Bonjour à tous ! Quick update: Closed captions are now available on my most recent and also most popular videos 😊 I'll progressively add them to more and more videos.
Hi Alice! I'm studying to be a translator. If you're interested I can translate the captions into Spanish. All for free of course, in return for your wonderful videos.
It angers me when Musk says you don't need to go to university to achieve what he claims, but all that he claims to have achieved was done by his engineers and scientists, all people he hired and that have actually gone to university. without university people, he would have achieved nothing.
Higher degree helps, but it's definitely not for everyone, and not all jobs/career paths need it. Also it definitely IS a commodity. It's something that can only exist if there are people that are willing to provide it. But those people need to be compensated as well, and who's going to pay them, if not the people receiving the benefits? If I don't want to go to college, why should I partake in paying for those who do? Naturally, redistribution of wealth will only cause tensions in society, as well as other issues as well.
@@goldstein10493 exactly. Not everyone who goes to uni is studying to be an engineer. Most everyone else is probably better off using relatively inexpensive paid courses and free resources...like youtube or the library.
@@mikochild2 yes. You don't even need college degree to be a programmer, just take courses or bootcamp. And programmers make a lot of money. In this day and age where the government is causing college tuition to be high, we need to be proactive and seek other alternatives, to force colleges to lower their tuition.
People forget that those "don't go to college...make money" people usually come from very rich families and are trying to sell the dream to highschool drop-outs with lower social standing;
Look at Zuckerberg. People glorify him dropping out from Harvard like its Harvard thats gonna make him great lol. It’s not widely talked about that he went to Philip Exeter, one of the most expensive boarding schools in America. And the most important contributing factor was that his parents could foresee the internet boom and sent him to programming classes before everybody rode on the bandwagon. Mind you, he was just 11 at this time, just how more perfect of an upper middle class life can you get??He went to Harvard more prepared than most kids his age were. Its good for them, of course, but other people should not aspire to make the same decision as him(no college), because everyone’s starting point is different and some may have more safety net. Instead, people should evaluate themselves and be honest. Edit : okay fine, the important things that he got out of Harvard was his business contacts & his wife who was there before he became a somebody, but thats all, really. Even if he attended lesser-tier colleges, he probably would have founded something else with a different set of housemates. Someone like him would go out of his way to achieve things, umm FB is Winklevoss twins' idea? Yes ideas are not patents, but you could already see his inner snake. Dont underestimate ambitious nerdzz
The same with Gates, Jobs, and Wozniak. They didn't drop out of college because education is useless. They were just so far ahead of the computer sciences niche they learned everything they could in a shorter period of time. They also all had the good fortune of coming around when IBM was in the middle of an antitrust lawsuit.
I hate Zuckerberg and he dropping out from Harvard shouldn't be exalted for a myriad reasons (observation bias, etc.) BUT a bunch of other kids had the same privileges he did and HE was the one who built facebook. Your comment makes you sound like a sore loser.
I have a BA degree and I'm proud of it (mostly because I achieved a good life balance) but what I realised was that some of the very high-grading people I met had very little social or emotional intelligence. They got straight As but were braggadocious and arrogant, portrayed themselves as 'woke' but never actually stood up for social causes, couldn't really use logic very well in a debate, and mocked people for wanting a work-life balance and not pulling all nighters every week to get those top grades. It made me realise that our idea of academic and educational 'success' is amazingly narrow.
Idk, I’m having a hard time buying that straight A college students can’t make logical arguments. If you’re in a BA program and can’t support your opinions logically, you won’t have an A in any class where you have to write essays.
This is just conjecture. People all along the the grade scale spectrum will display everything you have said. Secondly how do you even measure emotional intelligence, I love how people use it as a metric but have no standard for how it is measured in the first place. Thirdly, it looks like you're just trying hard to sound smart and make these ad hom attacks, but again, you have nothing backing up anything you have stated other than anecdotes. Fourthly, not everyone who gets good grade in college need to spend 8+ hours studying. There are people who are just naturally gifted with understanding the academic field they followed, and there are academic fields which doesn't require that much studying to begin with to get good grades. Why are you judging people based on the grades they get, seems very bigoted to be honest, but that's just my opinion.
I'm currently undergoing a serious career crisis. Studying has become plane, mediocre, automatic, uncritical. I read the assigned material, to engulf it and then regurgitate it in exams that are as far from critical thinking as they can be. But there are some moments in which I believe I can build myself a better path by using all the tools I'm offered as well as the privileges of having access to free education (I'm from Argentina). Even tough, academia has proven to be quite rough on people with mental disorders like me, I'm taking my time and trying to focus on the real goal: acquiring knowledge and the abilities to create, discover, criticise and accept criticism. As usual, I loved the video and your reflection was really useful.
Tbh, I'm so tired of rich influencers and celebrities (many of whom grew up with parents who were also rich or middle class BECAUSE they got a college education) telling the rest of us that getting a college degree is "useless". I'm so tired of pop culture degrading education and invalidating experts in certain subjects because they're offended by what they're saying. It's no coincidence that this phenomenon is happening while we live in time where anti-vax and flat Earthers are taking over. I'm glad I found this video, because I agree that college education has been degraded and taken or granted too, and that a lack of critical thinking has become an issue.
In all honesty I do think college isn’t the best option half the time as a college student. Like realistically half of the degrees that colleges offer shouldn’t exist. In my opinion it’s just natural selection we all can’t be successful. And there are also other ways to be successful but with my experiences a GOOD college degree is the greatest investment one can make if they don’t go into massive debt they know they won’t be able to pay back within a limited amount of time.
@@bryan-zp6ty well, there’s no good or bad degree. Just degrees that are more or less in demand. If you need job security you can be a teacher, doctor, lawyer, cyber security specialist... the list goes on. Everybody has their niche and can make a job out of it. Would I recommend a Bachelors of Arts? No. But it can be used and you do walk away knowing more than you did before
I think the part where you said that "studying can also be for the country" is actually common in a collectivist society like the Philippines. As a student of the national university, we call ourselves "scholars of the nation" and the concept of "studying for the country" or "to help our countrymen" is part of the school culture. Its also common for students all over different universities to use the quote "Kakayanin para sa bayan" which means "I'll get through this for my country" during finals week or if academic work becomes heavy. It's interesting to see the individualistic perspective from the West in comparison to the kind of mindset that I am exposed to.
Apologies for the number of comments I have posted, I get way to excited to contribute my own thoughts and experiences whenever you post! I enjoy this community and I look forward to learning from the discussions in the comments. Thanks for such an insightful video Alice!
@@mikaylab.4913 It's so exciting to find a fellow Iskolar ng bayan among the comments section. I owe my college degree to generous subsidies from the government and I'll always be grateful for that privilege. It was in UP that I learned to think for myself and opened my eyes to the broader world around me. However, having graduated years ago and watching my peers leave the country for more lucrative jobs abroad, I'm not so sure if the gov't is doing enough to stem the flow of this so-called "brain drain". I'm thinking of leaving myself, not out of greed or personal gain, but just to look for more greener pastures. Anyway, I've rambled too much but I'm really thankful that I found this channel.
Yup in my country, Indonesia too....i study in national university...many people can't afford to go to college. So yeah.... We study to develop our nation, to help others, etc...one motto of the campus is "For God, nation, and alma mater"
Everyone actually encounters contrasting opinions in university. So, when the accent is on the critical thinking, nobody really can teach you what to think. You have to decide it for yourself. The most impactful thing my uni professor said was "Don't believe anyone. Don't believe me. I could make mistakes or lie to you. If you want to have an opinion, go home and check what I've said, check multiple sources". Great video, btw! It's important to cover such topics, especially using many examples :)
Schools are not teaching you what to think, they teach you how to think in so many ways that just isnt explained, or is explained but people do not retain, nor listen to know. Of course you make your own decisions on what to think, but schools teach you to take something in front of you, and question it in many ways.
