That’s probably why you missed that my post was a bad impersonation of things that useless management people say. That’s okay, I’ve been there too my dude.
You should quit professional work for a year or two and take a job bouncing at your local dive bar. Tell them Uncle TwoJar sent you.
Sorry. I reread it now and got it. I am to tired to keep up with the discussion. Better call it a night.
It was brand new when l took it. Cobol was our dinosaur.
Bravo my man. That was beautiful.
That depends on what you mean by using the math and physics. If you mean how often do I solve a differential equation in my job, the answer is basically never. But understanding the math and physics that make your designs work and are the foundation for the analysis tools that you use is still quite useful. That said, you could still do most of what I do without knowing it, if you are willing to accept that some things work because of math or physics that you don’t know.
Higher education is useful with the right fields, but the “right fields” are small in number compared to the total number of fields offered. Let’s call a spade a spade, getting a degree in something like sociology, gender studies, etc, is completely useless, it’s a waste of time and money. If somebody wants to pay to get that degree, they have the freedom to do so, but kids going into these four year programs expecting to come out and do anything other than work at Starbucks are delusional.
In terms of personal experience, I attended what are considered two top universities, one undergraduate and one for business school (economics and finance, respectively). I can emphatically say that if I spent 6 years interning as opposed to those 6 years in school, I’d be way more advanced at my job from the start, more productive, and more competent and would not have missed out on learning anything. I went into these programs eyes wide open, I knew I was only paying for an alumni network, but a lot of kids unfortunately think that their Ivy education is going to somehow lead to better development of skills when it simply doesn’t.
I have worked with, for, and employed people from no name schools, mid-tier good name schools, and the top institutions in the world. I have found no discernible trend, I have seen total morons from all three and I have seen people that are completely brilliant from all three. I have also seen people that are smack in the middle average from all three.
What if institutions could discriminate providing loans based on the subject of study?
Engineering, nursing, law, accounting, etc.: good to go.
Gender studies, international dance, sociology, macro economics, journalism, etc.: no loan offered.
Also, no FAFSA either.
If you want to study a useless program, then do so, at your expense or a grant.
Well they should be able to do that regardless, but it’s unlikely given they get money for useless degrees, too, which is why this issue exists on the level it does.
I agree that a lot of humanities degrees are useless in today’s job market but this fact really bums me out.
Not every student is interested or even able to pursue a stem degree and a lot of those pursuing niche subjects are genuinely passionate. I was extremely passionate about Russian studies and numbers are very painful for me. I’ve come to enjoy and appreciate maths over the past two years, but cannot fathom going for a stem degree. Also struggle with computer stuff.
Of course, I’m lucky that I’ve found a semi useful field that I’m more passionate about, but I still feel inadequate because of my struggle learning programming
Ahh… classic violation of fungibility 
I understand your point, Anna. Students should study what they are passionate about and pursue careers they’re passionate about. My issue is that there are a lot of people who do this in majors that are not as employable, rack up a ton of debt, and think everyone is supposed to feel sorry for them when they end up getting a job they could get with a high school diploma along with crippling debt.
If I had a kid and they told me they were truly passionate about acting, dance, sociology, etc. I’d tell them that’s wonderful but I would only pay for their education in a STEM or business major. After they get their undergrad in biology or engineering, they can audition their heart out or buy 500 sociology books and become an expert/
I agree 100% with you.
That’s the attitude my parents are taking with my little bro. Ironically they were perfectly happy to let me do Russian studies
You need to separate education, credentials, networking, and fun. I enjoy lifting weights and am interested in learning more about it. That doesn’t mean I should expect someone to pay me to do it.
If you like studying Russian language and culture, you can do that in many ways that don’t involve a university.
I completely agree. I do want to hear your perspective on this: what if a student is unable to handle the maths required for a useful degree?
I think “passion” is vastly overrated. Realizing that you’re good at something without actively hating it is more than enough, even for a very successful career.
I got into engineering for the money. I realized that I like too much the independence afforded by affluence to live my life as a broke, bitter history teacher.
If anything, I think my emotional detachment helped me cope with the challenges of my professional career much better that those who were “passionate” about the subject matter.
Duolingo, the Classics (Dostoyevsky, Tolstoy, Turgenyev, Pushkin, Gogol…) and a overnight trip in second class (RIP platskart) to learn the anti-Asian slurs yelled out at you by occasionally violent drunks.
The guy who founded that used to teach at my school!
It’s a great app
Meh, I don’t need a fancy app to learn those 
I think you can get around being very mathematically talented and attain a good degree. Accounting isn’t really anything beyond basic math and is arguably the most practical and employable business degree. Law involves no math. I’m totally ignorant of the physical sciences, but I’d imagine biology doesn’t require much math (again I plead ignorance here). My degrees were super quantitative, especially the masters, and I managed despite not being great at math. I just had to apply myself more for courses like econometrics, risk management, derivatives, etc.
I find numbers painful, but econometrics is really really cool
I love economics but I was bored to death in that class to be honest. The funny thing is my graduate degree felt more like I was majoring in calculus, yet at my current job nothing I do is really more advanced than algebra and Excel does everything anyway.
Yep… as my advisor put it “multivariate calc with supply and demand sprinkled on top”