Chanced upon this LinkedIn article by the author of an upcoming book on the future of higher education. He touches on points that resonated with what I remembered of Barbara Dafoe Whitehead’s State of our Unions Symposium piece on the protective nature of the college experience for maturing adults, or emerging adults (a terms that just doesn’t sit right with me).
Jeff Selingo writes:
“Let’s face it, most 18-year-old’s are not ready for the working world, and some are not even ready for a college campus. The four years of college turn adolescents into young adults and through the campus experience—living with different people, participating in activities and athletics, and being responsible for one’s self—gets them ready for life.”
and Dafoe Whitehead writes:
“For all young people today, the pathway into a stable marriage is prolonged and arduous. It takes more time, discipline, and maturity than it once did. In negotiating that pathway, college plays an important role. The advantage of a four-year college degree is not just economic. It is social. College life provides an extended moratorium for young men and women who are sexually active but not yet ready for marriage or children or jobs. In my years living in a university town, I can attest to the fact that the average undergraduate is no more mature or disciplined than the average kid who works at 7-11 – maybe less so. But where the undergrad does have an advantage is that he can get drunk and hurl bottles at the police and he will get a slap on the wrist from Dean of Students. The kid at 7-11 may have to do time for a similar offense. (For him, it’s not just college partying. It’s called assault with a deadly weapon.) And while he’s in jail, he will lose his job.”
Categories: Civil Society, General
From Dafoe Whitehead:
“It takes more time, discipline, and maturity than it once did.”
Why is this so? Are parents doing all the things, chores, obligations, responsibilities that growing children maybe/could/should do? I think the better question is are today’s parents, no matter what social class, mature themselves?
Why aren’t parents disciplining children, instead of pampering them? Why aren’t their children cutting grass, washing clothes, vacuuming, dusting, making their beds, hanging up their clothes, shoveling snow? Why are today’s Gen-X parents, the prior baby-boomer parents, some Millenial parents doing for their children what their children can do for themselves?
Why aren’t these children at age 15, 16, etc. getting part-time jobs, and being taught how to manage their money? Why are children for the last 50 years treated like hot-house plants? Why are parents running themselves ragged, when their children could be of significant help in maintaining a home? What better way to grow tomorrow’s parents, than by having our children learn to manage a home themselves?
“The advantage of a four-year college degree is not just economic.”
I disagree with this statement. There is no particular value, economically or otherwise, to a four-year college degree. In fact, many students end-up economically in a hole to pay off student loans. Most businesses today want advanced degrees, because the competition is so keen for a smaller base of employers.
One would do far better by going to a vocational school, or getting apprenticed in a skilled trade. La Lubu would give this a yay or nay path for a child.
“College life provides an extended moratorium for young men and women who are sexually active but not yet ready for marriage or children or jobs.”
So being sexually active is simply a given for pre-marriage persons, today? Today’s teenager is simply expected to be sexually active? Why? Our today’s faith groups simply bystanders to all this; or, simply unaware of this? Why is abstinence not a valued virtue, anymore? And, more importantly, what is up with today’s (yesterday’s) being so utterly lacking in teaching basic, personal and socially acceptable behavior?
And, to all Family Scholars, why would you folks expect the government, state, faith groups or anything above the family to do for us what we should be doing for ourselves? Do we expect marketing, advertising, educators, politicians, ministers to come babysit our parents and children?
I’m seriously disturbed, although I signed the Call on Marriage, that somehow the conversation has to be from the ground-up not the top-down.
Last note: are the Family Scholars here, the Bloggers, those who are parents OK with your children being sexually active? Are you OK with having your children be immature at age 18?
I wonder if colleges here are serving as a proxy for any stabilizing social institution in the lives of young adults.
Maybe Barbara can clarify, but I wonder if the military, peace corp, technical schools, kibbutzes, or even a well run business might serve the same beneficial socialization roles that a four year college might.
I agree with Teresa that the fact that kids at 18 aren’t ready to live alone and make relatively mature choices is an indictment of how our society raises children more than anything. I am very grateful that my parents for the many small ways they forced me and my brothers to be responsible or fail and grow (like, when at age 12, suddenly laundry wasn’t magically being done anymore, or 13 when working on the car wasn’t exclusively Dad’s chore anymore, or at 15 when jobs were expected, or 16 when driving privileges came with the duty of running errands for mom and responsibilities to pick up and shuttle younger kids to school and back, and how all along anything less than an A or an A+ in a class led to a conversation about academic success and discipline, and a B- might as well have been a D.)