OMG THIS HERE!! god i fucking love that so much for the longest time couldnt explain why i cant make decisions for other people!! kind of like a "i dont wanna hold you back" type thing i cant explain but yeah this!! also hope i wasnt mean i just cant explain in general :""D
@Luís Andrade uh, even if those studies talked about that, without those courses we’d have no place to talk about that stuff. Education is just retaining knowledge. You don’t have to agree with it? Like you can take a whole class about a fictional alien planet and talk about their politics, doesn’t mean you agree with them ur just thinking critically. Same thing with this. Ideologies don’t help people, knowledge does. Honestly i dislike how capitalism has played out but sign me up for a capitalist-theory course I wanna see the thought behind it! Education doesn’t have to have a reason behind it for me to want it. Some things I just wanna know.
Gyal you killed this one. As a Political Scientist, we observe the decline of critical thinking in the 17th century with the birth of "isms" and "ologies" because they deliver prepackaged ideologies that you can subscribe to rather than formulating your own.
Agreed. Many people are so focused on finding the right label and community that they go along with ALL their ideals instead of cultivating a unique perspective through critical thinking
@@stepahead5944 sure so first ting comes to mind is Liberalism (no, not what Americans today know to be Liberals) but Lockian Liberalism as it was the first "ism".. Well ever. This was around the 17th century. Before then; ppl would simply read political theory. This was good because it created a polis which is essentially a public place in which politics took place and allowed for a healthy discourse to ascertain the parts of political theory that would work versus what would not. After Classical Lockian Liberalism, more pre-packaged idelogies popped up such as conservatism, epiricism etc. The danger was that ppl simply subscribed to an ideology which did the thinking for them. For example; i say I'm a Classical Liberal which can mean a litany of other things (social contract theory, pursuit of property etc) but I may not even know what all this ideology entails! Moreover, there's no debate because we already assume we know what these "Classical Liberals" are thus if we don't agree with them, we don't even inquest as to why we don't.
I don't think that the use of labels like all the "-isms" you might see in various subjects, fields, or disciplines is inherently a bad thing. Labels can be useful for providing a shorthand for various bundles of concepts and abstract trains of thought. Granted, people do need to have an awareness of at least the key concepts or reasonings related to an "-ism" before using it in discourse in order to get the most out of their use. However, at the very least, it would seem more useful to have such labels tie together concepts or wrap them up together, so that when they are used in language, bringing them up in conversation may allow others to better interpret or understand what its user means and what its user might be trying to say with them. Otherwise, without such labels and the semantic conventions that go with them, people would have to go through and explain every concept or idea that might be bundled within that "-ism" label every time they might wish to say something about whatever is related to the things they wish to speak or write about. I think the problem of where the usage of labels like various different "-isms" went wrong is that they can be overused. What began as a convenient and handy set of cognitive tools became potential cognitive crutches. As people got more comfortable not having to expend a little more mental energy thinking through concepts they bring up, they became less inclined to bring their own mental input to situations where such labels might be applied, resulting in tendencies to just carelessly or blindly throw around semantic labels without applying the thinking those labels were supposed to convey through shorthand in the first place. A chair is not necessarily useless or bad for walking just because people could potentially develop an addiction to a more sedentary lifestyle and develop habits of not walking or running enough to be more physically healthy. Likewise, I believe conventional labels for concepts are not necessarily inherently bad for critical thinking. They just need to be used when needed and not relied on when not needed. Like any other kind of tool, it serves its user well when handled properly and relied on in moderation. But if the user becomes overdependent on the tool due to letting their own abilities related to the function of the tool decline or atrophy from laziness, then indeed the tool can become the user's master, while the tool also suffers a decline in usefulness (for the one who once used it is no longer able to use it to its fullest capacity due to their own atrophy). - - -
There is something to be said for how libraries act a centers of adult education. I see people of all ages interested and curious when they come to the rural library I work in, sure there are plenty coming for entertainment from the DVD collection or the Fiction section but all media exposes people to ideas. It's a good resource for the autodidact, just as the internet can be. Everyone learns in different ways, I would not presume one way of learning is better than another. When I entered college no one had really told me that whatever you study will be your career, or that it was necessarily what you needed to get a job. And it was entirely unrelated to any occupation I have taken up since. I did cultural and linguistic studies but it was entirely for personal reasons. Do I regret it? Not one iota. The act of learning was the purpose.
That discussion among students (instructors welcome too, sure) is one thing that I found really, really important at university and it's not well replicated in our internet self-education. Discussion groups at public libraries would be great, but particularly when physical isolation is something we're stuck with, there ought to be better ways to cultivate it in online spaces too.
I feel a little better after reading this, i studied a degree that is not very profitable in my country, i just choose it because i didn't know what to study, and i liked the industry, not thinking further, and now i feel that my degree is useless for not being able to compete in an international setting and some other reasons, anyways, your comment made me feel like it was not time wasted.
This is becoming more and more common. I studied art for almost 10 years, before making up my mind what I wanted to do...and it was related to medicine, so I had to study all over again. The interesting thing, is that in current institution we get asked all the time whether we plan to work in this field or are we studying for ourselves, because skills we need to acquire differ. It really shows, that an education in the right field is not enough to make one a specialist in that particular field. So you can definitely study something “unrelated” and become another type of specialist - because of the way you think. Hope that makes sense.
I’ve heard that to work at a library you have to have a masters in library science... did you eventually get that degree? If not, how did you get your job at the library?
The real issue is that too many people either see college as the holy grail of success, or as an utterly pointless endeavor. In reality, it has it's pros and cons and does the most good for those who have a post-graduation career plan. There are other ways to succeed though.
And it may differ from country to country. At least in Mexico, most colleges are funded by the goverment so, the incentive to go without the hassle of tuition really makes the experience more organic in the sense that competition always comes first rather than the money.
I think that our education system is very rigid and it hasn't progressed enough to be able to develop every single person to their fullest potential. I do understand that technical knowledge is important but I personally think it would be better if the system and the curriculum sees self-development and, as you said, development of critical thinking skills as the primary goal of education (and not a just a by-product of the technical stuff that we have to study). It's sad to see people work so hard to get perfect scores to be "marketable to companies" after graduation while not being able to fully develop themselves for the real world.
Just wanted to add that I think the ineffectiveness of the education system can also be seen in the rise of side hustles. A lot of people do a side hustle alongside their actual job because 9-5 jobs usually don't pay enough. Building your own small business has also been part of the formula of breaking free from the corporate world and more often than not, these side hustles are not related to one's degree. Why pay thousands and spend years in uni if it won't even allow you to live comfortably? That shows a massive problem in the current educational system. If anything, some people do just go to uni to get a piece of paper and to build connections.
And honestly i could be wrong but even professors like Jose Rizal scholar Ambeth Ocampo misunderstands a lot of what's going on with Filipino communities in other nations, as if it is their fault for not "staying true to their heritage" or complaining about issues "the wrong way". It's like critical theory is a big no-no in the Philippines. Then again, anything remotely "left-leaning" is taboo in the Philippines as much as it is in the US (in conservative areas at least).
@@mikaylab.4913 yeah building connections is literally the only useful incentive at this point for many people. And im sorry if my comments seem out of left field. I don't know where my previous comment went. I got too excited to see another Filipino commenter haha
@@MiguelThinks sorry if my reply is insufficient or if I am not able to fully understand what you just shared but i do agree that there are just so many layers to it and I think that the political climate also affects the kind of discourse that we have in the country. Even though it's hard, I still have some hope that the younger generations can push to become more critical of the traditional beliefs that operate within our systems.
Hey, I just want to jump in here, because Alice said that too in the video: a better way of saying his/her is using their. Besides being less wordy, it is also including people who don't identify as he or she :)
Cannot help but to think about how the alternative self help gurus who are sharing this “don’t go to college… make money” advice are people who are traditionally legitimized in society (white men). Meanwhile, those from backgrounds who have traditionally been left out of certain industries need a university degree just to be taken seriously.
