College is not for everyone - San Antonio Express-News

Why college?

Actually, the socio-political, if not the funding battle for tertiary education is long won; it is an article of faith in America that college is good and that everybody should have the opportunity to go. Politicians, for example, want half (if not all) of the population to attend.

College, of course, is now mandatory for the professions (as is post-graduate schooling since the early 20th century), and as 1950s-era sociologists feared, has become a necessary credential for many occupations. This is behind those oft-quoted stats showing graduates earn much more over a lifetime than high-school diplomats. Finally, even if one does not learn much, college offers a socialization process that lets attendees assimilate more easily with each other in the workplace.

In technical fields such as science and engineering, a nation today cannot have too many graduates. (Even if, in economic downturns, some spend time selling shoes.) Canada, Australia, and New Zealand allow easy entry to foreign graduates. The U.S. does not, leading to constant complaints about a dearth of visas from Silicon Valley. Here we have a dichotomy in higher education. We turn out far too few hard-core scientists — many, if not most, enrolled in our universities are foreign — and far too many lawyers and the cults crowd like sociologists, political “scientists,” and modern language types, few of whom add much to the GNP.

Also, while university training makes good techies, there is no scientific evidence that college fosters talent. The best universities do not try to teach people how to make a living but to encourage them to think, which why so much leadership comes from a few campuses. On the other hand, the most talented innovators and artists in recent decades either never went to college or were dropouts. Think Microsoft, Facebook and a few others. The geniuses and talented do not need credentials nor to socialize and assimilate; they do their own thing and change the world.

In some fields college stultifies: College English courses have burned off more potential writers than dumb editors. College does not teach literature; it dissects it like a dead frog.

I believe the notion that everybody should go to college is democracy gone wrong. Part of our problem is that we pretend there are no sheep and goats; the other part is that we lack a training process such as Germany's apprentice program to educate skilled trades. The development of IQ tests was a grave blow not to democracy but the idea of individual equality, which we confuse. This is why all testing is seen as distasteful, and aptitude testing is more and more dropped or banned.

The SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test) does not measure intelligence but indicates rather accurately how one will do in college. The various so-called intelligence tests suggest than no one with a score of under 115 (average is 95-100) is capable of a “real” college education. This would restrict about 85 percent, which is why, moms and dads, you aren't getting much for your tuition at many schools. Education is a business, and it must market whatever sells.

Even if it's a bill of goods.