“I wonder if colleges here are serving as a proxy for any stabilizing social institution in the lives of young adults.”
Yes, I think so.
I don’t think this is true. I think the dynamics we are seeing these days (young people, especially young men, living at home until well into their twenties) is the result of a depressed job market and few avenues outside of a college education to improve ones’ chances. Vocational schools and trade unions are an alternative, but are more economically risky—there are more job opportunities for those with a college degree than there are for many skilled tradespeople (right now, a third of my local is out of work, and it’s been years since probably 80% of my local has worked year-round. That’s a total about-face from the 90s). The greatest job opportunities are in low-wage, no-benefit, largely de-skilled work (thus, no opportunity for advancement or greater earning if you stay) and moreover are primarily part-time positions.
So, I have to disagree that a college degree is a waste of money. While it’s true that there are more college graduates that are unemployed than ever before, it remains the case that they are significantly less likely to be unemployed than those without that degree, and are likely to be unemployed less often and for shorter periods of time than the non-degreed. They are also regarded as having more flexible skills in the workplace—a degree is “portable” in a way that many narrower skillsets are not.
I think we also have to look at the way the logistics of getting a college education contribute to (or cause? you tell me) the problem of “emerging” adulthood. Namely, FAFSA. What changed in the 1980s is who was regarded as an independent student. Young adults—those legally adult in every other way—are not regarded as such by institutions of higher learning for financial aid purposes. (this can be a trick bag for young adults too—parents are not obligated to provide a college education for their legally-adult children, but these legally adult children can’t get aid on their own. If a parent won’t sign the FAFSA, that puts an effective roadblock into a young person’s dreams—from what I’ve seen, mostly gay, lesbian, or transgendered young people who are rejected by their parents).
As for the sexual behavior of young people, sex wasn’t discovered in the 1960s. The difference was shotgun marriages have disappeared because there is no advantage to them. For what it’s worth, I think there’s evidence that comprehensive sex education that has non-patriarchal, egalitarian messages has better results in preventing teen pregnancy and in delaying sexual activity: “blue states” have a better record than “red states”.
And since you asked: I’m not okay with my child being immature at 18. (I don’t expect this will be the case.) I am okay with her being sexually active in an age-appropriate manner. Or, as I told her: “At your age, you shouldn’t be having sex with anyone else. You should be masturbating and exploring your own fantasies instead. Learn what pleases you before having partnered sex.” She’ll be taking the OWL curriculum at our UU congregation—a very comprehensive sex-ed program. Currently, we only have OWL for grades 7-9, and only offer it every three years (this will be the year!).
Anna Williams at First Things is hitting on this topic today as well:
http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/firstthoughts/2013/01/31/parents-let-your-teens-be-adults/
I do think it’s the first time most young people develop a relationship with any adult outside one’s own family. I never really thought about that before until my dad mentioned it—I’ll bring up conversations I’ve had here with him—and he spoke about how when he was a kid (pre-Boomer generation), it was fairly common for young men to have older male mentors from outside their family (or, from very distant relatives—distant enough to be outside the “enmeshment” of family drama enough to provide a fresh perspective or sounding board). That’s not something I would have noticed, because it was near-universal in my generation that there is no substantive contact between teens and adults from outside the family. A few people might have a close relationship with their coach if they’re on a team, but other than that….nahh. I didn’t have a mentoring relationship with anyone until I was 21—hell, I’d already been married for two years and out of high school five year previous.
Anyway, he thinks that has a lot to do with my umpteen-million male cousins who are still living in the basement in their twenties. He talked about how important those mentoring relationships he had as a teen were to him, and how important it is to have a relationship and visions of masculinity outside of one’s father, because that’s a different type of relationship—father’s aren’t mentors, and often can’t be mentors; the boundaries of the roles are different.
It is silly (and untrue) to say, “There is no particular value, economically or otherwise, to a four-year college degree.” And it is ironic to see such irresponsible statements on a site that purports to be concerned about the growing marriage guide between the middle-class college-educated elite who continue to marry and the low-income, high school-educated (at best) who don’t marry. The best way to accelerate the decline of marriage as an institution is to encourage people not to get an education.
La Lubu of course is proof that one can educate oneself, but in the absence of her rare capacity for analysis and thought, most people need the discipline and guidance provided by a college education, quite apart from the economic benefits.
Henry, the quote you quoted was from the comments section. That’s like going to the CNN comments section and saying “it’s ironic to see such irresponsible statements on a site that purports to be concerned about the news.” No, it’s not ironic; it’s the comments section. Ay, ay, ay.
