posted
I just wrote an essay for scholarships: "Where do you see yourself in ten years?" In ten years, I see myself married, an at home mother with children. Did I say that? No. Because why would they give me a scholarship when all I'm going to do with my life is be a mother. Because we believe in freedom for women, in letting them choose to be whatever they want. And if a woman is so stupid and downtrodden that she wants to raise children, why bother giving a college education to her, she doesn't need one.
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Mothers ought to be fully educated -- how can they teach their children what they do not know?
Sadly, though, you probably made the right choice on that essay. *sighs* Too many people don't understand why an educated woman with other options would choose to be a SAHM (stay-at-home mom).
You have my respect and admiration, for whatever that's worth. Good for you!
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posted
I was once asked the same question by my 11th grade english teacher. I told her the flat out truth at the time:
"I see myself still not caring about this essay in 5 years."
I then did what I do best and bs'd a lot of things such as "and I'm going to be a movie star, and pull a bank heist and run off with a Japanese girl to Mexico. Oh, and I've just kidnapped the alien from Roswell, too."
I didn't care about being honest on that essay. If I was honest, I wouldn't have answered at all because I didn't really see myself in any form in 5 years back then.
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posted
DO you think that you might get a job/ do more education once your kids have left home/are all grown up?
Not that it should make a difference to whether you get a scholarship or not - I'm just curious. I'm happy to say I've never had to write a "where do I see myself in x years" essay. Posts: 4393 | Registered: Aug 2003
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posted
That kind of a question is right up there with the "If you had a million dollars, what would you do?" question.
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posted
And that kind of assumption is exactly what I was talking about, and what I suspect blacwolve is afraid of!
She didn't say that she didn't want an education; in fact she said precisely the OPPOSITE.
aspectre, why do you believe her desire to be a wife and a mother is at odds with wanting to get an education first?
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posted
I went to bed! And now I'm late for school, I'll tell you when I get home. I don't have time to write anythign longer than this now.
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posted
unless you're going to complain that your goals are keeping you from being admitted to a university, i have a hard time seeing what your problem is.
as an engineering major, i don't qualify for English scholarships. as a caucasion, i don't qualify for minority scholarships. should i be whining about how much i deserve one of those scholarships i don't meet the requirements for? wouldn't that sound silly to you?
you don't have a right to higher education. none of us do. you don't have a right to money that is earmarked for a certain subset of applicants you aren't part of.
you want a scholarship? go find one you do qualify for. i'd suggest you start looking with FHA or 4H.
if you don't find funding, GET A FREAKING JOB AND PAY FOR COLLEGE YOURSELF.
it's as simple as where education falls as a priority for you. if it's high enough, you'll do what it takes to pay for it. that's true reguardless of your major or your career goals.
Posts: 3956 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
I agree with Tom. I think that very few parents are helped by the classes they took in college because very few parents are that involved with their children and because many classes in college aren't really going to be relevant to your children until several years have passed, if at all.
I think there's also a question of disposition. I know it's 'cool' in some circles to say you want to be a sahm, as some kind of rebellious finger towards those mean, ol' feminazis who think sahms are worthless. However, I think it might be worthwhile to ask whether you really are cut out to be a sahm. Not everyone is, you know. Maybe you would be happier pursuing engineering or chemistry or being an astronaut. I think before declaring that you're going to be a sahm, you get to know yourself a little better.
posted
Actually, I don't see why you don't just write about how your education will be used in that SAHM ideal you have for yourself in 10 years?
I mean, maybe if the school is looking for return on investment, they'll [EDIT: not] pick you (after all, SAHMs probably aren't big endowment donors), but MOST schools look for people who are unique. I think relating your education to your SAHM desires could provide an interesting and new to the reviewer perspective.
posted
Stormy, all the more reason to go to college. You're right...not all women are made to be SAHMs. And some women who don't think they are, are surprised to discover that they are happy being at home. Myself being a case in point. I never thought I'd like being at home, but I absolutely love it.
OTOH, I never did go to college, so my case probably doesn't have any relevence whatsoever. Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
/tangent Does anyone actually "deserve" an education? Is it a right or a priviledge?
Maybe I'm elitist but I think it is an earned priviledge not a right for the majority. There will always be a few rich kids spending their parents money but there are far fewer of them than there are of those who struggle to make ends meet while they are in college.
While I am for college educated mothers, I honestly don't think studying quantum physics actually prepares one for motherhood in any way other than trying to understand the incomprehensibility of life in general.
posted
Wow, it seems that a large group of people think that SAHM's don't need any education. Obviously being a mother is easy enough that any doofus could pull it off.
