their audience of legislators by systematically proving that college is not a necessity At the start of the essay, directly after the thesis, Owen and Sawhill immediately address a popular counter argument. They point out that a common problem with statistics about college versus high school graduates is that “the smartest most motivated people are both more likely to go to college and more likely to be financially successful”
Recently, many have begun to attack and degrade higher education in the United States. In the book How College Works, authors Daniel Chambliss and Christopher Takacs claim, “As state support has eroded, and as more students attend college in an increasingly desperate attempt to find viable jobs, the price to students of attending an institution of higher education has gone up, especially at more selective institutions” (172). So is college even worth it? Caroline Bird’s excerpt from her book Case Against College “Where College Fails Us” is an adequately written article that agrees with those who question whether college is a good investment. Bird argues that although some students would benefit from college and succeed, many fall short, wasting
“On average, college graduates make significantly more money over their lifetime than those without a degree… What gets less attention is the fact that not all college degrees or college graduates are equal. ”(pg.208 para. 1) Stephanie Owen and Isabel Sawhill are senior researchers at Brookings’ Center on Children and Families, Sawhill is also a senior fellow in economics study at Brookings’. Owen and Sawhill authored the essay, “Should everyone go to College?” The authors use a wide variety of rhetorical devices in the essay, including ethos, pathos, and logos to persuade their audience to take another look at whether college is the right choice for them.
In United States, going to college has become an expectation of teachers, and parents for students to attain a successful life and thrive in their field of study, no matter the circumstances, after graduating high school. In this article “Are Too Many People Going to College,” written by Charles Murray, he mentions that everyone is not the same. It is not meant for everyone to earn a college degree; However, society thinks otherwise. According to Murray you also must be “in the top 98th percentile” in order to even apply for a higher education. (Murray 238)
In “The Dangers of Telling Poor Kids That College Is the Key to Social Mobility”, Andrew Simmons, a high school teacher who teaches in a poor area of Los Angeles, argues that students should be taught to go to college in order to have “an intellectual awakening”. The writer’s purpose is to persuade and inform his readers to accept his view on the flaws of the education system. According to Simmons, teachers promote higher education by focusing on the economic advantages it could bring instead of the actual education that is offered. Because teachers focus on the financial benefits of college, students in poor areas focus on their potential wealth instead of their future education while students in wealthier areas focus on their future careers
Living where we live, you begin to comprehend that living off of $11.00 per hour including with your family will never suffice your needs. Getting a college degree can ensure the graduate a higher chance of being able to earn more financially. In the article “Why College Isn't And Shouldn't Have to be For Everyone” by Robert Reich, he states that “A degree from a prestigious university can open doors to elite business schools and law schools-and to jobs paying hundreds of thousands, if not millions. ”Even though Reich’s article is on the opposing side of the argument, he fails to overlook the fact that in the long run having a college degree will, and can open doors to many new opportunities. One of those opportunities is to be able get a well paying job that can earn more than the average non college graduate.
Many people dream of a life filled with riches, but that dream is hard to obtain without a college degree. It is somewhat ironic how people dream of being a successful student and going to college but the cost of tuition turns that dream into a horrible nightmare. It is not a shock to most people when they that college tuition is expensive, but in the past few years it has increased to an all-time high. Lower and middle class students have now begun to realize that college tuition is holding them away from their dreams. Even though college tuition could provide opportunities for job creation and economic growth, tuition is not affordable for the average American household which in effect, prohibits students from taking opportunities like going to college in the first place.
And for those recent college grads who majored in more traditionally lucrative subjects, like engineering, earnings were 138% higher than those of the high-school only peers” (White 6). This proves the claim to be correct because it shows how even lower paying careers earn a significantly more amount of income than a high-school graduate. To sum up, going to college is useful because a college diploma leads to jobs with higher pay and more
There is many people that go to college, but because of the cost they don't get through college. The elevated costs of college cause not only students to struggle paying for college, but also to struggle financially paying for college when they are done. In many cases, after graduating, young adults who don’t find a job will become poorer, increasing the gap between the rich and the
As a High School Junior looking at jaw dropping tuition prices, my family and I often ask ourselves a question I’m sure many other American households are challenged with: Is a college degree actually worth it? Once you look past the recent unemployment rate for college grads, you’ll find that a college degree proves to be highly beneficial once placed in a career. Degree holders often enjoy benefits such as higher pay, higher-skilled work, and an intellectual advantage over their coworkers that do not have a degree. These benefits often outweigh the seemingly outrageous cost of college, making the price tag more than worth it.