Is College Really Worth It?

http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/cliff-kuang/design-innovation/infographic-day-college-really-worth-it

by latif • 17 years ago

43 64 17 years ago

markpneyer• 17 years ago

Not if you're smart and motivated it's not.

I went to High School with a guy named Chris. He dropped out of college to do programming work, and I stayed on, eventually going to grad school.

Now he's the founder of GitHub and I'm some no-name programmer working for a financial company nobody's ever heard of.

Oompa4• 17 years ago

And Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg both went to college and dropped out. So perhaps college does give some benefit, but the degree isn't necessary.

tjr• 17 years ago

Sure, but how many people dropped out of college with aspirations to do something great and then failed?

More to the point, does college really have any particular impact on such matters? If Bill Gates had finished his degree, would he have still been as successful? If Don Knuth had dropped out, would he have still been as successful?

chrischen5• 17 years ago

I don't think you even have to be smart, because college really just forces people who aren't really motivated to learn, to learn. I mean what's a better substitute for motivation than the threat of thousands of dollars going down the drain because you failed.

EDIT: and really even with the forcing learning is not guaranteed.

endtwist• 17 years ago

Sheerly out of curiosity, outside of your anecdote, what evidence or credentials do you have to make that claim?

Now, I'm not saying you're unqualified or wrong to make that claim — I merely would like to know what you're basing that statement upon. I see a lot of people make statements like this one based on a few prominent data points, completely ignoring the vast number of data points that don't fit their claim. It seems wrong, especially for a community so hell-bent on accurate, useful data.

boff• 17 years ago

Totally agree with the above. Everyone can remember when success is achieved but no one seems to care about the thousands who fail trying to do the same thing. That is why medicine, my field, is no longer practiced anecdotally but based on evidence.

chrischen5• 17 years ago

In defense of the average guy, not everyone can go out and do great things, otherwise those things wouldn't be considered great anymore.

lionhearted3• 17 years ago

> In defense of the average guy, not everyone can go out and do great things, otherwise those things wouldn't be considered great anymore.

I incredibly, firmly disagree with this. The average person actualizes maybe - maybe 3% of their potential. It's possible for almost anyone to reach high level domain mastery in at least 2-3 fields in their lifetime, and make a at least a couple profound contributions in those fields. There's some hard tradeoffs involved, but it's something that almost anyone is capable of if they want it.

himmel• 17 years ago

It helps a lot to know the right people. That's in addition to being smart. Also GTFO of Cincinnati helps too.

dangrover2• 17 years ago

I dropped out this year and feel awful about it, despite being way better off.

During that time, I've quadrupled sales in my ISV and have made a full-time living of it, and I now have no debt and decent savings. I'm no Mark Zuckerburg, but it's not a bad start.

But I still kinda feel like a loser without a degree, even if I don't think I'll need it. Especially since I paid so much for the first couple years. I applied to another school (public this time) to transfer, just in case I come to my senses.

I think there's credit bubble in education just like the one in housing. Lots of easily available, subsidized money for student loans, even if the rates aren't great. Plus it's a platitude that there's no sacrifice too big you (or your family) can make to get a college education. So even reasonable, well-meaning institutions have totally wacky prices, just as a reaction to market forces and a desire to stay "competitive" building fancy new stuff.

This sounds really crazy and tin-foil-hat-ish, but sometimes I think that there's kind of a "educational industrial complex" if you will that's benefiting from this weird (hopefully temporary) situation, and I feel icky supporting it just because I'm afraid someone will judge me wrong without the piece of paper some day. One of the reasons I quit my job after I quit school was because I hate that feeling of knowing you're being fucked over a little bit each day because you don't have the balls or resources to do anything about it. I feel like school is that kinda situation now, and it shouldn't be, because there's a ton of good things about college and I want to finish.

jeff182• 17 years ago

Your post is all about why dropping out was great for you, yet you feel bad and you are trying to apply to get back in "in case you come to your senses". What is your motivation for going back to school, after proving to yourself that you don't need it?