And that, my friends, is a big part of the reason why kids are so screwed up. Maybe if Mommy had enriched herself and gotten some self-confidence that only comes from being sure of your abilities, she could have passed that little trait down to her kids.
Being a mom isn't easy, even if becoming one is. Intelligent mothers are rare, and therefore so are confident and free-thinking children.
Moms of the world, get an education! You are your child's best teacher! Why leave it all up to the schools? Don't you realize that you are the biggest influence on your child, and you can spend five minutes teaching your child something that the schools will spend years on?
And continue learning!!! I am an intellectual, but right now I am at home with my two preschoolers. How much better off would I be mentally if I could just take one class a semester? A confident mom is ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY to have confident children. Confidence can be gained many ways, but one of the best is a good education. If moms get educated, America will reap the benefits.
*gets off soap box*
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posted
Actually I believe the sentiment expressed was more that SAHMs don't necessarily deserve a free or reduced education. Big difference.
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posted
what is more important than kids having good education? and what but college educated SAHMs is most likely to give children the best education? It's like being an unpaid teacher all the time.
I am for college educated mothers as I said before.
But:
I do not believe "college-educated" equals intelligent.
I do not believe that education is a "right". Much like driver's licenses I believe it is a priviledge.
This is going to sound terribly cynical and people may jump all over me for this but I'm going to say it anyway.
IMO, children where the sahm is college educated are more likely to have their basic needs met both emotional and physical/financial, than either those of the non-college educated mom, or the working college educated mom.
The full time working college educated mom simply has less time and energy to devote to her children, even though she may be an excellent parent. The children may not be as likely to be well off emotionally. I realize there is lots of debate about this and we probably don't have conclusive statistics yet.
The college educated sahm is more likely to marry a college educated husband. Therefore that single income household will generally be higher than that of a non-college educated mom.
The non-college educated mom is less likely to marry a college educated guy and so both will often have to work to make ends meet. If she does stay at home the financial sacrifice is often far greater than that of the college educated stay at home mom.
This is totally cynical, but in a lot of ways along with education, college is a meat market for society's priveledged to make matches to perpetuate their priveledged status. I've participated in the system. I don't know if it is intrinsically good or evil, it just is.
posted
"Wow, it seems that a large group of people think that SAHM's don't need any education. Obviously being a mother is easy enough that any doofus could pull it off."
While I can't speak for anyone else, I'm sure you misunderstand MY point.
It's not that stay-at-home moms don't need education; EVERYONE needs education. It's that college offers less benefit to a stay-at-home mom than to, say, someone who intends to be a lawyer, and that it's therefore NOT unreasonable to expect a proto-lawyer to benefit more from a college scholarship.
There are plenty of other ways to become educated, and few of them are half as expensive.
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posted
Everybody take a nice deep breath and try again.
The school is not going to judge you on whatever goal you are writing about. They are going to judge you on two things, the fact that you have taken time to think about your life's goals, and you ability to put those thoughts into a clear understandable order on a page.
If you respond with, "I'm going to be a married mother of three." then you will not win the scholar ship. If you write a powerful essay on the importance of Motherhood or SAHM or whatever you want to call it, and why such a worthy calling is you goal they will accept it as much as they will accept anothers goal to be a computer programmer, and more than "I plan on being a plastic surgeon and making zillions of bucks doing breast implants."
Some people have questioned whether you should go to college if caring for children is your goal. They do not question your ability to go to school or the need for all parents to be smart and educated. What they are asking is, "Is a college education the right education for child care." Unless you are going to be teaching your children Milton and Shakespeare, do you need to study that stuff?
My answer is Yes. Not because your children will be greatly better off because thier mother can quote Plato. A college education is almost a neccesity for employment above minimum wage. Where you plan to be married and taking care of teh family ten years from now, twenty years from now an accident or illness may force you to get a job to take care of that family. A diploma in your back pocket is insurance that you can do so if needed.
(Technical schooling will also get you a good job, but it needs to be kept current to be useful. My skill in MS-Dos 3.0 will not get me anywhere today.)
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posted
There is also a decided difference between "educated" and "college-educated" (unfortunately I have probably misused the terms in my above posts)
TomD is an educated person, if not college educated. (I find it ironic that he works for a college.) Self education is completely ok and should be encouraged. But horrors, sometimes self education leads to free-thinking. I know several non-college educated sahms that were sucessfully self-educated. However they were still up against an income gap because their husbands were not college educated either.