Also a lot of these people came from rich or upper middle class families and had parents who were able to provide for them as kids most likely BECAUSE of their education. What a slap in the face to their parents for their own kid to grow up and basically say that the effort they put into their education so they could get a good paying job was "useless". I'm not saying they have to get a college education, but at least be respectful of those who do and acknowledge that it's at least somewhat important for a good amount of people to have it.
Agreed. My parents forced me to go to college against my will and didn't care what degree I got, so I majored in art. I've literally never used my degree. It was a huge waste of money. Everyone benefits from *education* but higher education as it currently is is the wrong choice for many, many, many people.
@@lindan7238 bruh he obviously isn't talking about medicine LMAO he refers to the general public who won't go on to pursue essential careers. Obviously he can't tell a STEM person to leave their education because they won't get any job without it. However, for example, business majors are probably encouraged to think twice about their degrees since liberal arts degrees usually don't need a higher education unless they're going into academia.
What you are studying is part of it, but there are also a lot of important and necessary jobs that require a degree or some kind of advanced training that are still considered "worthless" by society. These jobs include teachers, social workers, paramedics, librarian, etc. It bugs me when people say to get a "worthwhile" degree, but they don't really stop to think about all of the jobs in society that require one that pay less than non-degreed work. We do tend to generalize, and in the process, we completely undermine and underpay critically important people in society. We are starting to see the fruits of that terrible attitude in the form of massive labor shortages in jobs like teaching, social work, and certain medical fields.
Several years ago I had the distinct privilege of hearing a Nobel laureate (who happened to be a professor at my university). He told us the point of a PhD is to learn how to do good science. That’s always stayed with me.
As a daughter of an immigrant in America, traditional college education has transformed my and my brothers trajectory to well employed contributing people of our communities. Without it, I don’t think we would have come this far. And for my my mother, as a woman, there were huge limitations to what she could achieve in her home country. My liberal arts college education did not directly contribute to my current profession in the medical field, but it enhanced how I understand the people I see. Thank you for this video!!
Hey I was just curious how were you able to get a job in medicine with liberal arts degree and what kind of job it is? I hope you don’t mind me asking I work in the field as well
Many people do not enter the field that they get their degree in. College IS a place to help you think about the world and interact with different people. That's the way it should be viewed. I think that's really what a lot of us should take away from this discussion.
@@moonlightbae333 I can’t speak to what specific career OP has, but pre-health students in America can usually choose whatever major they want before entering medical/pharmacy/PA/vet/etc. school. They would just need to take a certain set of classes as undergraduates. These classes can sometimes overlap with the classes needed for the degree, and some of the classes may not overlap.
The thing that bugs me the most about this general criticism of academia is the idea that things are only worth while if they return a profit. Whereas it seems to me that it's often the opposite. Since capitalism is so driven by profit and perpetual growth, companies must either raise the prices on necessities or market more and more things that are totally pointless. The result is that the more pointless a job is, the more profitable it's guaranteed to be, a classic example being a stock broker. As you alluded to in your video, the only way to stop this cycle is to reform the system, and more accessible education is imperative in order for that to happen.
A stockbroker is not necessarily a 'pointless' job. A stockbroker can help people invest their money far more effectively than they could on their own. How is that any less necessary than a grocery store clerk or restaurant owner? Maybe you're still under the impression that stockbrokers only service extremely high net-worth individuals, which is now a thing of the past. "companies must either raise the prices on necessities or market more and more things that are pointless" what are you considering as necessities? This statement is extremely vague and not generally true. There are tons of things that go into the price of a certain item (e.g. supply, demand, cost of production, value of currency a.k.a inflation, ethics, etc.), one cannot say that the increase in price is necessarily due to a sinister fixation on increasing profits.
@@kockarthur7976 I'm sorry if I was vague. My train of thought was something along these lines: any person or society has a finite amount of needs. Obviously those needs will change from year to year, but in general they won't grow exponentially. Unfortunately, capitalism is driven by profit, which means that in order for a company to sustain itself, it needs to make more money than it did last year. Obviously you can cut costs, but only so much. So you need to increase revenue. To increase its revenue a company has two main options: it can find more customers or it can raise prices. For companies that deal with necessities i.e. housing, food, clothes etc, they generally prefer the latter, since there's a very finite need for these things (especially houses and food). For those who provide services that are unessential, such as chia pets, glitter or anything you might see on an infomercial, they're mostly attempting to find new customers, because if they raised their prices people would just lose interest. Obviously this a bit of an oversimplification, but my main point is that capitalism doesn't concern itself with the welfare of individuals. It cares about profit and growth. And there are some silly things that are absurdly profitable. To answer your first point, my beef with stockbrokers is just that I don't feel like the stock exchange is that useful. While it nominally helps companies raise funds and distribute risk, in practice it's a bunch of suits speculating the value of stocks in a multi-billion dollar game of chicken. It's totally detached from reality, as shown by the fact that the stock market performed great last year even though...everyone else had a pretty rough go of it. And while I'm sure you're correct in saying that stockbrokers help some people, I still feel like it's mostly those from the upper-middle class.
@@jonathanjackson1388 I disagree. The stock market is far from useless. Especially today, where anyone can invest from their smartphones. Investing in stocks can benefit people from any socioeconomic class. It allows an average person to grow their pension fund to retire or for average people to acquire ownership assets now that stock investing has been democratized by apps like Robinhood. I think capitalism inherently benefits the welfare of society. It provides incentive to create products that benefit people such as the case with the COVID vaccines. I think the problem is when capitalism isn’t properly regulated and corporations abuse it such as the 2008 bank bailouts. Crony capitalism aside, I think with a robust social safety net, a society can flourish with a capitalist foundation.
@@jonathanjackson1388 I think you forgot to account for a really big factor: efficiency. Many companies that deal with necessities try to raise efficiency in order to increase profit, and both the costumer and the company benefit from this. You actually have a curious case in Brazil, where the introduction of more efficient and affordable air conditioners lead to an increase in money spent on air conditioner per household (as it was way more affordable and many people bought more than one AC to spread throughout the house). The same thing happens with the food and energy sectors, we are the generation that spends the most money in food and energy in the entire human history, and yet we are the most efficient generation in doing so. And don’t forget that many “needs” change quite rapidly, in just 15 years a phone became a “need” to most teenagers, internet connection became a “need” in any household, etc
Higher education crisis is too real in Brazil too. Students have to study a lot to get into free universities and, after getting in, it's hard for them to get a job because of the hours (and also the strikes make the course run longer and longer). We also have private universities, a lot of the, commodified education as you said. Something weird here is that poor people go private (some are not that expensive, some are "easy" and students can work and study with no conflicting hours) and rich people go to public unis (because they can afford to spend hours and hours studying to get in and even not work until after graduating). Alas, for the past couple of years, we are all suffering from unemployment, regardless of education.
As a Brazilian, everything leads to believe that not having a degree will not change many things due to the rise in unemployment, but even so I believe that those who have the opportunity should try. Being able to choose a career and filter the opportunities is much better than just taking the job that comes (if it does). You can choose something for passion and personal development, or something for money and that has a good job offer. It's not wrong, it's our reality
@@yasminfranco5736 in this current scenario (the pandemic and economics crisis) I don't know how much changes, but I've actually read a study that stated that in Brazil, getting a college degree still has a great impact on how much you earn and on the risk of unemployed, when compared to other developing countries.
@@analupelosi3319 ter graduação hoje é quase como ter ensino médio completo. Ao mesmo tempo que cursar e concluir a faculdade é um privilégio, também é banalizado justamente pela comodificação da educação. Já perdi as contas de quantas vezes vi vagas de emprego pedindo graduação quando era completamente desnecessário. E com isso as pessoas se sentem obrigadas a cursar uma faculdade, não porque querem, mas porque devem, porque tem oportunidades de emprego (um pouco) melhores. É complicado.