Asa-Nisse• 17 years ago

Part of it (I'm also a dropout, not very successful though, I can pay my bills but thats about it) is the fact that very many social interactions congregate on "what education do you have"? It's a social status thing that people measure other people on in my group of people atleast. Most of the people I socialize with are either doctors, dentists or have a liberal arts degree.

I'm on of the only few with a technical education and I always have a hard time explaning that "yes I did go to college" (I'm from Sweden so it's called University but its not the same as in US), "but I did not graduate".

Their eyes flicker, and I'm instantly degraded to that basement guy with big computer screens they know so well from highschool.

I know very well that my life in very many aspects would be other peoples envy. I organize my days myself, I pay my own salary and I can divulge on whatever project I choose.

However, many people equate a steady paycheck with safety and responsibility. Two keywords that are atleast here in Europe quickly becoming very hot.

clistctrl2• 17 years ago

(drop out here too)

I definitely feel like I've managed to be "successful" without completed college (yet) I make a decent salary, and I can see that growing in the horizon. I also feel well respected and needed by my coworkers, and family. However I completely agree with the opinion above. While part of me wants to complete it for the sake of ensuring future employment. My main reason for wanting to finish is to gain that last part of self confidence i'm missing.

A second reason, one that is less mentioned is more social. I try to skirt the issue when talking to people, but (even more on the east coast) people tend to think of myself differently when I tell them the truth.

dangrover2• 17 years ago

I dunno. I think it's just the stigma of being a dropout. Also, I think it's generally a good thing to go to college for the intrinsic value, and nothing I'm doing is so critical that it can't wait.

I actually had a 3.8 GPA before my last semester. Going back immediately after dealing with a brain tumor/surgery kinda screwed things up, though I should have been theoretically unaffected by it.

A friend of mine who is far more successful than I'll ever be and shouldn't even be using "go back" and "school" in the same sentence, just went back, and after a semester, he's done again. So I dunno.

I think there have been some pretty big changes with how companies, jobs, and credentials work ("High Res Society" kinda stuff), and the culture will lag behind 10-20 years.

TravisLS• 17 years ago

You could probably actually buy two Ferrari F430s once you take into account all of the student loan interest.

zach2• 17 years ago

This kills me -- I've seen so many financial illustrations about the miracle of compound interest and the true cost of a loan. But these lessons are never applied to paying off an onerous student loan until middle age.

This unexamined attitude of education as an unqualified good has already led a lot of young people overpaying for professional education of questionable benefit, and now to even more taking on unreasonable debt in pursuit of a bachelor's degree.

PStamatiou• 17 years ago

430s to be deprecated soon. 458 Italias for me.

jasonlbaptiste• 17 years ago

The only value I have received from college is knowing that I don't need it to succeed. I dropped out and went back to finish in between startups. If you do go, enjoy your time there, drop in on interesting classes, and most importantly meet as many interesting people as possible.

oldgregg• 17 years ago

College doesn't pass the smell test to me. During the housing boom everyone was saying, hey, easy money, housing is a sure thing. That just doesn't smell right, and sure enough, the system was being temporarily propped up. College is the same way. If everyone is taking out 80k to get shit faced for 5 years it just doesn't smell right. Like housing, the system is being propped up in large part due to low interest rate loans among other things. Certain professions that have government backed monopolies (medicine, law) might be alright. But just like your housing deed, most every other degree won't hardly be worth the paper it's written on.

verisimilitude• 17 years ago

The loans aren't low interest rate, and the costs of education keep rising. Unfortunately, rising tuition rates aren't going to the professors.

Straight (no banks -- direct lending) department of education loans are 6.8% and 7.9% for the most common loans.

I'll pay over $95,000 in interest over 10 years on department of education student loans. I don't own a car or a house. I have no credit card debt. I came out of undergrad with $0 in debt.

Volscio• 17 years ago

I went to college, didn't take it as seriously as I should have (dotcom daytrading era) and joined the Army afterwards. I really would have gotten more out of college if I'd gone into the Army first. Saw a lot of young 18 year olds who did it right and are now in college... Grad school was a far better experience for me...

hamidp• 17 years ago

College is totally worthless. Everyone is the very smart entrepreneurial type like we all of course are, and already posses the vast majority of skills that they'll ever need in life. Indeed, college for them would be nothing more than nights spent alone in their dorm room working on their next failed startup and leaving comments around the Internet about how much more successful they'd be if they stayed out of college. Man, now if only they could get invited to a party or talk to a girl.

dryicerx• 17 years ago

Seeing this question really bothers me.

