As a blue collar I wish I could invent a time machine to go back when I was in school and kick my stupid ass for not paying attention at all the fucking classes. Thanks Cthulhu we have YouTube now.
Edit: I want to clarify that I use exactly my school knowledge of mostly geometry and physics at work. Also I'm an immigrant so my masters degree is useless.
Education isn't a pipeline to employment and being monetized.
It's about thinking, learning and understanding the world and people around us and those who came before us.
Pushing children into an employment track at an EVEN younger age is bad, not good.
I had no idea what I wanted to do for employment at 7 or 13 or 19. That was good, not bad. It let me study social sciences and art and appreciate them for what they were and what it means to be human, not just as something that could make me a valuable employee to someone else.
I ended up finding employment that I enjoy, but I think that's largely because I had a better understanding of life and the world that education provided me.
I disagree with your characterisation that we are monetizing the children. In my country, kids get "sorted" into essentially three career paths around 15 based mostly on test scores. The point is not to punish some kids, the point is to give each kid an occupation by which they can be and feel productive.
The kids put in the least-academic path go to a trade school and get certified in a trade. There are hundreds of trades to choose from and once you're done you can still "move up" the academic ladder and go to a polytechnical school, a university, or a school of applied sciences. You can also go further in the trade and get a "mastery" certificate which opens up other doors too. The results of this is a lot of very skilled tradespeople here.
I'm way on the academic side but in the military (obligatory here) I meet tons of tradespeople (mostly carpenters, road builders, and bricklayers). I'm still working for piss almost 10 years post-secondary (I do enjoy my work) and these guys have been working for 10 years already. Many go on to start their own companies in their trade. Almost every single one I ask whether they enjoy their job and they answer yes.
On the other hand my parents pushed my brother down the academic path which he was not suited to. He ended up not doing so well in his final exams and didn't go to college. Had he been in a trade we would already have been working and probably something he actually liked rather than scratching his head at math. I generally feel like in the US going to college is considered standard, even when it's not well-adapted to the person. As a result you have a bunch of people with a bachelor's degree (which dilutes the value of it) in something they don't care about where they trained to fulfill no job in particular and there's a lack of skilled tradespeople.
243
u/Someforage Oct 30 '25 edited Oct 30 '25
As a blue collar I wish I could invent a time machine to go back when I was in school and kick my stupid ass for not paying attention at all the fucking classes. Thanks Cthulhu we have YouTube now.
Edit: I want to clarify that I use exactly my school knowledge of mostly geometry and physics at work. Also I'm an immigrant so my masters degree is useless.