College degrees

[quilbilly]

Got my degrees in fisheries and marine invertebrates a long time ago (am 62) then never used them because I refused to work for the government after one summer of gov't work. The degrees almost cost me my first job (boss said I was overqualified). Now with my own business I use the degrees to help my customers in the fishing industry plan for the future. Two weeks ago I had to tell them to save their money as the chinook runs from 2015 and 2016 from NW Washington to SW Oregon are gone due to ocean conditions affecting marine invertebrates. Coho are gone next year for the same reason. Two years ago I told them how good this summer would be in NW Washington. For this info they buy my products and provide me a living. A college education can be worth it if you use it right

[375RUGER]

I had a meeting to go to yesterday and didn't get to post some of the stuff I wanted to say after that common sense comment I made.

Getting a college degree is not what it use to be. I blame these get a degree quick online and conventional colleges, giving out degrees but short changing students on a real education.There are some good online colleges, so I hope no one reads this as bashing all of them.
It all boils down to money for these institutions, they can generate a lot of capital with less overhead if they cookie cut the students.


The real key is how an individual approaches a potential degree-education is an investment-the more you put in the more you get out.


I know a kid who is getting his Airframe and Powerplant license, but I don't want to fly in any plane that he has had to do mechanical work on.
The one guy in that program that I would trust, is the one who is getting the license to work on his own plane-he is doing it for himself not to work for someone.
The really sad thing is that this college use to generate real quality students, but I know for a fact that some of the "professors" there miss more class than the students are allowed to miss.

I know someone that got another degree(he already had a technology degree from 20 years ago) from an online college and he is the type that wouldn't settle for some cut rate program.



I don't know how guys my age go back or start a college education. I couldn't do it, I was finished when they handed me that diploma.
I'm not through learning though. I like to learn and teach, I just don't like to do it in a classroom setting-I'm in an online school now- castboolits.gunloads.com
How many posts do I have to have to get a PHD?

[1Shirt]

An AA, a BS & some grad work, all as a non traditional student in the military. No degree until I was 36 yrs old. I believe that there is merit in a later in life, non traditional education. Non traditional students, are in class to learn and to better themselfs. Traditional students at a young age, often switch majors 2, 3 even 4 times in the process of obtaining a degree, and often spend a 5th or longer year in college to obtain the degree. Degrees to me do one thing: They open doors that might otherwise never be opened. Regardless, the day we stop learning is a day wasted! Lastly, it should be remembered that Education is Big Business, and accordingly, the "Business of Business IS Business!"
1Shirt!

[Jailer]

No college degree for me and I'm 42. I do have some college as it was required for my job that I currently hold.

I've been working in prison since I was 19 years old. It's not a job you'll get rich doing but it pays the bills and allows me to live reasonably comfortably.

A degree isn't the end all be all that it's portrayed to be. Having said that if you are not going to get a degree I do believe you need to learn a marketable trade. You need something to make yourself valuable to a prospective employer and to give yourself options while you're in the job market searching.

A degree does help in some cases but the world needs laborers too.

[frankenfab]

I've been working in prison since I was 19 years old.

Haven't we all!

[sundog]

Uncle Sam paid for my degree and lots of leadership schools during a 26 year military career. I am well past 60 and using the degree Uncle paid for, which ad nothing to do with what I did in the Army. My current employer also footed the bill for some expensive technical training that is being used on a daily basis programming for a financial institution.

[Junior1942]

I started college as a 48-year-old freshman. And I lived in a dorm that first semester. I graduated at age 53 with a 3.97 GPA. I have a BA in anthropology and a minor/almost a degree in English. I need 10 hours of anything for my English degree. If I lived closer to a college town I'd have that English degree. Plus I'd take at least one class a semester until the day I died. I love college. Some of the courses I'd like to take are: physical anthropology, forensic anthropology, paleoanthropology, Biblical history, ancient history, ethnomusicology, on and on....

[skeettx]

BS Louisiana PolyTechnic Institute 1971 (now call La Tech University)
MS West Texas State University 1986 (now called West Texas A&M University)

63 years young

Married in 1970 and still married to the same Red Headed Gal

Retired: Air Force and Pantex (yes they have radiation at Pantex)

Mike

[fatelk]

I went back to school a couple years ago, got a 2-year electronics degree at the local community college. Better than nothing they say. I sure wish I would have known how things are a couple decades earlier. In some ways I was disappointed; for the most part it was not much of a challenge. Some classes were insulting. I hope things are more challenging at a real school. I ended up with a 4.077 gpa (some instructors like to give out A+'s).

The younger bunch that was just there messing around irritated me. At nearly 40 years old, I was there to learn something and was not happy with stupid puff classes that wasted my time. Even the real classes with interesting stuff seemed dumbed-down for the slowest in the class. I really feel that I could have easily learned just as much or more in one year if it wasn't for the waste of time classes.

My dad is a college grad, top grades, honors, and all he ever wanted to do was farm. I grew up hearing about how college was a huge waste of time for him, so when I was of age I had no interest in college. I saw friends and acquaintances who went off to the big university to party on daddy's money, then graduate with some bs degree only to come home and pump gas. Then a few years later I watched another friend work his tail off paying his own way through school to become an electrical engineer. He had a job with Intel before he even graduated and makes good money now.