And – even if it were written by the blogger – Family Scholars welcomes a lot of different voices, and many of them disagree strongly.
Teresa,
Speaking from my own experience, I found that getting a college degree was beneficial in many ways, both economic and otherwise (for instance, most of the jobs I’ve had so far required at least a BA).
Also (for me), it was great to spend four years around other young people who were eager to learn! Beyond merely learning facts, I feel like I learned a lot about how to think. Also, I met my wife there
.
That said, I think that many people, of course, can succeed without a college degree, and I really admire them for it! It just takes more initiative and lots of involvement in civil society.
Teresa
I too have a college degree, one of those useless ones everybody condemns. I wouldn’t change it for all the tea in China. It taught me to think and exposed me to a wide range of written knowledge I’d never have touched otherwise. Plato, Locke, Mill, Augustine, Aquinas, Madison & Schopenhauer. As well as Pinter, Brecht, Marlow and Bacon. Even if I’d spent the rest of my life cleaning toilet, I’d be a toilet cleaner that reads Nietzsche, understands Machiavelli & can quote Kant.
To Family Scholars, a question:
Who exactly are the elite, well-educated class you’re talking about? For example, what is the standard, educational-degreed background these persons have? What SES are they in? What does highly-educated mean for Family Scholars?
Does a B.A. put you in the elite, highly-educated class that are marrying later, and staying together longer?
Not to get to curious, but are most Family Scholars part of the highly-educated, elite class we’re talking about, or on their way to being so?
Lots of good thoughts.
@teresa – In general today’s middle-class kids do less chores because they are doing more homework. This is necessary for them to get into college.
I agree with what LaLubu says about college and about young people not being able to get decent jobs right out of high school, no matter how mature they are. (By decent I mean they could support themselves and they have some prospect of earning more in the future.)
I also agree with LaLubu on the importance of relationships with adults outside of your family, especially for older teens and people in their 20s. Parents are parents, not mentors. As a parent, I love it when there are other adults around who reinforce the things I say but have a chance of being listened to.
Anyhow, what your father says suggests that one issue for young people is the loss of community in general.
OK, Mont D. Law, I understand that; and, you’re point is well-taken … and, that’s exactly what a college education should do. But, that’s not what the average person going to college thinks a university education should bring them.
My point is that a college education, today … is seen as a ticket to a job. I’m not quite sure many people would be happy graduating from university, today, to face a life of cleaning toilets. One could hardly raise a family on toilet-cleaning.
My main contention about a B.A. degree, today, is that it’s simply vocational school minus the vocational training. I abhor mixing the trade school mentality with the classical, university education.
Listen up here, guys, I’m not bad-mouthing B.A. degrees, as such. I’m concerned with its current debasement, and trivialization. And, I know that’s gonna raise some hackles; but, so be it.
“For all young people today, the pathway into a stable marriage is prolonged and arduous. It takes more time, discipline, and maturity than it once did.”
Thoughts on why this might be true:
1. Economics. Young people can’t earn enough to support themselves without some kind of training or education, and their parents aren’t likely to pay for them if they get married.
2. Because nobody else is getting married yet. If the general expectation is that you don’t get married right after high school, then the path to marriage is just going to take longer. And if you go against the norm, you may not get any social support.
3. Debt. Young people are offered the chance to go into debt in a way that we weren’t. They also can’t afford the college degree that helps them get jobs without going into debt. And as LaLubu has pointed out, you don’t want to marry someone when you or they are in debt because then you are legally liable for their debts.
4. Communities aren’t as strong and people aren’t members of community organizations like churches or Elks or unions or whatever it would be. So it’s harder for young adults to get guidance or support from older ones on how to have relationships, etc.
@teresa – I don’t think of myself as a scholar. My impression from what I’ve read of the reports is that they people writing them are distinguishing between people with a B.A. and people without one because people with college degrees generally do well economically and have stable marriages.
I think it’s interesting to think that they are also getting a little longer to grow up without facing consequences for messing up.
Diane M:
“It takes more time, discipline, and maturity than it once did.
I see some of the points you’re making, Diane; but, I can’t find anything about discipline and maturity in your numbered ideas.
Diane, what is wrong with parents that they are not producing mature, disciplined adults, by age 18 … and, yet somehow, they think college will do for their children, what they have been unable to do? Will, somehow, tomorrow that maturation age might be 22, 26 … when?
Are the parents somehow immature themselves … a spin on “you can’t give what you don’t have”?
Are these unacceptable questions? Unreasonable questions?