I think a different solution for this could be to focus more on teaching critical thinking skills in highschool and compulsory education. I don't see why college is necessary to learn some of this stuff, and it also varies a lot depending on what area of knowledge you're studying. As a second year biology student I haven't been required or encouraged to do too much critical thinking yet but I have been introduced to a lot of resources to do research on my own that I would have loved to know about in highschool. It's not so hard to make stuff like political and literary analysis, sociology, how science actually works... more of a focus in compulsory education even if we can't go into it as deeply as we do in college. I know most teens don't take highschool as seriously but idk I'm thinking of going into education and I think we should try harder
I completely agree! I have always grappled with the concept of teaching critical thinking skills in higher education when it is common knowledge that colleges and universities are not accessible to many people on the margins of society. I believe it does everyone in society a great disservice to reserve that for university-educated individuals.
In the U.S. at least, what gets taught in the early compulsory education is far more dictated by local political bodies, which skew conservative. Even the suggestion of teaching "critical thinking" sets off alarm bells for them. I absolutely agree we _should_ be teaching students how to learn and how to avoid bullshit in grade schools, but getting there is going to take a substantial fight rather than mere work and attention to it.
Another thing to keep in mind: developmentally speaking, while children and adolescents are not incapable of thinking critically, they can’t do it the way adults can. So I suspect that although it’s undeniably helpful to instil these tendencies early on, part of the reason so much of the development of critical thinking happens in higher education is because university coincides with the developmental stage when people’s minds are best suited to it.
@@willemjohannes9007 Good point. It also underscores the needs (1) to make continuing education for one's own sheer self-development as a human a normal expectation, and (2) to make it readily available to people without the ability (for whatever host of reasons) to get it in a university. People need it, but they may not get it well enough when we've got all their time and attention.
@@jeffengel2607 Honestly the critical thinking have to be taught after 25. There's a level of maturity needed before you can learn these critical thinking skills, and I'll say most people below 24 aren't mature enough to understand them. We probably need to give people the ability to take free courses at 25 and above that will help develop these skills, such as a leadership conference or a college semester on critical thinking and politics. In a democracy, or a constitutional republic, this is very important since everyone vote does matter and a well informed population is the strength of a democracy, but I also think on average people tend to have a stronger grasp on the concept of critical thinking above the age of 21. Give 3 years for real world work experience and 25 seems like a good time to train the mind on these concepts.
University saved me. I grew up in a very religious household (some would call it a cult). I had no critical thinking skills, and I only learned that because I went to university. I did get a career in my degree, but I would have never left that religion and lived my own free and happy life if it wasn't for the critical thinking skills I learned, so for that alone I'm grateful.
This is such a refreshing perspective. People laugh at the thought of education for the community or as a public good, but they've never been introduced to any other way
You made me think with this video: at my uni, most of our group projects are done by looking at projects from previous years and then going "they did it like this so we should too, to get good/higher grades". Even through my first year of uni, whenever a colleague of mine suggested what essentially is borrowing ideas from others without thinking about them, I wondered about whether we were really learning or if we were just trying to crank out the highest number on a sheet of paper, disregarding the point of the project itself (which clearly was to apply what we had been taught in class, in our own way, making our own mistakes and learning from them) - and now that I've watched this video I'm pretty sure I have the answer. Thank you for that.
Congratulations on your first sponsor! You definitely deserve it. The smartest, most well read and well informed guy I know never even finished high school. He was also genuinely lovely, a family friend who took me in as a pregnant young woman with no job and no home. But he was entirely self taught. The way that they taught at a mainstream high school (especially in the 80s), just didn’t gel with his learning style. Looking back now, I’d say he’s very likely neurodivergent. But once he was free to study on his own, he just blossomed, educationally speaking. He’s the person I would go to for information on what was going on in the world, he’d always know the very detailed ins and outs of a situation the news barely skimmed. Unfortunately, he was very down on himself, calling himself a high school drop out , not very smart, etc. and that’s such a shame. We put so much emphasis on one way of learning that we disregard other avenues. Especially avenues that are purely for self edification, and have nothing to do with climbing a career ladder. I hope that with the rise of RUclips and educational channels, that this is something that is slowly changing. I can’t study at university anymore thanks to disability, but I still love to learn, and do the educational side of RUclips has been a godsend to me. And as a career is no longer a goal of education for me, I’m able to enjoy my learning that much more.
I did a business degree and it was very beneficial to me, and it did help me become a better thinker. It's easy for me to justify because my degree cost about $10K USD and I had 3 paid work terms.. I wish education was cheaper and more accessible so people don't have to get crushed by massive student loans just to get an education.
Education can be found elsewhere BUT a degree is needed if you want to get hired and work for a big company, that's the difference between a degree and not getting one
The better the access, the smaller the tension between classes. People wouldn't have to worry about getting a degree because it is accessible by choice rather than affordability, and therefore no longer an argument. EDIT: Also no longer a "gatekeepy" subject.
Does America (or france) not have apprenticeship? In this videos it sounds like it is either college or being completely fucked. In Germany people who are not interested in going to school for higher education can do a apprenticeship to become nurses, cooks or Handy man and much more. It is not as prestigious as going to college but you will be recognized as professionally trained.
Where I am in Canada we do have "apprenticeships," however due to regulations and (usually) necessary certifications to practice in certain fields, most apprenticeships are through university/college/student "co-ops" where you're being paid due to your academic achievements and aspirations (through a job-term associated with your field). Apprenticeships without formal education are only normalized in art spaces (tattoos, fashion) or the service industry (Bartending, cooking, autoshops, etc.) and even then, you need to know people to be given opportunity to learn without background experience.
America apprenticeship= military. Every other corporation or company will ask for 3 years of relevant work experience for a starting position, its a contradiction.
my thoughts exactly. many pretty well regarded and incredibly necessary jobs like mechanics, electricians and carpenters are based around apprenticeships. There are artistic professions like hairstylists and goldsmiths, office jobs like travel agent or banker, "intellectual" professions like bookselling or librarians or jobs with and for people like drivers of all kinds of public transportation or carers. And you can start from the age of 16 after finishing 10 years of schooling. Most apprenticeships take 3 years and then you can actually start earning a salary while your peers pursuing a higher education are just finishing high school. Plus you can continue your education in that field and become a master of your craft. Financially, it is a very sound decision at least here in Germany. And I'd argue in most fields it is easier to get a job after an apprenticeship than with a university degree because more and more people go to uni creating a shortage of skilled professional workers.
In America, trade schools would be the equivalent to apprenticeships. They’re 2 years and tend to carry less debt than colleges, but the education system tends to put them by the wayside. Jobs like mechanics and electricians would involve trade schools
America does have apprenticeships, available from various trade unions. I nearly took an apprenticeship with the local branch of the electrician's union, for example. You won't hear about them in high school though, I only knew the IBEW was hiring because my grandfather is a retired electrician. It's not that you need a family connection, they'll take pretty much anyone who can read and shows up to work on time and sober, but kids are taught in high school that they'll never amount to anything without a four year degree, so they don't bother even looking for trades.
I really like the point that you made: “by getting an education, we are helping our country to get richer”. I wish that they understood that in the USA. Certainly, many people can learn on their own, as long as they have a lot of discipline and integrity. However, much more of us do not have this aptitude to carry on and finish a project on our own. Sadly, everything in the USA has to be achieved by taking loans on top of loans, they don’t see that it will discourage a bunch of people from getting an education. Hence, this lack of education and development of the mind will not only slow down the economy of the country, but it will also impede lots of creativity and innovation. I also want to add that, the fact that many people no longer want to go to college or university school will also have a huge impact on world’s economy and progress.
You're so right! I'm American and I would absolutely love to get a higher education but the unbelievable tuition fees and all those loans is not only keeping me from going to University here but is also one of the biggest reasons I keep considering leaving this country. I could easily get a Lithuanian citizenship which would gave me access to either free or just way more affordable education, but I would have to give up my American citizenship. And at this point? That doesn't sound too bad anymore. And I can't be the only one considering this.