I came to realize that the value of a degree is in what you do with it. I know now that I could have done anything I wanted, and it sure would have been a lot easier 20 years ago. When my kids get to that age college will be encouraged, but it will have to be with some focus and purpose, otherwise it's just a waste of time and money.

I know some folks love to go to school for the sake of going to school; learning for the sake of learning even if what they are learning is of no practical value to them. I can appreciate learning, and top grades have never been a problem, but I'm sure glad to be done with school.

Added: in my previous job before being laid off and going back to school, I had plenty of training classes. These were typically practical technical stuff that I would actually use, usually taught in a more compressed, challenging manner. That is what I had been use to. Somehow I expected college to be more and it turned out to be less.

[Stick_man]

I returned to school, armed with two AAS degrees, at the ripe young age of 29. Graduated with a BS in Accounting and one in Finance at age 32. Wife did the same thing in different fields. We were both full time students, had two kids under age 3, and I worked 30+ hours per week so we didn't end up enslaved beyond reason with student loans. I am a number cruncher. Been in the field since I was a teenager. Before I went back for the BS degrees, I was constantly being beaten out of good jobs ONLY because I didn't have the BS. These were jobs with 100-150 applicants and 4 rounds of interviews. Several times I would end up as one of the final 2 or 3 candidates and each time the job went to the one with the BS degree rather than to the one with the AAS degree and several years experience. One of these days, I am going to return to get an MBA so I can break through this glass ceiling on the wage scale.

[gbrown]

[QUOTE=Junior1942;1776567]Plus I'd take at least one class a semester until the day I died. I love college.

+1 with that. Most of us are on this forum to learn. I'm retired and still seeking to learn. 1 BA, 2 MS & 15 hours short of a 3rd. My oldest grandson just finished his freshman year with a 3.5 gpa. A lot better than my freshman year. I was in the military (law enforcement stuff) for 23 years (R), civilian law enforcement for 15 years and taught for 22 years (R). I have always maintained that when you stop learning, you are dead. Good or bad, you learn something new everyday. Anything you learn can be used to solve a future problem. It's called transfer of knowledge. Whether its formal learning (school learning) or experience (informal learning). I have many friends who never completed HS. In reality, they are smarter than me. It depends on the person, are they able to learn or not?

[Tom-ADC]

I'm 70 have two AA degrees on my GI Bill, I retired from Goodrich as a Staff Engineer with five engineers working for me. Goodrich also understood some people just knew how things were made and how things went together.

[UnderDawgAl]

Education, too often, is wasted on the young.

I think I and many others would have benefited more by joining the military for a few years and then enrolling in college in our mid-20s, once some semblance of maturity set in. Of course, exceptions exist to the rule, with some young folks straight out of high school taking college very seriously.

[jumbeaux]

Barely got out of High School......four years in the Navy.....3 years at Tech schools....then as a 26 years old eight long years (at night school) to earn a BS in Manufacturing Technology.......drove over 100,000 miles to school, worked full time, became a father and finally graduated at age 34. Medically retired from the same company after 31 years....

rick

[btroj]

I don't buy the whole " older people take it more seriously or do better" arguement.

It is about the drive and desire of the individual. Some have it punt and do fine, some develop it later, and some will never do well in college at any age.

Generalities just don't work well with me. We all have a perspective. I did well in school right out of high school. It wasn't about anything but me doing what needed doing.

Someone mentioned that not everyone needs to go to college. I say amen to that. We need people working as skilled laboreres. We need peole in the trades. Rose are respectable jobs that need doing. I say more power tortoise that do them.

[fatelk]

It is about the drive and desire of the individual.

That is true, but it is true that in general those that go back to school later in life typically do so for a reason, instead of just "That's what you do after high school". They're also less likely to party and mess around because they are more likely to have a job and a family. Not always of course, but this generality is generally quite true. I sure know it was for me.

[TAMU74]

I'll soon be sixty one, and I have two degrees in Agriculture and one in Physics all from one of the only two schools that really matter. Sunday school and TEXAS A&M!

[Beau Cassidy]

I have been lucky to work in my degree field and have been quite successful until getting screwed over big-time 2 years ago by some jealous docs. I was making 3 times the national average and live was good. Just got another job that hopefully will be similar.

The first degree was at the age of 28 from the Mississippi University for Women followed by 2 others elsewhere. After sitting on my butt for the last 10 years I am probably gonna go back for my doctorate the year after this.

I read one time that unless you have a very specialized degree, 80% of the people who get degrees don't work in their field of study.

[Wayne Smith]

AAS-Law Enforcement; BA Psychology; MA Psychology; PsyD Clinical Psychology. Almost half of a MDiv in the doctoral program, and use it every day. I have so much fun with what I'm doing I don't want to retire.

I come in just under your cut-off, I'm 59.

Wife is a geologist and uses it daily, one son has his MDiv and writes and teaches, the other has his MS Areospace engineering and is employed by NASA.

I guess we believe in using our education!

[BD]

I have a BA in English Lit with a minor in economics and a handful of grad credits taken my senior year. I'm 57 and haven't used the degree at all in that field. However, my college education has served me well as it taught me how to learn, how to sort and sift information, and how to deal with bureaucracy. It also helped me to discover early in life that I was absolutely not cut out to spend my life indoors at a desk, in the classroom, or as part of any bureaucracy.
BD