Diane M,
“My impression from what I’ve read of the reports is that they people writing them are distinguishing between people with a B.A. and people without one because people with college degrees generally do well economically and have stable marriages.”
It’s unclear to me, Diane, if your impression is correct (it certainly may well be). I think the reports continue to use phrases; such as, highly-educated, elite, etc. In my opinion, a B.A. is not in that class.
What he emphasized the most was how informal that process was. Just….knowing older guys from the barbershop (or neighborhood, or pool hall) or from the part-time job he had at the grocer’s in high school, or the temp jobs working construction or in a factory. These weren’t formal relationships, but they were there just the same. They were friendships, but not peer friendships, ya get me?
I mean, most of the references I see on this blog as far as community reference formal community organizations: religious, political, civic. But what is really lost are the informal means of finding community.
My daughter was the only kid in her elementary school that went to that school from kindergarten to fifth grade (and actually, two years of Early Start too). The only one out of a couple hundred kids. That school (like most of the high-poverty schools in the city) has a high attrition rate—well over half the student body changes mid-year (job loss, evictions). How are those kids going to find community?
I still remember sitting in sociology class back in 1984. The teacher (foreign-born) asked something about community; something about how a person gets settled in a new place (something she had a lot of direct experience with!). And I remember how frustrated she was that none of us, all thirty-some of us in this night class, couldn’t come up with the answers she was looking for. The class was mostly older adults (“nontraditional students”) and working class; we were all focused on the nuts-and-bolts, y’know, how to get your gas, electric and water turned on, get your mail forwarded, get kids enrolled in school, that sort of thing. But no! She was looking for ways in which to build community, find friends. (that wasn’t how we defined “getting settled”) So…church was mentioned. What else? Silence. Dead silence. Then, “saying hello to your neighbors, if ya see ‘em”. (someone else: “but they’ll probably move on you, or you’ll move.”) We were just stuck. So (the teacher was practically pulling her hair out by this time) she started giving us the answers she was looking for, about civic organizations. Joining the “Y”, joining social clubs, professional organizations. This wasn’t in the readings; it came up as a part of class discussion. It was totally outside our experiences—for everyone in that classroom, there was work and family. For the young kids just out of high school (like me), there was friends….maybe. The ones that hadn’t moved away, or joined the service, or got too deep into drugs and you didn’t want to see them anymore…
I remember being kinda miffed, and frustrated myself from that class discussion. How could she have expected us to know that? Who’da thunk it? The “Y” as a means to find community? Are you kidding me? That’s just for workouts. Who the hell are the Rotarians, and what do they do? Is that a cult? My parents were union members (union officers), and….that’s it. My dad used to play cards with a group of guys, until they realized he beat ‘em a little too often (he’s good). My mom played on a bowling team one year in one city, and played on her workplace softball team another year in another city. But actual social clubs? Nope.
Re: My impression from what I’ve read of the reports is that they people writing them are distinguishing between people with a B.A. and people without one because people with college degrees generally do well economically and have stable marriages.
Honestly, I think Teresa is right here.
The reason for the premium on a college degree is, 1) that the ruling class in this country has systematically destroyed manufacturing employment and other well paying jobs that didn’t require college, and 2) that employers often treat a college degree as an indicator of an IQ test, i.e. for signalling purposes. It isn’t really that everyone needs valuable skills that you can only get in college.
Plenty of European countries send far fewer people to college than we do, and they have better social outcomes. In a healthier society, people who weren’t interested in learning for its own sake could start vocational training or apprenticeships and make just as much money as the typical college graduate.
My eventual career track, if things work out, is that I will be an academic. I don’t actually believe a college professor should make more money than a fruit farmer, an autoworker or a truckdriver. All four of them do jobs that are important for the functioning of society and require a fair amount of skill in their own way, and all of them should be rewarded commensurately. The college wage premium is an increasingly unhealthy aspect of our society that really serves no one but the elite.
According to one new study we have 41 million college graduates in the work forced and just 28 million jobs that requires a college degree. http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/338984/we-need-fewer-college-graduates-maggie-gallagher
The college loan program is misleading vulnerable 18 year olds about what makes sense. Yes go to college. No if you have to borrow money to do it.
My college student niece took a job over the summer as a hostess at a restarant. All the waitresses have college degrees.
Something is going seriously wrong out there. We are not really grappling with what we are doing to this next gen.
That’s good, because most of them don’t. They just have better working conditions.