@@hippl32 I am sorry to hear that. If you do want to live in another country, research a lot about it and be ready for the difficulties that you will face. However, if you want to stay in the USA, I would get a cheap technical degree that pays a lot. I would then save as much money as I can, and then, when I am ready, I would go to college. However, while you work, keep on learning on your own, watch videos, and talk to people so that you can develop your critical thinking and stretch your brain for further learning. For example, I have a cousin who studied massage therapist and he makes about $20 per hour plus tips. Right now, he is studying to become a physical therapist. I wish that I knew these options when I was younger. Sadly, I did not research much.
@@cookingwiththehaitiantwist I'm really happy that there still are places like technical and community colleges that make education more accessible to people! And I'm really glad your cousin found a path to get to being a physical therapist because of that technical college. However, what I want to study isn't as "job-safe" as something like physical therapy and all that extra work to get there just isn't for the type of person I am haha. I definitely know what it takes to move countries, I'm not as young and naïve as I was fresh outta high school😄😄 I'm definitely very privileged that I already have family back home in Europe so it makes it a lot easier. I also have a few more reasons than just education to get outta here lol. I just wanted to further emphasize the point of accessible education being good for the entire country and its future. Thank you for the advice!
@@hippl32 yes I understand. Definitely go for it when you are ready. I think we have an innate intuition that tells us where we belong. I wish that you accomplish your goals. Good luck! Also, a quote from JOrdan Peterson: Imagine who you could be, and then, aim single-mindedly at that. I do not know if you are into arts or humanities, which are fields that people tend to belittle. It is sad that we tend to believe that they are career paths that seem to be a waste of time. Art, philosophy, social studies, etc… are so important for the development of a nation. If we were to prevent artists from existing, we would suffer a whole lot. I don’t believe that there are worthless careers.
In Ireland, if you're family earns over a certain amount of money you have to pay for university. Otherwise, you can apply for a grant. You can get half grants or full grants depending on how much your family earns. This grant also includes expenses money that you get each month which is supposed to be used for rent etc. I really appreciate it when looking at America
@@somedudes6455 why should every child be completely dependent on their parents financial situation? Obviously, children are dependent on their parents somewhat, but I don't think this should be the case for healthcare and education. If the government funds healthcare and education, children have the ability to make career choices independent of their parents. In the long run, this works out better for society - for many reasons, e.g. people have more freedom to choose what they're actually good at and interested in and therefore will likely be better at it. Obviously, you don't want to be taking loads of money off rich people, people have the right to be rich - it can be looked into in a more efficient way. For starters, college tuition in America is insane, it's nowhere near that in Ireland, I don't know why that is? Maybe when the government are partly involved in paying college tuition they can lobby with uni's and prevent tuition prices skyrocketing just because uni's can / there's demand
@@somedudes6455 Sorry if I'm wrong, but it seems you didn't understand what OP said. No one is forcing you to pay anything. In most countries in Europe, studying in Universities tends to be cheaper than in the US, but you still have to pay, doesn't matter how much your family earns. The difference if that people from families with not a lot of resources can also apply for grants, which gives them money so they can afford tuition and materials, as long as they comply with certain terms, like passing a certain number of classes (At least in the region of Spain where I live). I f they don't follow those terms they would have to return the money of the grant. But that doesn't mean people who's families can afford with not a lot of problems can also apply for other grants, most commonly those associated with good grades in class, which everyone can have access to if they are good students. For example in the region where I live they where giving a lot of grants to people with either few resources or good grades, depending on you families salary you'll have more or less (the more money you have the less you'll receive since you don't really need it). But the better scores you have the more money you'll receive regardless of family background. To summarize there is an initial tuition everyone has to pay, but those with few resources can access grants from the government which helps them pay it. Those grants come from the taxes everyone pays.
I personally feel like the concept of proletarian autodidact may be dead for now, at least in the US. I’ve worked many working class jobs and the majority of people work 10-16 hours a day at a tough job, and when they get off they want to spend their time resting, relaxing, or taking care of their family, not necessarily educating themselves about something that at the moment feels so improbable. I think in general this is the problem I have with how some leftists approach the self help community, as they somewhat antagonize it. I understand that as I’m not a fan either, but a lot of it comes off as condescending or unrealistic as this community is providing people who may be priced out of an education real hope for a better life. In addition, almost all of my friends who went to college feel like it has lost its magic, I personally felt the same mainly because of what the internet has enabled, which is the biggest contrast between the golden era of the 60s and now in terms of access to information. College back then was cheaper and actually held a resource which was scarce(credible information). Now, even though reading books or watching lectures on RUclips obviously doesn’t hold the same value as a college degree, many people perceive the value you get for your money as magnitudes better than a college education, something that I find hard to disagree with, especially if you are pressed for money. Sure, a college degree gets you accreditation in the white collar world, but I’m speaking simply at the level of acquiring knowledge/critical thinking. I personally think we may have to experiment with new forms of teaching/education and technology that adapt to the modern age, rather than try to revert back to an educational infrastructure that seems impractical now.
Yeah. There's that precious value of the classic college experience that needs to be encouraged and preserved where we can do so, but recreating it or something like it elsewhere where people who have to work hard and long without an income surplus can still get some of it with little time, energy, or wealth.
The concept of focused learning at academic institutions taught by experts should not go away. I think it is the most practical approach. But the paradigm should shift: knowledge should be a right, not a privilege. We should also take "classes" endlessly because the world doesn't stop after you "graduate". Ofc bare minimum is we stop treating education as a tool for a job: there's plenty of better tools for that
@@nickallbritton3796 Building on that - I take it, anyway - _both_ professional training AND general liberal humanistic education are rights, and should be available and supported lifelong, and they deserve to be conceived and supported each as such without one of them being erased in the shadow of the other.
I love that you talk about the elitism in academia because it is not only classist but greatly affects women and people of colour. The world of academia like many things was designed for rich white men and is used as a tool to help them succeed.
That's absolutely true, and the systems put in place to make education more exclusive and elitist also prevent a lot of nuerodivergent people from being able to get educated in schools and universities. University is affordable in New Zealand and yet the exam-based structure and generally inaccessible teaching methods create a situation so hostile to the way my brain works that I'm better off as an autodidact! I barely made it through the six month course at community college that was absolutely necessary for a job in my field despite having an innate love of learning and a passion for the material. There's no good reason for it to be like this.
@@seachelle2316 nice job analysing the meta of his comment, but it would've been constructive if you actually made a proper point rather than trying to be a smart mouth. Why do you think the info is misconstrued?
@@AliceCappelle I heavily disagree, when you have something that's free, it will inevitably be abused, Universities have always been the starting point of a counter-culture, or some kind of "movement". For that reason Reagan wanted university's to start charging a fee was to keep people ,who were only looking to push a political agenda, out.
I come from a developing country and the amount of information I learned by going to college is incredible. All the knowledge I have about other cultures/religions I learned at school, even though my major was computer science. And the things that I think are common knowledge are not viewed that way and it baffles me. Therefore, it depends on the person willing to learn and think critically while absorbing information and I really do think higher education is incredibly important
I come from a developing country as well, I have 3 degrees, one of them European. None of my core values came from the institutions but only from self study and experience. It’s all very anecdotal i and very much depends on what are you studying, your background, work, etc.
Good points, but I'm afraid I have to disagree with you. I did a lot of reading before going to college. The entire time I've spent in it, I haven't learned a single thing. I took a neuroscience course and had already memorized everything from day one to the final exam just from the time I spent reading textbooks in my free time. Im aware that sounds awfully pretentious, and I hate it, but that's just how things went down. I was frankly very disappointed. I get what you're saying about self-help gurus, though I wasn't aware Big Tech leaders fit in that category. I had an interesting conversation about Student Debt the other day with people just 20 years older than I am. These individuals went to college for an entire year for just 10k at a state university. I would have to pay 100k if I wanted two semesters at my state university today. For the wide range of accessible knowledge and the ever-accelerating pace at which knowledge IS becoming accessible, college isn't keeping up. Besides, your whole video is resting upon the idea that college is actually promoting critical thinking. I really think that alone is up for debate. It doesn't feel that way. I felt as if I was more of a critical thinker, and a free-thinker to boot, when I read books outside of institutionally structured reading. I do agree with you that a lot of the college experience is today about the " little paper at the end." We often like the assurance of a set of certified credentials, but that's assuming they really mean anything. I think now might also be a good opportunity to inset I am talking about the Liberal Arts here. I do not mean STEM careers. Unfortunately, college is failing us in those departments and isn't as needed as you might think. The argument against that, that it doesn't turn over a profit, doesn't exactly apply here. Not only is it not exactly turning over a profit consistently, but it's also very political, biased, and focused on indoctrinating students. Hopefully, that's objective as to your argument. I sometimes get these kinds of comments on my own videos and they can just be a little mean-spirited so I want you to know you did a great job on this video! Those are just my two cents, and I enjoy you opening up the conversation on this topic as it catches on.