This may have been why they associated more value with college education and emphasized it to their children. They were also disappointed when their children didn't come of of the college system with the education they thought their kids were supposed to be getting. College educations don't instill common sense.
posted
Tom, I wasn't really refering to you in particular, just the beliefs of people in general. I was more concerned about Storm's response to what you said...it seems to be the opinion of most of the people I know.
I just need to point out that, like Tom and Banna said, educated/intelligent doesn't necessarily mean "college educated". That is a great way to go about it though.
I'm doing my best to get educated right now, even though I can't get to a college class. I'm learning Japanese from a friend, and I am trying to learn how to write. (A big part of the reason I like this site.) I just think that it's important to have knowledge to share with your kids. I also believe that women who can occupy their mind are less likely to go insane being cooped up with people who barely speak English, 24/7.
And I agree that if you can’t get a scholarship, you should bite the bullet and pay for it yourself. The worst thing that can happen (if you do it right) is you get some life skills that most college kids don’t yet have. You learn how to work hard, manage your time and money, and take responsibility.
Have you ever heard of children who were neglected? They can't talk, they can't walk, and if they are older than two years and have been so neglected, they are unable to bond.
So, for the first two years the primary caretaker is the teacher of:
Everything a two year old needs to grow up to be a normal, happy child.
After that, they have preschool to substitute for moms (or SAH dads) My child has never gone to preschool. There were a couple studies done, with _high risk_ families in which it was shown that the children did better if they went to preschool. So then people decided that every child needed to go to preschool. My kids come out of my care more (than) ready for K than most that attended preschool.
Parents have in the past been teachers of shapes, counting, alphabet and some still are.
Lets not forget continuing, ongoing socialization. Taking the barbarian out of the child. And hygeine. Toilet training.
How to hold a pencil right...
I decided I wanted to be the one to give them access to books, so I teach my children how to read.
Sex education starts about the time they start asking questions like why are there boys and girls. Or watching a diaper change and noticing that the equipment is different and asking why. Or asking how the baby got in mommy's tummy.
And then they get to school. We still have to explain to them why some people act like A-holes. School anti-drug programs are nice, but fairly pointless unless the parents are active in teaching their children about drugs.
You have to wonder if your child even has a good teacher.
Lets not forget spirituality or belief system in whatever form it takes.
Basically, parents teach everything that school doesn't teach. People can live and survive without school. Population wide literacy is actually quite a new development. But they can't live without what their parents teach.
If you want to be a SAHM and want an education, tell them that you want the education for it's own sake and the sake of your children. It sounds like you don't really feel like the education will be useful, yourself, though, from some of your word choices. You might try thinking about the following as reasons for going ahead and educating yourself:
quote:To be Queen Elizabeth within a definite area, deciding sales, banquets, labors and holidays; to be Whiteley within a certain area, providing toys, boots, sheets, cakes, and books, to be Aristotle within a certain area, teaching morals, manners, theology, and hygiene; I can understand how this might exhaust the mind, but I cannot imagine how it could narrow it. How can it be a large career to tell other people's children about the Rule of Three, and a small career to tell one's own children about the universe? How can it be broad to be the same thing to everyone, and narrow to be everything to someone? No: a [mother's] function is laborious, but because it is gigantic, not because it is minute. I will pity Mrs. Jones for the hugeness of her task; I will never pity her for its smallness.
-G.K. Chesterton, What's Wrong with the World
I will also bet that many men, unfortunately, will be more likely to look down on a woman or overlook her mental value if they perceive her as uneducated.
Posts: 2112 | Registered: Sep 1999
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quote: I will also bet that many men, unfortunately, will be more likely to look down on a woman or overlook her mental value if they perceive her as uneducated.
tangent: Unfortunately the converse is also true, in a mating sort of sense. If you appear more educated than they are, they are the ones intimidated and scared off, even if the intelligence levels are completely harmonious.
This reduces the highly educated (grad-school+) single woman to a decreasing population of mates that are more educated than she is, unless she has met her mate before she seeks the education.
posted
Okay -- something that no one else seems to have touched on here, so I will.
First, let me say I am college educated, but I've also been a SAHM mom and a homeschool mom, and now I'm in the working world.
I'm also a single parent!
It is for THIS reason that she needs to go ahead and get a college education. Despite all our hopes and dreams for the future, there might come a time that she has to raise her kids BY HERSELF.
It happens. Divorce happens. Death happens.