It’s not the college loan program that doesn’t make sense. It’s United States economic policy that doesn’t make sense. Those college students aren’t being stupid—they are making a rational decision. They’re purchasing hope. The hope that they’ll be one of the 28 million that gets a decent-paying job with a future. If they don’t get that degree, they have a guarantee for being locked-in to low-wage, no-benefit employment—a lifetime of it. The only way out is education. Their odds are a lot better odds than the waitstaff that doesn’t have degrees, and whose hope comes in the form of lottery tickets.
What else are they supposed to do? How many times do I have to remind people that the musical chairs situation for tradespeople is much worse than the musical chairs for those with college degrees? Or that most “vocational employment” is paying a premium to be yet another low-wage worker? That is, if you can even get a job?
Most businesses today want advanced degrees, because the competition is so keen for a smaller base of employers.
….and you don’t get that advanced degree without a four-year degree. I’m curious, Teresa, why you think the four-year degree is useless when it’s a prerequisite for an advanced degree? It’s as if you said “Don’t take first-year French, you only learn how to really speak in fourth-year.”
I’m not sure where this ‘today’ came from, either. Other than for the rich leisured class of the sort that invented the term “the gentleman’s C” or could afford to send a daughter to college purely so she could “get her MRS” (ie., find an educated husband), when was a college education NOT seen as a ticket to a job?
Some more food for thought:
In the Times this morning Arthur Brooks, president of AEI, discusses his “10k-B.A.” degree and how his choice to do college by correspondence has effected his life.
I love the ring of “10k-B.A.” – I think that an enterprising college will eventually recognize that offering bare-bones (maybe online, maybe part correspondence and part on-campus) degrees programs at discounted rates will draw in applicants as long as the educational offerings are quality. If done right they could win greater market share and hopefully begin a correction in the inflation of college tuition costs.
Color me skeptical on the idea of online college degrees. For one thing, many of the jobs that require a degree (actually require it, as opposed to using the presence of a degree to weed applicants out) are in the sciences—and that means labs. For another, being on a campus—even if its just a community college—means having the ability to build relationships (mentoring relationships, “connections”, networks). That’s a lot less likely to happen online, and do I need to mention how crucial it is for working class students to build these relationships? They aren’t “legacies”; their parents (*cough* raises hand) can’t help them build professional relationships or guide them through the maze/nuts-and-bolts of learning and making a name for themselves in their chosen field. Their only means of building social and cultural capital is being *present*, on campus. Also—students with disabilities need the structrual and educational support that only campuses offer (learning centers, accommodations, etc.)
Online degrees can help nontraditional students who are already employed adults gain credentials that can help them get promoted in their existing employment, or can help them get college credit in classes that don’t necessarily require a classroom (while completing a degree in the classroom). But let’s not delude ourselves into thinking that a psychology degree from Online U is going to make someone as effective a psychologist as someone who had the opportunity to get a standard degree by having ample opportunity to have their knowledge tested and ideas challenged by other (peers and instructors) consistently, the ability to have their work critiqued and supervised, and the ability to network and discuss ideas informally with other educated people learning and/or practicing their chosen field.
My apprenticeship took five years. It consisted of night classes and 40 hrs. A week of on-the-job employment supervised by journeymen and foremen who evaluated my work and my progress. But there’s another way to get a journeyman card—you can pass a test. I could teach someone with average ability and zero experience to pass that test within three months. But they wouldn’t be a journeyman by any stretch of the imagination, nor would I trust their work (plus, they’d be slower than hell and clueless to the physical apects of the trade—passing a test on loads, breaker size, code, how to hook up a transformer, etc is a lot different than making actual installations on the job, and troubleshooting? Fuggetaboutit.).
@Teresa – “I see some of the points you’re making, Diane; but, I can’t find anything about discipline and maturity in your numbered ideas.”
Yes, I think one of the big differences between modern young people and the generation that got married out of high school (who are now over 70!), is that it takes longer to be ready to get married. I don’t think that means they are less self-disciplined and mature, they just don’t have an economy that makes starting a family possible as young.
I think waiting and building up your education and jobs as they do does require more discipline and maturity.
But comparing them to my generation – as opposed to people who married out of high school – the economy is worse and they really do have to be more self-disciplined. My generation didn’t pay so much to go to college. Most of us graduated without debt, or at least much debt. We could take a semester off to find ourselves (and we were encouraged to). We had a better chance to get into colleges because there were fewer of us.
When I look at young high school students who are preparing for college, I actually see more maturity than I or my friends had. These are kids who do more in terms of academics and activities. When they do go to college, they will know that they are costing their parents money and running up debt.