In my experience, critical thinking comes from meeting different opinions which is not what happens in universities. Commerce students all have the same values, sociology students same, law students same. They are very homogenous in their ideas. In order to learn critical thinking one would have to spend one moment in law school and meet those people, then one year in sociology or art school. You get the idea.
Yeah your comment has legs agree with it entirely! The term university is broad, quality varies and often people do whatever they have to do to obtain the GRADE not the knowledge 🤷🏾♀️
It’s unfortunate that degrees like psychology and neuroscience don’t really stress critical thinking. It says a lot about those fields. I know in many engineering/math-based degrees coursework is based on problem solving, which seems to be a much more effective way to teach.
Why would they put in critical thinking in a (I guess introduction level?) course about neuro science? On that level you have to learn the things people have learned before you. The STEM field is pretty much aquiring knowledge, working on problem solution, doing smaller labexperiments and rewieving others work before working on your thesis(es) and then developing things after you graduate or start a phd
As a 17 year old student living in Asia, this is so relatable. I feel sad that a lot of (Asian) students regard education as a painful stage in our life that we have to endure in order to get to a good college and attain a good job.(defining a good career or a successful life in a very narrow way) What we do at school centers on studying (memorizing stuff), but no one really understands what learning is, not to mention enjoying and seizing the opportunity to learn. A really funny thing is that our government is now adding "critical thinking" to our curriculum, yep, we are now studying how to do critical thinking and the right ways on critical thinking. What's even funnier is how all the critical thinking focus on certain topics that is considered ''important'' and "useful".This is it's just another kind of spoon-feeding education to me. Since when do you care about what we think, The idea that we must choose a "correct answer" and achieve "high grades", otherwise you're failing in learning, not hard-working enough, and is simply a valueless person is deep rooted into our mind.We are stripped of the ability of critical thinking by the rigid education system that is now going to teach us critical thinking, how ironic it is. Still, I'm glad that our government tried to reform the education system, it gives me hope that one day our education can be meaningful and children can enjoy learning. Wish me luck on my college entrance exam : ) , counting down to 214 days.
We can never have too much education, at any level. Instead of career wage-slaves, we should all be students, with jobs on the side. In other words, life-long learning. For many, time spent at university was the most rewarding. Imagine the freedom we would have if we could continue our formal education indefinitely. Our self-education, which is what the producer seems to be into, should always continue, and would if we were not overworked. Viva the Yellow Vests!
For my job, I work on construction projects to get them ready for contractors to be hired for the city. It's as you'd expect a full time job that prevents me from going back to school(I already have a degree so no worries on that). If we could live in a world where people continued to be in school but didn't just learn... also contributed to research and innovation... I'd be down for it. People should go to where they are needed the most or can contribute the most. I'll keep working to make society a better place and life-long students can help from their campuses :).
I've graduated in the Netherlands and throughout my studies I even got paid ~500 euros a month by the government to study and free transportation until I'd finish my studies! Tuition fee was ~2000 euros per year and every University charges the same fee unless it's a private university. My boyfriend graduated in the US and he's saved a lot of money just by doing an exchange year in Germany. He regrets not doing his full program in Europe though. He has a huge debt back in the US. To anyone who's a US citizen looking into education options, I'd highly recommend looking into European universities!
Rather than solving the social issues students were protesting, they chose to trick them into being unable to protest and then act surprised when that caused further social issues
@10:30 "Criticism targeting higher education shouldn't come from people who only care about becoming the next richest man in the world." - Let's not kid ourselves, making more money is why people go to college. Without that promise, they have nothing of value to offer. Libraries are free, books/literature are readily available, and people can socialize on their own time. The college system had its chance to self-correct for decades and they only raised tuition costs instead. Now that they can't hide it anymore, people are refusing to buy what they're selling. They're getting EXACTLY what they deserve.
This is honestly really interesting if you think about it. I honestly think college for some people is still about not making money and just to learn but for many people honestly it is about making money. BUT now with the whole internet thing its pretty clear that college isnt the only way to learn things if you want to learn and it isnt the only place to actually socialize. Right now the current stand up college has compared to other learning resources is costly tools (which is a another whole discussion).
Disclaimer: this was my personal experience in uni. Maybe your college experience was/is different, which I would love to hear and learn about too if you'd like to share When I think back on the most impactful and valuable things I learned in uni, they were during required classes I would have never have chosen to take on my own, learning about ideas I wouldn't have had the interest or resources to really engage with. The structure and environment of uni forced me outside my own judgement of what is valuable and worth learning, and that led to significant growth for me personally. Outside of the more specific skills and knowledge I learned in uni, the experience of stepping outside my own value bubble is something that is important in life, at least in my opinion. Also, I wholeheartedly believe that significant growth, intellectually and emotionally, requires active engagement with other people. In uni, I had classmates and professors who come from different backgrounds, who approach the subject in different ways than I do. Having the space to learn subjects with other people in uni is sooooo enriching, because others' pov often led me to examine my own pov and develop new ways of understanding them, myself and the subject. I'm not saying this kind of intellectual and cultural diversity are exclusive to higher education. For me, uni simply gave me access to it. Higher education is not perfect by any means, but to me that's no reason to abandon it entirely. Great video, Alice! This is really interesting topic and I'm enjoying the discussion from the video and the comments section as well :)
yes, i completely agree... i think active engagement in discussions is one of the fastest ways to reflecting your own thoughts and path. from my personal experience as well, college and uni is a great place for diverse discourse!
Couldn't agree more with you! As an academic, this topic resonates strongly with me. I like the way you frame it: university is not just about acquiring knowledge for yourself. You can, indeed, acquire that on your own (hence all the hype about self-help, the 'university of life', and patati patata [haha I absolutely loved the expression!]). That's why free speech and a free press are also so important, btw. But what university gives you is access to a particular way of acquiring and applying knowledge that makes you answerable to society; in other words, it makes you a 'professional'. Universities are gatekeepers to those professions (like the law, medicine, engineering, etc) that as a society we don't want to simply entrust to anyone because of the great risk of misuse of that knowledge. Of course, professionals also misbehave quite often, but that's why we have universities, professional associations, courts and similar institutions to keep an eye on them. Thanks again for sharing!
' Universities are gatekeepers to those professions (like the law, medicine, engineering, etc) that as a society we don't want to simply entrust to anyone because of the great risk of misuse of that knowledge. ' 😂 Literally translates to these professions are lucrative; hence we need to gatekeep and obscure them from the public in order to benefit from the masses suffering in all manner of ways. Nothing about going to a university makes one a professional either. One would hope your 'academia' syco phancy would have taught you to paraphrase your bias in a more discreet manner. Alas! that wasn't parroted at your particular archaic institute.
some of the professions that are being gate kept should not be university courses AT ALL. In these professions the only way we learn to do them properly and safely is through experience in the fields. Therefore, they should all be apprenticeships or degree apprenticeships. On the 'academic' side, we can't develop critical thinking because we have to learn and memorise ideas and mechanisms that are decades or centuries old, because not knowing these things could lead to us doing our jobs wrong in the future, and potentially hurting people. In med you have to know how the body works, treatments etc.. in law you learn the law and civil codes etc. you get the idea. With university, you literally are just entrusting these professions to just anyone - most of the people on these courses for the most part come from some sort of privelaged background, and or power. That's why so many of these type of professions have professionals who misbehave or have some kind of superiority complex, because they've been screened from these areas of society, through money and selection criteria and aptitude tests etc. These professions also end up being extremely elitist and do not reflect the communities they serve. Honestly, love this channel, the short format of videos and topics discussed, but sometimes they feel rushed. There are some topics that can be discussed like this, and others that can't. We are killing critical thinking, but university is also killing it, alongside those self help gurus. it is way too commodified under capitalism. just a disclaimer (I personally do believe going to uni and formal education is important. however, i don't believe that they're generally places that allow critical thinking. If they did, they would not exist as they would not be profitable).
