Academic Theory

Why Going to College Might Be More Important Than What You Study

I think that my largest motivation behind going to university was the safety net factor. It was like moving out into the world on my own, except I was only being a student (which was all I really knew) and there was a giant system designed around housing, feeding and amusing me. This probably is not the best way to train for life because it exists as a completely fabricated reality, parallel to the real world but it was good for me. I got my first job motivated by need. I found myself, in my effort to not take out loans, with $33 to my name and lacking about two critical textbooks. Then I worked as a custodian and found out that I still was not over my fear of household chemical-cleaners. I ended up taking out loans.

Paying back those loans will be a worthwhile challenge because the person that pays them has developed a great deal. Cliché: college is a good place to discover one's self. In contradiction to academic standards, I do not posses any fancy statistics, but I remain confident that a large proportion of graduates, or even non-grads do NOT work in their field of study. Luckily, I planned for this and designed my choice of major around pleasure, skill, utility and future regret. After four years, even if I never translate, interpret, subtitle or live abroad again, I will still speak Spanish and continue to put it on every job application I fill out. In the real world, speaking Spanish will also help me in the service industries, construction and farming, and basically any job I search for in Texas, Florida, New York, California, Arizona or any other major urban area.
Returning from the southern United States to my cliché...Universities are pluralistic breeding centers of any path in life one could desire. If you like a language, you can probably study it or at least find someone that speaks it. If you like science, which kind? You can learn about chemistry, including organic, lab and computational; biology, including zoology, conservation, ecology; engineering and other sciency-flavored subject that my useless humanities degree can not comprehend. There are religious clubs if you want to join a cult or if your spirit pulls in a different direction from your upbringing. It is possible to explore cultures, sexuality, jobs and careers, manias (most universities have psychological services, often free of charge [read: covered in tuition]), transportations and really anything all within the confines of an institution. Many life skills are also explored such as driving, orienteering, laundering and cooking.


Aside from the debt, I can find one major drawback in my theory. Many courses of study, if followed through, are not skills per se. I did not learn to interpret-I learned Spanish. I assume Career Services and it's other collegiate mirrors were supposed to fix this. Regardless, and with the exception of certain programs, supplementary programs and tradeschools, the only thing I really know how to be and do successfully is a studenthood. Maybe the safety net is too safe but I never would have discovered that, nor myself as I know me to be, if I had not jumped.

Feudality

If you have ever daydreamed that maybe you could live a life of ease, you are probably not alone. Sure, rich folks aren't always happier, but you would be different...or at least less worried or less overworked, a little less degraded by not wondering where your next bite of food will hail from. For me this daydream is related to the stupid idealism often applied former time-periods, a practice of which I too, am guilty. I constantly wish I were living in the 1960's. The music was sweet and a huge populous got off with running around in rags and hangin' out all the time. They also had things to believe in. However, in reality, the 60's would have been really lame or really scary. War sucks with a voluntary army and I don't like the racism that still exists. F-the past.
My favorite stupid is the Middle Ages. Wooo! We'd run around, go to market, play with horses, maybe work or live in the castle, smell like shit, walk through shit, be undernourished, and work for a feudal lord. Speaking of feudalism, that would be the real segue into this ramble. I HATE the concept of rent. In the modern bourgeois world, poverty exists wandering the streets and begging for food in the fortunate places where you can do that in public. More pervasive is the poverty that exists as an either/or conundrum. You can afford to pay for a place to sleep, or you can afford to eat. Sure, there are programs for such things but what happened to the dignity of self-sufficiency? And even if we were permitted to wander onto a plot of land and claim, till and live it as our own, we'd probably just fail and starve anyway.
I understand that most of our average, landlords are not evil, feudal scum. They are just people trying to keep a roof over their head and food in their mouth. If someone is far enough up the ladder that they can afford to be a douche, then they're living off of more than just your money. I need close to no money to maintain what I find a comfortable standard of living. I like to have a roof in the winter, I'm also fond of eating, and studying and occasionally renting a movie. I am also fortunate that someday I will find some sort of job and easily fulfill these desires with minimum work within the context of my own society. There are many people who would settle for any of the meager things on my wish list—but who'll never get them.
There are no answers here. I will continue to live juxtaposed between my wealth and my poverty but my leisurely daydreams will be tainted by the knowledge that if I were living the life of luxury and leisure by not working, I'd be living off the work of others.