Dartmouth President Doesn't Get It: Isn't the Four-Year College Experience an Anachronism?

 Why in the world, given what we know now, would we encourage the next generation to attend a four-year institution of higher education? 

In an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal Dartmouth President Sean Leah Beilock admits the university has a trust issue. Essentially fewer and fewer size up that four-year experience as a good investment. Then Beilock proposes reforms to restore that trust. Those range from introducing affordability to ensuring employability. Beilock includes what Dartmouth itself is doing differently. 

The pitch is earnest. But obviously it comes from someone inside the system. 

That could be blinding him and other university reformers like from getting it: Has the four-year college experience become an anachronism? 

It is no longer radical to ask: Why pile on four more years of being a full-time student in order to achieve any of the things that are touted as benefits of "going to college?" What those real or supposed benefits include - critical thinking, curiosity, deep knowledge of a subject - can be obtained in other venues, sooner in a life, faster and probably at a far lower cost. In addition, the other paths don't require going off from home to a campus and staying there for four years of a life.

It's not persuasive to argue that the likes of Bill Gates and Sam Altman didn't do those four years. And that they did just fine. They are extraordinary. Most of the rest of us aren't extraordinary.

But what is persuasive and I deal with it every day as an intuitive coach and tarot reader is the large number of adults making a good living and manifesting critical thinking who never did the four-year experience. They're the ones able to pay their mortgage, with RVs and boats in their yard. How many college-educated are losing much of that or never had it?

For a marketable skill the non-college might have gone right into a family business, purchased a franchise, paid for a trade school, landed an apprenticeship, embraced entrepreneurship or worked their way up from a minimum wage job. If they had attended a decent public high school where the rules of grammar were instilled they wouldn't give away non-college-attendance through incorrect usage. They frequently have the same confident presence as do knowledge workers who likely went beyond the BA/BA to advanced degrees.

Of course, what "we know now" is that decades ago it was not easy to break into making a middle-class living without that college degree. Sure, some did such as those auto workers on assembly lines. They had a house in the Detroit suburbs and a cottage up north. A Boomer, I "had" to go to college and assumed beyond onto doctoral studies to establish myself in knowledge work. A female, the trades were not wide open and it didn't occur to me to join the military to learn skills.

It's interesting to note that when I deal with members of the military they tell me that a motivation for joining is no longer access to a college education for free. It's to have the opportunity to develop a variety of skills.

A few days ago an upset parent asked advice on seeing the son through the rest of the college freshman year. They are not doing well. The only passion is the joy at being accepted into a frat. Perhaps that question should be asked several years earlier and the focus on how to earn a living. 

Success is a mental game. Failure comes from being done in by the “committee” in your head.

Together, we liberate your thinking. Then we change your story. And, unleash success.

Intuitive Coaching. Special expertise with transitions, becoming a solopreneur and aging. Psychic/tarot readings, upon request. Complimentary consultation with Jane Genova (Text 203-468-8579, janegenova374@gmail.com). Yes, test out the chemistry. Zero risk.

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