I feel that this video unnecessarily lumps everyone who doesn't go to college/uni into the same category. There are plenty of reasons why someone might not go, aside from being convinced by 'influencers'/influential people. I would know since I'm someone who doesn't plan to (at the moment). It seems from what you've said here, that France is in a very different position from where I live, Hungary. So much so, that none of your points ring relevant to an everyday person here (or at least, I don't think your explanations and points in these topics are accurate) except maybe for the last one about elitism. I have encountered the idea all too many times that people expect you to go uni because you have good grades and you're clever. If people perceive you to be these things, then it's baffling to them if you choose differently. And not even just about uni, but long before that as well. How things work around here is basically that, after you finish 8 years of elementary school, you must take entrance exams to either high school or vocational high school/technicum (more about these 2 terms later). Still, there's been a prejudice against going to a vocational high school. Since high schools providing better quality of learning are hard to get into (yes, there's a difference in the quality of learning, one can see it if you look at the average achievements of students throughout the country, there're also so-called 'collecting' schools, for students with bad grades who couldn’t get into any better schools, these tend to do the worst), lots of people go to vocational high schools instead. But there's also a large number of people who go to these kinds of schools because they care about the vocation, or they want that in combination with a regular education. I also go to a school like that, because of the latter point. Still, when I decided on the school, everyone was appalled, since I was a 'good student'. That was the first time. Now it's happening again with the whole college talk. I'm now in my 4th year of vocational high school (out of 5), and I've been seriously thinking about what to do later. Despite going to this kind of school, I don't think I want to do the vocation I've chosen, but I don't know what I 'want to be'. I've always known that I didn't fit into the educational system, I've always had great difficulties, because classroom learning doesn't work for me (a.k.a. attending classes, then going home and having to study for tests, do homework and assignments, and repeating all this on weekdays). I prefer to simply do the work and tests alone, if it has to be done, without having to go to lessons. That is because I often feel that I don't get anything meaningful out of them. I don't like how sometimes, we even have as much as 9 lessons a day and only finish at around 4pm (this is just the mandatory lessons without extracurricular activities, and school starts at 7:30 am), then study after we get home. It makes me lose all motivation, to the point of not wanting to get out of bed. The worst part is, we have lessons where we don't even do a whole lot while we're there, but have to learn the material at home for the exams we'll have to take in the last year. I feel that uni is slightly similar to this. Although you don't have to show up all the time, and not all classes are mandatory, you still have to attend classes sometimes. I'm not sure if those will provide enough value for me to feel like it's worth it. Besides, I don't even know what kind of job I want, so I don't know what course to take. People tell me I could just go to figure that out, but I don't think you should get into a 5-6 year commitment, which could potentially cost a fortune, in the case that I can't get a scholarship (I know myself enough that I'm almost sure I won't, unless I could muster any motivation for it), just for the vague hope of 'maybe I'll know what I want to do for a living if I'm there'. At this point, I'm sure it looks like a typical problem people my age have, but it goes deeper, and a lot more Hungarian specific. You mentioned in this video that getting a degree should be about more than just acquiring knowledge and a paper, but about enriching your country. Still, this is a very privileged mindset. After all, wanting to get a better job and making more money isn't about greed for everyone, but about needing it to support yourself and your family. Not only that, but personally, I have all too many problems with this country. I could probably write an essay 5 times the size of this one about that, but I'll keep it to mostly this topic. To begin with, Hungary seems like a very 'cheap' country to many tourists, but the reality is, that's because your currency probably has more value than our forint. As the years went by, it has been getting worse and worse, yet wages haven't been raised enough to account for that. I wish I could pull a percentage of the inflation that's happening to illustrate my point here, but sadly, the government hasn't released any and even if it did, it would just be a falsified one that doesn't reflect the reality of the situation (which is fairly normal here and people with common sense and any connections can see it). Still, generally, it's easy to see as a normal consumer who lives here, as it's basically month-by-month, and often on everyday products like food. Here, you might think, 'that has nothing to do with higher education' and I guess you'd be mostly right. I only wanted to give a taste of what's happening here. It’s hard to get by, which puts pressure on people. But there’re of course more education and work-related issues as well. It’d be awfully long if I went into specifics, but the government has been changing too many things. It changes the high school system constantly, in fact, the classes who are a year below us go by a completely different system, and the curriculum is different than it was for us at that time too. Same for the current graduates and the graduates before them as well. It’s nearly impossible to navigate. On top of that, many trainings, uni courses, etc. have been changed or entirely dismissed recently as well, so once again, no one really knows what’s happening. Similarly, working rights and conditions are also being changed by the government, making people quit their jobs (even as essential as surgeons!). This of course, opens up possibilities for many, and yet, most don’t want to take them for the exact same reason as those who quit. Overall, I don’t feel that this country deserves people pursuing higher education with the mentality of ‘it’s worth doing to enrich the country as well’, especially because no influential people, or even the government, views it that way. People are caught up with their own money problems only, not having the time or energy to care about others, which is understandable, since no one cares about them either. Therefore, I don’t see this point, along with most made in this video, as applicable to Hungary, or other countries in similar positions. If you made it this far, props to you, random person reading the comments! Hope you have a nice day! :)
Thank you for taking the time to write such a complete comment! I understand where you come from and I do share some of your points. Actually, today I was talking with a friend about how good students are pushed to higher education and aren't offered the option of technical education. I'm studying right now for a technical degree because I wasn't able to find a job (I'm from Spain, with 38% of unemployed youth). In Spain, we have a huge problem right now with people who have higher education but are unable to find a job, so they have to come back to study for more technical degrees or just taking "low-qualified" jobs (sorry for using this term, I don't know which one would be better to use). How is the situation in Hungary? Do you have more employment opportunities with higher education or with a more technical one? I'm sorry if I missed something you already said, but I'm curious about the situation there. In this kind of conversations about higher education, I miss the opinion of people from countries like ours, that have particular social-economical contexts.
The third part reminded me a bit of that infamous Jubilee video on intelligence. I think now more than ever, people are noticing that having advanced degrees doesn't necessarily mean an individual has a higher-than-average level of intelligence, and that it's possible to find a meaningful, fulfilling life outside of the realm of academia.
I find it funny that these upper class/rich people born into upper class/rich families are telling us not to go to college and what we should do for a successful life. They didn’t need to go to college. They had all the opportunity to start up their own company when they had a fail safe. It’s required to have a college degree for a lot of jobs. I’m sure college is beneficial for other reasons, but I haven’t been to college yet. I’ll also have to look into Ronald Reagan because I currently don’t know anything about him,other than him being president.
Exactly! People who tell strangers online "Lol you don't need a college degree to become successful." Scream privilege to me. Gender, racial, and *especially* economic privilege. Like, no Jason, YOU didn't need a college degree, because your daddy let you take over your huge family business with no knowledge in the subject, you have a trust fund, and you went to a private school. Not all of us have that. If we went to an interview, asking for a certain office job with no degree, they'd laugh at you for feeling "entitled" for even thinking that was a possibility, even though you're just going by what you've been told. It leaves young and impressionable people this false idea that education is bad, or them not being able to afford college is fine, and it perhaps may keep people from not protesting against these institutions who keep college tuition unaffordable. Maybe.
@@mynameisreallycool1 Agreed. The thing that can't be said enough is you basically get a degree in advance prior to promoting to a job that uses it. It takes 3-4 years to get one and you have to be working on it as soon as you can. You can't just tell the interview panel "I'll get the degree in 3-4 years" when the job itself requires the degree upon being hired.