Because it's a impossible question to answer, it's too broad and there are so many factors.

The Major and the school. Each and every one is so different, I don't really see if it makes any sense to even average them together.

Personal need and motivation? Are you there to learn and challenge your self, or for the social experience, or just to do the lowest possible to get a piece of paper that says Degree.

Indirect opportunities. For example meeting great researchers and professors and working side by side with them in some cases. Internship opportunities. Social networking and meeting people.

Causation vs. Correlation. Are people who go to college more successful because of college, or are those people bound to be successful anyway, they just happen to go to college.

andylei• 17 years ago

wait; has anyone considered this: college is fun.

Oompa4• 17 years ago

It's educational and gives you a place you could meet future co-founders as well. I feel like people look at college from a purely educational perspective, which isn't exactly correct. If you're going to college just for the education, you're in the wrong place, if you ask me.

chrischen5• 17 years ago

Then again then college isn't the only way you can do those things. Perhaps if college didn't exist, there could be something filling the void that's not only more efficient at educating, but at fulfilling those things too.

jeff182• 17 years ago

This is a non-sequitor, unless you are implying that not going to college is not fun.

elai• 17 years ago

It depends on your experience. If your high school was better (private, small) then the college can seem a bit anonymous.

nearestneighbor3• 17 years ago

Excellent question. For coders trying to maximize their probability of getting rich enough not to worry about money by the time they are 25 or 30, I'm sure going to college is an awful bet, especially in the US, where college education is expensive. And the more education you get, the worse of a bet it is (I have a PhD from an Ivy League school, BTW, as does pg, I think)

However, some important work and innovation absolutely requires higher education. For example, you are extremely unlikely to learn linear algebra and matrix theory "on the job", while running a startup, or even if you are just relaxing at home with nothing else to do for a few years.

    tl;dr: don't go to college, but expect to have your
    horizons limited

jey3• 17 years ago

> you are extremely unlikely to learn linear algebra and matrix theory "on the job"

Why? All of the information is available in books and on Wikipedia. Nowadays you can learn nearly anything for free with just an internet connection and some dedication. The biggest potential impediment is be a self-defeating attitude that prevents you from trying.

On the other hand, don't expect learning "on the job" to mean that you'll get paid to learn.

jrp• 17 years ago

> Why?

Because of laziness. You are right that you can learn by just investing time, and the grandparent is right that almost nobody will bother when they can play videogames with that time.

nearestneighbor3• 17 years ago

> Nowadays you can learn nearly anything for free with just an internet connection and some dedication

It's no different from the situation before the internet, since books are cheap (compared to your time) and usually are still a better source of information on such structured subjects anyway.

In fact, when I was in college, I mostly read textbooks anyway instead of attending lectures (it's easier for me to learn this way).

This however is not the whole story. Even if you are motivated ("I'd like to learn math"), you are probably not motivated enough for some feats of cognition. If you know people who stayed home and studied math on their own for a few years, full-time, at college level (I don't), they are probably very rare.

xcombinator• 17 years ago

I had a friend in my University, he had spent a lot of time working and studying from what we call a "Distance Education"(They give you books and some video lectures).

He had a hard time doing that and valued a lot direct contact with the teacher. It resonates with me because I studied engineering but love psychology too and when I learn let's say NLP from video-audio made by masters I learn way more that in the same authors books.

Books are very good when you dominate the subject.

90% of the communication is not verbal. Nuances and emphasis are very important.

nostrademons2• 17 years ago

So, I'm not certain that college is really worth it, but there're a lot of misleading statistics in the infographic:

1. The cost of attending a private vs. public university does not include financial aid. For many middle-income kids, the actual price of attending a private university is often less than that of attending a state school, because the private university may give you a full ride based on need, while the state school has much less resources to spend on financial aid.

