Pursuing Adult Education With Economic Recession

Admin — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 05:53:17 +0000

The benefit of acquiring advanced level of education and skill comes with a hefty price. Indeed, graduate school can be a tough financial burden that most opt not to pursue it. And yet, they miss out on the rewards of attending graduate school.

The economic recession and the resultant growth of unemployment often lead people to rethink their career choices. Oftentimes, this leads to getting additional training in their current field for broader opportunities or training in a wholly different field where better opportunities lie.

Fortunately, there are more ways to receive training than there was before. Just a few years ago, training was restricted to taking formal classes in a college or university. Long distance and correspondence trainings were not taken seriously.

Nowadays, alternative training and education such as correspondence courses are no longer demoted to a fad or cheap propaganda. Thanks to the advent of the Internet, these alternative forms of education have become more accessible than ever and with it carried a change in which people regard them. People who take up alternative forms of education are now seen as self-disciplined and motivated individuals. Employers see people with these kinds of qualities as desirable and an indispensable asset to the company.

Alternative education can take in the form of certifications, distance courses, and weekend and night classes provided by private for-profit schools. Certifications and distance courses, often pursued with self-paced and self-motivation, have gained much growth and recognition in recent years. Some elite schools like Harvard and Columbia have even taken into granting degrees through distance courses. On the other hand, the rise in private, for-profit schools have made pursuing study and training in a more formal set-up more accessible. The various venues for training effortlessly make it possible to provide any prospective student a choice that would fit his/her preferred field and schedule.

Choosing which school or field to pursue is often the easiest part in continuing education. The hardest part of it is finding a way to finance it. Fortunately, there are ways to go about it.

You may try for a scholarship. However, scholarships were primarily designed for students just entering college or students returning to college. They were developed long before any had a mind to develop alternative learning techniques and distance courses. Though there are a few scholarships that could cater to non-traditional students, these scholarships are quite few. Oftentimes, the scholarships offered by private for-profit schools are no more than a discount on the tuition.

Federal financial aid also offers little help for returning and non-traditional students. Financial aids are only available for undergraduate students. So if you’re thinking of doing graduate work, no federal financial aid would be available for you. The same is true if you are taking up a technical or vocational program.

Now, perhaps the best way to finance your pursuit of additional training is by acquiring a student loan. This type of financial aid makes no difference between undergraduate and graduate students, technical and non-technical courses, and vocational and degree programs. Moreover, student loans are quite easy to qualify for and repayment may be deferred while in school or extended for some period after graduation.

By: Low Jeremy

Who Needs a College Education?

Admin — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 13:45:32 +0000

Not everyone needs or should have a college education.

As I have listened to and read the seemingly endless news stories about the cost of a college education today, the problems of obtaining loans and grants for tuition, the amount of debt many students are burdened with after graduation, and the extent of defaults on student loans, I have changed my attitude about the importance of a college education.

I have a college degree, and my career has been largely based on my education. After dropping out of college and a long delay in returning, I did not graduate until I was in my 30s, then entered public accounting and quickly went into practice on my own. For the past 50 years, almost everything I have accomplished in business has been based on or greatly influenced by my education and professional training. So, for me, a college education proved to be a major asset and the foundation of my livelihood.

However, I now believe we place too much emphasis on a college education and, what’s more, the particular college or university our young people attend, such as the “Ivy League” schools. It has become far too important to many parents that their children not only attend college but one with a prestigious reputation, such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Brown, Stanford, MIT, or Cal Tech, etc.

Although my career has been based on my education, the particular school I went to didn’t matter one bit. Throughout my long business and professional career, no one ever asked me what school I attended or what my grade point average was. It didn’t matter, and they didn’t care. People only care that you can perform. If you can’t do that, a degree from the most prestigious university in the world won’t help.

I have concluded that teaching our children how to function in the world at large is not stressed enough: how to balance a checkbook, manage a budget, how our economic system works, and how to provide a service that people are willing to pay for.

Easy for me to say, you may think. After all, I have a college education. True. But, my experience over 50 years has led to the conclusion that not everyone is college material.

Recent reports indicate that a very high percentage of America’s students now drop out of high school, because the education they are receiving is not relevant to them. Greater emphasis should be placed on encouraging more young people to attend a technical or trade school, such as computer technology, hotel or restaurant services, construction trades, health care techs, auto mechanics, bookkeeping and office management, etc.

Walter Gardner, writing in the Sacramento Bee, noted: “”By requiring virtually all students to take courses specifically designed for the college-bound, we unavoidably set the stage for failure. The truth is that not all students have the desire or the ability to pursue a four-year degree. And when they see little or no connection between what they’re forced to study and their future plans or interests, they either act out or drop out…According to Alan S. Blinder, former vice chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, the only jobs that will be safe in the next two decades will be those that can’t be delivered offshore electronically. As a result, plumbers, electricians and auto mechanics, for example, will be earning a comfortable living, while their academically educated counterparts will be at risk of having their jobs terminated.” (“U.S. needs to learn that college isn’t for everyone,” By Walt Gardner, Sacramento Bee, April 11, 2008).

A college education may well be the preferred choice from an academic point of view, but it is not particularly important for most occupations. Europe has had a system of apprenticeships that dates back to the Middle Ages, and something along those lines in America today makes sense to me.

Mr. Gardner also made the following observations, among others:

>Our competitors “routinely sort out students into academic and vocational tracks without any compunction.”

>”Singapore undertakes this differentiation with its primary-school leaving exam, and Finland does so based on grades at the end of the ninth grade…Not surprisingly, both countries have remarkably high graduation rates…”

>Not to be outdone, China in the early 1990s overhauled its schools to place greater emphasis on job training.”

>For the United States, the time has come to disabuse itself of the comforting delusion that college is for everyone.”

We should stop warehousing young people in our colleges and wasting valuable resources in the process. But, that’s just my opinion.

© 2008 Harris R. Sherline, All Rights Reserved

By: Harris R. Sherline

Education Economics » Harvard

Pursuing Adult Education With Economic Recession

Who Needs a College Education?