If you think education is expensive…
Lately I’ve been writing back and forth with a young friend of mine. She’s in her last stretch of high school, still not entirely sure of what she wants to do with her future or whether she can afford to go to college. A few days later, the Cal Alumni Association called me, and I signed up for a lifetime membership, partly in recognition of the opportunities that the school opened to me. As I balance these two events, I keep coming back to the same thought:
If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.
- Derek Bok, former president of Harvard University
Over a lifetime, the average college graduate makes a million dollars more than someone with only a high-school diploma. Many careers remain forever closed to people without degrees. I’ve heard it said that the first four years of college are worth ten in the field.
A university education is about more than job training, though: a good one forces you to digest so many different viewpoints, so many disciplines and ideas, that it’s almost about transformation. For me it was a chance to grow into myself, for me to find new directions and the things I really care about. It did wonders for my social consciousness. None of this would have ever happened if I hadn’t gone to Cal, and I doubt that 1000Gears would exist at all. I wouldn’t be half of the person I am now if I’d gone to an industry training program and called it done.
I think that’s what disappoints me most about my friend’s situation. I think she would grow from it, and her transformation would be a staggering thing to watch. First she has to go, though, and put herself through the mill.
I’m not about to lie. It’s hard and it’s not for everyone. More than once I pushed myself too hard and broke against my limits. Every year I could count on staying awake, grinding away at a project, until the sun rose over my shoulder. I learned a lot of things the hard way, by failing over and over again until I got them right.
That’s part of the process, though, part of life, part of becoming the people we would like to be. It takes a forge to make good steel.
I absolutely agree about college. While you can live a good and functional life without a college education, it will certainly make things a lot easier. I’m hoping that as my little sister goes away to college (she’s still in state, but will be away from the family) she grows as a person. She’s harsh and judgemental sometimes, she’s superior and I tend to think that she could stand to be knocked down a few pegs. I love her, but I’m hoping that putting her in a new situation will open her eyes.
It’s hard when you have to put yourself through, or when you don’t have a scholarship, I know I didn’t have one initially and it’s scary to worry about grades and money at the same time. But there are so many people I know who ended up giving up on college and other dreams (You end up seeing a lot of broken and faded dreams in the service industry), and I never want to be one of them. I don’t care how long it takes or if I have to balance a crazy job life with my education, but I am going to finish. It’s something I’ve promised myself. ^_^