Nothing is worse (believe me, from experience) than suddenly being a single parent and having nothing more than a high school education. You can't MAKE enough with that to support a family. You HAVE to have something to fall back on.
You have to be prepared. Get your college education first -- you may need it someday.
posted
Amka, of course I believe mothers should be well educated. I thought that this point would be immediately salient, and don't let Tom fool you, he went to college, though I do have a feeling he knew quite a bit more than most kids about just about everything before he went there.
Dan,
quote:Not because your children will be greatly better off because thier mother can quote Plato.
That's where I disagree. I think her children will be. There is a myth in Protagoras about how Epimetheus was charged by Zeus with distributing among all mortal species powers, giving hide to protect them against the weather, speed to the weak, strength to the slow, hoofs or hard bloodless skin to protect the against the ground, etc. To his dismay, Epimetheus used up all of his powers on brute beasts and left man naked, unshod, unbedded, and unarmed. Prometheus came to his friend and man's aid by stealing fire and the mechanical arts. In the beginning, these skills were thought to be enough, but since man lacked political wisdom to go along with these skills, he couldn't work together and was devoured by wild beasts.
Zeus, fearing the destruction of our race, "sent Hermes to impart to men the qualities of respect for others and a sense of justice, so as to bring order into our cities and create a bond of friencdship and union."
Here is where it gets important:
"Hermes asked Zeus in what manner he was to bestow these gifts on men. "Shall I distribute them as the arts were distributed - that is, on the principle that one trained doctor suffices for many laymen, and so with the other experts? Shall I distribute justice and respect for their fellows in this way, or to all alike?"
"To all" said Zeus. "Let all have their share. There could never be cities if only a few shared in these virtues, as in the arts. Moreover, you must lay it down as my law that if any one is incapable of acquiring his share of these two virtues he shall be put to death as a plague to the city.""
Every single person necessarily has a share in political virtue, and the stoking of that share is the purpose of education. That's the discipline that ties all of the others together, and is the one that is necessary not only for humans to survive, but to live well. This shouldn't be all that new to anyone, at the top end of Hatrack have CT and The Rabbit, and at the bottom end you have Ced and we all know what happened to Baldar.
These people weren't cast out because they failed a science test, or couldn't fathom multi-variable calculus, just as people aren't thrown into jail for not being able to take a derivative. I don't know how we have confused the role of public education. But we have.
Protagoras goes on to say that all children are taught this virtue from their parents, friends, teachers, and anyone they come across. It's the most imporant and the only perfectly ubiquituous art given to man, and since everyone has a share of it, no person can know it all, but Protagoras argues that one who is coached in athletics to understand the body, schooled in music to appreciate harmony and balance, and educated in law can develop the highest share of political virtue and better move society to more harmonious place, and that these are those who usually enter school the earliest and leave the latest.
We are a people who thrive through education, and who but the parents are primarily charged with the education of the young. That's a cursory analysis of an incredible text, and one I was exposed to for the first time at a University.
I'd love to speak on it more if anyone else is interested.
________
Notice, nowhere here did I talk about education in terms of money. While I agree that it is a factor, I think our pre-occupation with earning-power has deleterous effects to the way we think about education.
posted
actually, farmgirl, i think that reasoning falls under what Dan posted, and is very true.
just so we're all clear, i don't see college education as unnecessary to a sahm, in fact, i can see quite a few reasons already cited on this thread. i just happen to think that higher education isn't a right for anyone. even the girl who wants to be an astronaut has no right to go to college. i guess that means i agree with AJ.
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However I am now going to point out the part of this whole thing that bugs me. It has a lot more to do with my own family particular attitudes and pre-suppositions than anything else.
My mother and her two sisters as well as 2 my aunts that married are all college educated. That is a total of five college educated women, all of which have exceedingly marketable degrees. They are all stay at home moms. 4 of them married men who had degrees that could bring in more income than they could.
The other one married her high school sweetheart who didn't get a college degree. They scrimp and save the most to keep their children clothed. They wouldn't survive if my aunt didn't have a huge garden and can everything. It is obvious to an outsider (which I am since I have never been deeply involved with that branch of the family) that they would be far better off financially if my Aunt was working and the Uncle stayed at home with the kids. But no my Uncle HAS to be the provider because his ego is so fragile that he can't stand the thought of being dependent on a woman. He also expects my aunt to do wonders on her budget (which she does amazingly) and keep the kids clothed better than all of the children of the richer siblings. She also has to cloth 5 children in such fashion compared to the richer relatives who only average 3 kids. The rich ones basically don't give a darn about appearance for the most part and their kids will look like banshees at times compared to their well manicured poorer cousins.