2. The "17 years to make up the difference" figure is based on starting salaries, but it doesn't account for raises that occur soon afterwards. Many of college friends went into financial, software or consulting businesses at around $55K/year - 4 years later, they're now making well over 6 figures. Many of my high school friends went into local or boutique businesses at around $50k/year - 4 years later, they are still making $50k/year, or worse, they've lost their jobs because of the economic crash.

3. "1 out of 2 students fail to correctly analyze prose" - ironic, because of the inaccuracies in the infographic...

The numbers spent partying/drinking/videogaming seem about right though. I think it's pretty likely that college is a bubble, but I don't like to see some of the financial myths repeated. If you get into Yale and you get decent financial aid, you should probably go, because that degree is worth a lot more than one from UConn, and the people who write for FastCompany often have no idea about the inner workings of the financial aid system.

trimski2• 17 years ago

The financial aid available at top-tier schools is very generous, because so few low-income students make up the undergraduate body. If I recall correctly, at the top 120 colleges in the United States, only 3% of the student body come from families in the bottom quintile of household income.

As a result, schools such as Harvard[1] and Stanford[2] pay for all tuition for students with a household income of less than $60,000.

[1] http://www.admissions.college.harvard.edu/financial_aid/inde...

[2] http://www.stanford.edu/dept/finaid/undergrad/

nostrademons2• 17 years ago

Right. Which means that if you are a lower-income student with the academic chops to make it into Harvard or Stanford, it very much behooves you to go. You get a fully subsidized education, and it probably makes much more of a difference to your bottom-line earnings than if you were a child of upper-income parents that's always figured you were going to Harvard.

alain94040• 17 years ago

It's going to sound condescending but I'll say it anyway: if you enjoy hanging out on HN (and you do since you are reading this), then you'll enjoy attending college because it's the only place on earth where everyone is college-level smart.

Obvious of course, but kind of true. Everywhere else (except maybe at Google), you have to deal with the uneducated masses :-)

chrischen5• 17 years ago

Depends on which college you go to. Not my college though. My college's motto is to provide education for the masses.

wensing3• 17 years ago

"except at Google"

It dawned on me at my last cube farm that some companies really are like high school, while others are like college.

lionhearted3• 17 years ago

> ... because it's the only place on earth where everyone is college-level smart.

Not true - there's plenty of places where most of the people you'll meet are quite intelligent, and not everyone in college are college-level smart. If you go to Harvard, sure, it's all fairly smart people. The average state school? Not so much.

As for places with lots of smart people, it's very worth it to go get coffee at the Ritz Carlton sometimes. It's $10 for a pot of coffee that'll serve 2-3 people, so it's only like $5 to go if you go with a friend or the girlfriend, and it's good coffee. There'll be smart people there from out of town, often having a quick bite to eat alone while reading a newspaper. Contrary to popular belief, wealthy people tend to be very friendly and approachable if you're polite, complimentary, and interested in striking up a chat - I've met a fair few intelligent people while having coffee at a nice hotel or ex-pat bar or other place like that.

If you're willing to try to charm a little bit too, you can probably talk your way into the business class/first class lounges with decent success when you're flying, and people inside tend to be a smart, a bit bored, and quite receptive to having a conversation.

There's lots of places to meet smart people. University is good for some smart people, but not all. I enjoyed some of the business and technical classes I took, but absolutely went nuts with the "general requirements" and the rote busywork it entailed.

So there's lots of places to meet smart people besides university. And seriously, I'd recommend anyone who isn't comfortable in "wealthy places" to go have a pot of coffee at the Ritz Carlton. It's $10, cheaper than a mid-end restaurant lunch. Strike up a conversation with someone. Might change your life, but at the very least you get more comfortable in the environment.

wensing3• 17 years ago

I flew first-class for the first time last year and couldn't believe what I had been missing (I always thought the best part would be the seats or service).

quizbiz• 17 years ago

Want to share more about talking your way into the lounges?

endtime• 17 years ago

>except maybe at Google

You really think Google is the only company with uniformly well-educated employees? Microsoft, Goldman, McKinsey, etc - there are plenty of companies out there where you'll smart and educated colleagues.

biotech• 17 years ago

One out of two students fail to correctly analyze prose like a newspaper editorial

Okay, I don't know the source, but this statistic seems reasonable to me. In fact, I'd venture to add a couple more (based purely on my anecdotal experience):

- One out of two students can't structure a well-reasoned argument.

