Alex Green IV

From the moment that most children are old enough to know what school is, they are encouraged to go and told of the great things that will come from being a good student. Slogans from ad campaigns and public service announcements like “Stay in school, it’s the rule” or showing how cool it is to be in school have permeated television programming for years. Celebrities (some of which have not gone to college but are relatively rich and famous) are often targeted to encourage youngsters to stay in school with promises of a brighter future. It has become cliché to espouse the merits of getting an education and to coerce those who think that school is not for them to go to school. There is a belief that an educated populous gets us closer to an ideal society. While this belief is accepted, just what education means is not clearly defined and how one qualifies or quantifies education is undetermined. There isn’t a mathematical formula that computes the return on investment from education.

Furthermore, the word education that most use so freely does not have a singular meaning. Is education going to school and/or getting a degree from an academic institution?  Can one be educated without attending an academic institution? Or…up to what level does one need formal education before they are considered educated? Is it high school, college, post-college? But this conversation on levels of education by no means begins to delve into the complexity of the matter.

There is one other consideration that may help frame a discussion on this topic. As there are infinite variables that can affect the access to knowledge like socio-economic status, birthplace, and family background, it is virtually impossible to establish a level playing field. In fact, the allocation of resources that seem second nature like textbooks, competent instructors, computers, notebooks and pens/pencils, athletic facilities, etc. remain unequal. One can list the reasons why these inequities still exist, but these rationalizes don’t mitigate the reality that many youngsters face who are trying to get an education. Simple knowledge of a problem without a solution is not good enough. Of course, there is no one solution.

If education is so important that it is imbued within American societal discourse, why is it such a  broken system? There seems to be a lot of pontification but very little substantive action. For a while, someone pays attention to a problem but as schooling seems to run like a constant machine with no pause/stop button—it’s almost as if important discussion about the problems that face the educational system become background noise with the next school year. While this discussion intends to be an analysis of the cost vs. benefit of post-grad work, this analysis is inadequate without surveying the educational system in its entirety. This conversation does not purport to be a thorough case study of the American educational system but rather to highlight a few key points that are impossible to ignore.

These key points are what some use to champion the argument for charter schools. Proponents of charter schools say that they offer students the opportunity to receive a quality education regardless of where they live and to create healthy competition—a hallmark feature of a capitalist society. Many believe that charter schools hasten the demise of already ailing public schools and that more must be done to fix a broken system instead of skirting the issue. Despite one’s perspective, the truth is that there are serious and vast problems that permeate the educational system and that stop-gap measures to improve student, teacher, and school performance have been ineffective. The fundamental fallacy of demanding performance which is based on outcomes from high-stakes testing carrying the threat of punitive measures for underperformance is that schools are not given the resources to excel. Is it just to hold a person or institution accountable for failure when the ingredients for success were unavailable?

Too many remedial changes come after the fact. After the educational system has failed to reach a majority of students from kindergarten through high school, these students are expected to aspire for college and beyond. It’s illogical to expect that students who have been neglected throughout their formative years to have the same goals and aspirations as those whose academic curiosity has been nourished. Moreover, it’s doubtful that these youngsters will be able to perform at a level required for higher education. This, as well as a host of others, provide the impetus for programs that encourage underrepresented and underprivileged persons to enter college and, in some cases, reserves spots for such applicants. The pros and cons of such programs that are designed to atone for past inequities is a lengthy discussion of its own. However, the fact that such programs exist is an acknowledge that there are extreme imbalances in access, opportunity, allocation of resources, and level of success.