This is a stupid gender stereotype that I am proud of Papa Moose for challenging.
The interesting thing is that this relationship could be said to be a healthy marriage, because neither spouse challenges the pre-concieved sterotypes even though the family would to me clearly be more well off if they had. To them though the roles are more important to society and to question them is to destroy the fabric of America.
Perhaps the most interesting thing is that my most intelligent uncle of the bunch doesn't have a college degree, he went to college was expelled for smoking pot. Now he is a pig farmer, with a side appliance repair business. However in his spare time he is steadily working his way up the chess tournament rankings.
posted
I realized I started out to make one point in my previous post and ended up on a related point but not the one I was trying to make. What personally annoys me is that all of my aunts, and my mother would say that the college degree is important for "back-up" security, but they won't actually use it if a back up might be necessary. When one of the more well off uncles lost his job because in general he's a slacker, the rest of the aunts and my grandmother threatened social ostracisation should the aunt (who is an accountant) go back to work so that the family could have some income. Even though they would logically deny it, their actions state they think the man should work or no one.
I am less of a person in their eyes because I actually want to use my degree in the field where I trained.
I respect and even defend their right to choose to stay at home, yet I am ridiculed for choosing differently.
posted
1. If you are going to be using your education as a back-up in case of divorce or death, you need to keep your education/work experience current or it won't do you any good.
2. We need fewer mothers who, by example, teach their kids to lie, cheat, and steal. That is what you are doing, isn't it? You are lying in order to con someone out of money. That's stealing. And getting an education by lying and stealing is pretty much the definition of cheating.
3. There are many things that you learn while getting a college education that you may never use while raising kids and running a household, while many things that would be valuable to learn will not be taught at college. If you want to honestly win a scholarship, great. Go for it. But if you are trying to fool someone into giving you a scholarship. . . well, don't. That's just wrong.
4. If you had to pay for college all by yourself, would it be worth it? If not, you might reconsider why you are going.
5. There are plenty of places (MIT online springs to mind) that you can get "educated." However, if you are looking for a piece of paper that says you are educated, I wonder why. Again, if you had to pay for this by yourself, would it be worth it? Would it be worth using tens of thousands of dollars to get that piece of paper? Couldn't that money be used as a large down payment on a house? Or at least, not as a debt that your family will carry for years to come by way of student loans?
6. Yeah, what Celia said. If you want a scholarship, don't lie. Find one that fits you. Set a good example for your future kids.
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quote: While I agree that it is a factor, I think our pre-occupation with earning-power has deleterous effects to the way we should think about education.
I'd like to throw out a few thoughts about this. No, I am not a parent. So, yes, I am probably speaking from my bunghole.
I agree with the above quote, and just to be clear, I'm not saying that parents with a love of learning shouldn't learn and impart their knowledge on to their children. Obviously, the more informed you are about any matter, the more options you have to help you resolve that matter. I just tend to believe that you can learn these things without going to college for four years. I think someone can learn the same things outside of college in a lot of instances that they could inside the college.
That said, wanting to spend time with your children such that you impart this knowledge to them is certainly NOT a universal trait. I'm sure we all know parents who, though good people, don't really have the social skills necessary to interact with their children, or the energy, or the correct mental attitude such that their interaction is going to be beneficial to their children. Time spent with their children is awkward.
I guess I kind of look at knowledge as a raw resource. It's there, but turning it into something useful that another people *wants* to use is another trick, and NOT one all people can learn. I DO think that to some degree good parents are made, not born.
Yes, people can modify their behavior and become better parents, but can they learn to love being with their children? With any children? That's the question. I don't know too many parents who really, truly like spending time with their children instead of pursuing their own interests. Then again, I don't know a lot of parents. So, take that as you will.
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quote:Yes, people can modify their behavior and become better parents, but can they learn to love being with their children?
I know parents who are exasperated and frustrated by their children because they can't answer their children's questions or articulate in an honest and compelling manner any of the lessons they want their children to abide. I think it's a common frustration, and one that it beat back by rigorous study. On a few threads, Chris Bridges showed how he can explain what some parents assume is unexplanable to children so young that these same parents think that they are unteachable. I somehow have complete confidence that Ela's explanatory powers are equally impressive.
