Summary Of The Chapter 'What Is College For?'

College, the most discussed and controversial topic for hundreds of years. The necessity of college has been discussed in many different countries for hundreds of years in the past and will still be just as controversial in the future. Many have asked why college is important and what it has to offer. William Deresiewicz in the chapter “What is College For?” from the book Excellent Sheep attempts to answer this question by using multiple literary elements to show his audience, which is primarily high schoolers, why college is the only option and is essential to all. In reality college is not the only option, in fact there are some jobs that require different forms of education such on the job training or going to a technical school, which falsifies

The writer says how a high school education doesn’t give you what a college education can, which is opening your eyes to the real world to see what's happening. To further his claim on the importance of college he says, “Is this a privilege that most young people in the world can only dream of? Absolutely. But you won’t absolve yourself by throwing it away. Better, at least, to get some good from it” (Deresiewicz 81). The questions in the following quote really accentuate his point by getting students’ attention to tell them that there are a lot of advantages with college. Deresiewicz continues by saying that education is a privilege that many don’t have, so don’t waste the available opportunities. These opportunities are the benefits that college has to offer like friends, skills, and an education. The Logos and the symbolism built the foundation for Deresiewicz’s work and is how he was able to make his point clear that college has many benefits to

He adds to his argument by claiming that going to college can give much more than monetary rewards. A four year education can give someone the skill of negotiating, meeting new friends, communication with others and it can help find you a spouse. These are all things that are necessary for many people in life. He also says that college is the best place to get theses skills because it exposes students to the real world. Deresiewicz should have included a paradox to his argument to fill in the holes in his argument. The points that he misses are that one can get these skills in the actual real world which is either a technical training school, an internship, or going into the workforce. With these non-college options there will be no student debt and in a way it’s free education. But if this same person choose the college path they would be paying money for four years and may be taking on the burden of student debt. This sounds like a no brainer and is a something that Deresiewicz should have pointed out to complete his argument. At the end of the day different jobs require different education types and if a paradox was inserted then the writer’s could have accommodated to all of these