Even if one somehow bypasses or excels despite the numerous pitfalls that are in the educational system…the ills aren’t over. Ok, so one is lucky enough to excel in high school and go to college. This is where the guarantees stop to some extent because the American philosophy is that all people are entitled to an education from preschool through graduation from high school. After that, the entitlement is over but the necessity remains. Most agree on the importance of getting an undergraduate college education. Why is something that has become so integral to the success of the average person engulfed within the capitalist paradigm of America? A capitalist paradigm that, simply put, the bottom line which is a calculation of earnings, expenditures, and profits (the quintessential business model) is foremost. In college, school becomes a business. Tuition and room/board costs are often too expensive for both college students and their parents. Financial aid is a reality for many college students. Depending on the school and the amount that the student and his/her parents are able to pay, a student’s debt after undergraduate work can be well in excess of $100,000. It’s believed that such exorbitant debt for education is an investment in one’s future. If one uses the same capitalist mindset that has made education so expensive, doesn’t it seem that $100,000 in debt in unwise regardless of what it’s for?

It’s even more damning when one talks about post-undergraduate work. The costs continue to mount for degrees that don’t always mean a difference in pay. In fact, one degree in particular (the Masters) seems to have infinite forms as there are Masters degrees in a mind-boggling variety of specialties with more being created by the day. As there are so many different degrees with as many different qualifications, is there a standard on which these programs can be measured? What more, are there enough jobs to that require such distinct specializations to utilize such Masters work? Even if one finds a job that utilizes the expertise that one gains from an advanced degree program, is the pay scale so much different for someone with a Masters degree as compared to someone without one? These are all important questions that arise when one makes difficult and life-changing discussions about education. So many times after asking these questions, the answers are unsatisfactory and as puzzling as the questions themselves. As Masters programs are so diverse and non-standardized and in a seemingly infinite number of disciplines, it comes as no surprise that some of them come with caveats that they are not “end-point” degrees. Supposedly, this means that the degree offers more specialized knowledge but does not provide the qualifications for a specific job or position. It does not mean that one’s pay scale will change or that one will be more marketable career wise. Yet, do these same admissions counselors and academicians say that the program is at a discounted rate or that somehow the extreme financial burden of such programs that often costs 10s of thousands of dollars will be allayed? No such luck, these same programs that don’t make one more marketable in the job market and don’t offer specialization towards a particular job cost the same or more than degrees that do provide more job marketability. Students that pursue these Masters programs compound their undergraduate debt by twofold in half the time to earn the same or a little bit. It doesn’t take a Masters in Mathematics to know that these numbers don’t stack up in favor of the student.

And beyond the Masters degree, things don’t look too much better. There are a growing number of degrees besides the Ph.D., M.D., and J.D. Despite the kind of doctorate that one has, it still seems that even these degrees aren’t once they once were and even they don’t pay dividends that match the resource expenditure in terms of the outlay of cash and time needed to get these degrees. The medical field that was once thought to be a panacea has quickly become more of a war with managed health care and mounds of paperwork than a focus on caregiving. PhDs are often saddled with jobs in the educational field that basically teach students how to one day be the professor. It’s a very circular concept to think that the professor would be teach a student how to one day be the professor because the only kind of job that the student will be able to get is that of the professor. Does this provide for a dynamic job market? And, last but not least, lawyers…jurists who often earn little money unless they get a high profile case. Many lawyers are constantly in search of that big break and unless they get it—they remain poor. Furthermore, there are a multitude of jobs in which lawyers find themselves that have little to do with their training. Often people say that law hones argumentative, cognitive, and reasoning skills. Is it necessary to get a law degree to learn how to think effectively?

Of course, there are people that have never seen a college classroom that are on the Forbes 500 list of billionaires. This is definitely a kick in the gut to those who are in college “to get a good job.” What it seems to come down to is not the college degree but the level of luck, ingenuity, and creativity that one is able to display in how successful he/she becomes. Let’s not forget that college may be one way but definitely not the only way or even the best way to be successful. As with so many things, success and accomplishment cannot be bought or manufactured, it comes from within. There is no magic formula that governs it. It can neither be given nor taken away by any one person or entity and though it means different things to different people, once one attains a certain amount of it…further discussion is moot. Perhaps, that’s why it is so coveted!