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posted
That's great, but I don't think you're responding to my point. My point is that before you can elucidate, you have to *like* being a teacher to your children. You have to like spending lots of time around your children and taking the time to answer their questions, and you then have to have the ability to phrase the knowledge in such a way that they can learn from it and want to know more. I do agree that 'rigorous study' will help a person to communicate with children. Though, I do think some people are naturally much better at it than others.
I specifically said having knowledge is useful. I'm not arguing against parents learning so they can better answer their children's questions. I am saying that having the knowledge is different than being able to, or having the desire to, teach. That said, I appreciate that there ARE lots of parents out there, like Bridges and Ela, who have that ability.
posted
Ok, lots of stuff to respond to here. I'm going to start with a basic outline of what I hope my life will be like.
First, I'll go to college, I'm definately going to college, there's no question about it, even if I do have to pay for it myself. Scholarships would just make things easier. I then intend to work for a few years, 5 or 6, earn money to put in the bank, because my children are going to college too. Somewhere in there I'll hopefully get married, and then I'd like to have kids when I'm in my late twenties. I'd like to stay at home with my kids until the youngest one is around ten. This is where it gets tricky, because I don't know how many kids I'm going to have. Then I want to go back to work until I retire and live happily ever after.
I hope that maybe makes where I'm coming from clearer.
Practical reasons why I need a degree: Most of these have already been stated, but I'll repeat a few. Mostly, you need one to get any kind of a good job now. Tom is an exception, but I'm not Tom, and I doubt that would work for me. And I do have every intention of working before I have kids, and when they are old enough to be left home alone I want to work again. Also, if anything should happen to my husband, or if I didn't get married and would want to adopt, I would need a college degree to support my family. They're really pretty much nessecary nowadays.
Personal reasons why I want an education. I want to learn. I can do some learning on my own, but I'd learn much more with a proffessor. I'm going to graduate high school in a year. I do not feel educated. I feel horribly ignorant. I remember discussions at the dinner table about Einstien and the meaning of life from when I was nine or ten. Most of what I know about the world around me comes from those discussions, yes, a mother does need to know Milton. And at some point or another, her children will tap that knowledge.
Why i want to be a SAHM. Quite frankly, I'm not capable of being a mother and working. Being a mother is a huge job, I would never be able to handle the stress of being a mother and working. I react to stress with depression; I've spent the last 8 years of my life with a depressed mother, my children are not going to go through that.
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posted
blacwolve, all of that is great! Why don't you write your essay (assuming it's not too late) about that? Just like you did, only with more details? Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
You know, many scholarships were established with a particular goal in mind (i.e. helping the disadvantaged, furthering the goals of a particular discipline), thus many of these scholarships from an economic stand point are provided such that people who normally would do something else with their lives can dedicate themselves to advancing a field.
Scholarships are not solely for the edification of a single individual, and to think that is such rubs me as being kind of selfish. I think it is absolutely vital that mothers be educated and that they pass on such education to their young, however, paying for their education is an academic dead end, in terms of technological advancement. Scholarships are an investment in the future of all people, not just a single family.
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All of your reasons are wonderful, though I particularly like the last two.
The first one, I understand but don't agree. I don't have a college education, but have had a very nice career in business. My husband doesn't have a college education, but is still a successful salesman. My brother doesn't have a college education, but is still one of the most successful Comcast Broadband managers in the state. Conversely, my mother has a ton of degrees (AA, AS, BA, and MA) but never has had much of a career. And my father's degree (BA) has no relation whatsoever with his current occupation.
So while I think a college education is wonderful, admirable and in most ways excellent, I don't think it has much connection to a successful working career in many many cases.
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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"life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness " Education is a right ! Absolutely!
Even if it wasn't, stupid parents yield stupid kids. True, education does not equal smarts , but it can help develop them. If you're totally un-educated, you're bound to be totally stupid. College, while extremely underfocused in some areas of education, is our societies attempt at increasing the inteligence/wisdom of the human race, and in many respects, for many people, it doesn't do a half bad job! Unlike primary and secondary schools. So don't knock it so much. The truth about scolarships is they're handed out in an unfair way. Why does somebody who can BS away through an essay deserve scholarship money over somebody who can barely write and wants to get a really good education and so do his/her level best to better the circumstance of the human race?
Posts: 1103 | Registered: Apr 2002
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I should clarify, it was an essay for my school's scholarship committee.
If you realy believe that scholarships are only for those who plan on working for the betterment of the human race, all I can say if you're either really idealistic or really stupid, your choice. Posts: 4655 | Registered: Jan 2002
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