- One out of two students are unable to write a readable essay.

- One out of two students do not know how to prepare for and deliver a speech.

My problem is not the state of State Colleges. The problem is the state of highschools in America (although we are not unique with respect to some of these problems). These are all skills that can and should be learnt before college.

dylanz• 17 years ago

I love these types of posts. There seems to be "a ton" of them lately.

I'll say one thing... college is definitely worth it if you're planning on working in the Medical field. I think hospitals only hire people with a formal education now-a-days ;) The same probably goes for sending people to the moon, building nuclear reactors, etc. There is a reason for colleges to exist, as sometimes the human race "needs" to make sure you know your @#$%.

zach2• 17 years ago

Talking about "college" as a mere experience, drained of its knowledge value, reduces its significance to being a social club of sorts. You make friends, you signify some kind of status to potential superiors, and so on.

I don't think many people take this kind of mercenary view of college outside of the Bush family, and maybe it's a more realistic view, but that's the perspective that seems to be in play when the question is whether it's "worth it."

natrius• 17 years ago

"you signify some kind of status to potential superiors"

Sorry to burst your bubble, but I think this is why the vast majority of people go to college.

wensing3• 17 years ago

I'm fairly convinced that college will be obsolete by the time my children are old enough to attend. World shrinking fast, and don't forget about smart siblings.

bjoernw• 17 years ago

Statistically there is so much wrong with this infographic.

trimski2• 17 years ago

For curiosity's sake, could you provide some examples?

dinkumthinkum• 17 years ago

I just feel like the view espoused in this article is unbelievably cliche. Most of the response are pretty cliche as well. The consensus seems to be that college is essentially pointless, a social gathering at best.Then there's also the the typical "colleges will be obsolete soon; we'll all be crowdsourcing our own learning" blah blah blah type nonsense. It's all just rather naive to me.

balding_n_tired• 17 years ago

Winemaking is a perfectly reasonable major, unless you want to close down all the A&Ms in the country. UIUC, the University of Maryland, no doubt many other schools have excellent computer science departments within smelling distance of barns.

luckydude• 17 years ago

Hi,

Small tech company founder, still the guy who hires and manages the engineers. Just some background.

I used to think that Google's desire for graduate degrees was sort of elitist and not necessary. I've changed my mind, and here's why.

I work in a woodshop as a way to relax and have found an analogy for the education thing. I've come to believe that a well educated mind is sort of like a well organized shop; a self educated mind is like a messy shop.

There is no judgement intended, both neat and messy shops can produce excellent work, just as a self-educated person can produce just as good work as a formally educated person.

The difference is speed. At the risk of stretching the analogy, in a neat shop you can find tools quickly and make things quickly. A formally educated person uses the education to quickly make choices about how to solve problems whereas a self-educated person has to rederive a lot of those choices.

I've personally witnessed this in engineers that have worked for me and I'm moving towards wanting formally educated people. If you want to do well in the tech industry, I'd strongly urge you to get a formal education and cover the basics. If you have a CS degree and pointers bother you, you got a crappy degree. Ditto for basic language design, compiler design, OS design.

Just my two cents and you should probably ignore it because while I have a masters in CS, I also have a messy shop :)

teeja• 17 years ago

"Worth it"? Depends on what "it" is. There was a time when college wasn't about vocational education ...

Is it worth spending 4 years learning about the history of your country and culture? Seeing a lot of great movies or concerts? Hanging out and enjoying life without lots of burdens before joining the rat race? Having the time to explore a lot of options to find out what you're really good at, or maybe discover some field or some country or some culture that you didn't know existed that changes your whole life?

College is what you make of it. It can be more than being trained like a lab rat. Some people even find friends who hire them later on!

Is College Really Worth It?

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