Can you imagine if your dentist get their "degree" from Skillshare? Or maybe your therapist get their "degree" from online coach that charge them hundred(s) of dollar for 3 hours zoom meeting? 😂
What is ridiculous is that you believe that a degree is a pivotal point in becoming adept at ones vocation. Truly worth laughing at. What a close minded and entitled manner of thinking. Even after obtaining these so called degrees medical practitioners aren't ever let loose on the general public but rather complete apprenticeships of sorts for many years before becoming consultants in their chosen field. So yes a person who has obtained their knowledge of a subject even medicine online and completed exams and their apprenticeship period is as able and competent as someone who has gone through a university course. It'a funny how Alice makes videos on inclusion to stay relevant yet mocks the methods that underprivileged and bright people may pursue to bridge the gap. A degree is just a label ;one that has little correlation to capability or excellence.
@@0Rachizzle0 A lot of the commenters are a hive of privileged people from a certain demographic. What's more performative for me is alice. I have been watching her videos as of late and i truly feel she is reaching. Has made videos on poc without real insight covering such topics. This video was highly biased given she is an attendee of such an institution. Its just a justification for her own choice. I am truly glad we live in a world where anyone can attain education in any topic regardless of background. Do not have to go through the toxic and abusive playground that is universities. It's sad that brainwashed people like this exist who believe in paying for 'education', going into substantial debt for 'education'. When you should be paid for your time and energy in any worthwhile institute.
@@sevehrsevehr6001 understand what you are arguing. But I don’t think the original comment has to do with the scenarios you are arguing tho. I think you are talking about online college and university. The original comment is talking about general online media platforms like Skillshare or RUclips which are very different from certified online programs that offer degrees in professional fields in this given situation. Not that what you said wasn’t important, I think your argument about online degrees make lots of sense and you’ve pinpointed some of the critical problems
I think that it’s simply too expensive for most American parents to send their children to college for the purpose of “learning how to think.” I mean, if college here was more affordable, then I would completely agree with most everything you said. But to gloss over that one very important and most relevant point, that it’s so expensive, is strange to me.
You're right! The situation in the USA and in most European countries is completely different in terms of higher education. It's understandable that in the USA you would try to study more "useful" degrees in order to get a job because it's a huge investment. In France higher education is quite inexpensive (I have family there and it's ridiculously cheap compared with Spain, where I am from) so it's more affordable to just study what you really want to. It sucks that in the USA higher education is regarded as a "luxury"... :(
I also question this notion that we "learn how to think" in college. I'm pretty sure none of these people (that I know) who went to University "learned how to think". They "learned" how to be great at college but that isn't the same as learning how to think. Learning how to take tests and write term papers should not to be confused for "Thinking". Most of us "learn how to think" from our parents and public schools at an early age.
@@awwtergirl7040 I think most people learn a lot from reading and writing scientific articles. Sure it’s done sometimes when you’re younger as well, but mostly in college/uni. I think it’s very valuable to learn how to build a thesis
I think self learning and going to the educational institutes are both equally valid means of learning, but we, as students must be aware both come with their OWN flaws. Colleges and other institutions are at the end of the, filled with propaganda and an agenda to have their students fit a very specific mold that a socially responsible and useful individual in modern society requires. However, with the free to learn means, like RUclips, we must be aware that crowdsourced information is often coming from imperfect sources, like students or totally unqualified people (and that doesn't remove their validity as teachers of a kind, but we must be critical in how readily we can accept information that comes from youtube or not) and it becomes a personal responsibility to ensure that no matter where you are, you ensure your filters are appropriate enough to let the "nonsense" be left out while we continue to absorb useful information and gain knowledge as we grow. Also make education cheaper and a lot of these probelms get solved. I understand that isn't easy, especially as populations grow and these colleges and whatnot were made to deal with populations of people from the 1800s and whatnot. Fixing the economic and political problems that haunt the education system is important. Also a little more exploration of the topic of how the education system is still majorly tailored the way early industrial revolution era British schools were made- while not literally sorting people into academic or vocational lines of education and work, the system does fail to accomodate people who fall somewhere in the middle of the two. As a future self published comic book creator, I need to learn how to be a "businessman" while also learning the vocational skill of drawing, inking and coloring and the many other processes needed to publish my art. It's a more complex world, and the education system enjoys ignoring the complexity, imo.
You can debate until you're blue in the face which society ultimately benefits more from, but opening a business vs. exploring new ideas via higher education are both reasonable, non-mutually exclusive paths. The college-dropout investors and entrepreneurs are a pushback phenomenon of university education (usually in non-STEM fields) not necessarily leading to financial independence. At the end of the day, it's hard to explore your interests when you're worried about your bottom line, and I don't think you give this point its due emphasis. I think you would be more resentful about majoring in English Studies if you considered your financial situation unstable. Also, I feel you unfairly condemn the pursuit of your own financial interests if you prefer to drop out of/skip uni to start a business or invest. Nevertheless, I appreciate you taking a stand for higher education against self-help gurus who routinely demonize it. Not sure about your choice of certain people in the thumbnail though.
I come from a developed country and education helps me to get out of the poverty line. My family is classified under low-income so I didn’t have much opportunity outside of education. So when I received offers for college education, of course I took the opportunity. I don’t think I’d be anywhere if I rejected that offer. I was also in BA English and it helps me with my proficiency in expressing myself. I think our uni implemented both critical thinking and entrepreneurial skill in our syllabus, so it’s not all a waste of time as tertiary education becomes more aware of the need of the industry. Since people would often say people have to pay the bills etc as their main argument, I think it feels like a defense against people who’re seeking more than being money-making businesses but for their own personal growth as an individual. Although, education in my country is relatively cheaper but there are a huge number of people who still can’t afford one. I didn’t have much issues after finishing college either because most of my classmates received plenty of offers to work in different corporate companies and so… yeah it depends on how you use your course to enhance your profile I think, well at least from my pov.
I was having a tough time lately, I've been valuing my self worth on my individual academic accomplishments for far too long, and as a result it's left me frustrated and doubting whatever impact I could ever make in the world with or without a degree. Your channel could not be recommended to me at a best time, and I'm so grateful for the content you make. You remind me why I love learning so much, and that it is not the individual gain I could get from this that matters, but that we form ourselves as to progress collectively in a more thoughtful way. From the bottom of my heart, thank you Alice !
I had to drop out of uni out of necessity and started studying a practical career instead. It's artistic which is nice, but I also feel a safety and comfort in knowing I have a pretty straight forward path ahead of me. I know I will find a job within months of graduating. I don't think I would have gotten this feeling of security had I finished studying uni. I still love learning and do a lot of it on my own. And I kind of enjoy learning more now than I did in uni. Still I can't shake the feeling off that I should go back and finish my degree. I want to do it eventually, but part of me wonders if it's just because of the "prestige" of having a degree or to please my parents. It's a shame that I couldn't continue studying because of money, and maybe I even stopped enjoying learning because in the back of my head I was always thinking about how much it was costing my family. However, I don't know that I will enjoy this practical career I've chosen forever, there's a lot of other things I'd like to explore and I think uni really allows for that flexibility even if it comes with uncertainty. At the end of the day, as long I can provide for myself and give back to my family and enjoy life a bit, I'll be happy, degree or not.
Rien à ajouter ! Tu as parfaitement résumer ce que je pense :) The more people are now educated (especially girls in the developing world) : the more the country is growing, healthier, richer and open to socio economic change.
These self help gurus don't express themselves right, they should say : you don't NEED a degree to become an entrepreneur because no school will teach you that as good as trying yourself ! (also when it costs the huge $100k PPP is most countries) I don't think they would say you don't need a degree to be a doctor, a lawyer, a train driver. Also you don't ALWAYS need a degree to prove your skills, some jobs require more real world skills than what you learn in school. There is a misunderstanding here ...
I believe that in most cases limited critical thinking is just connected to being a neurotypical human person. Wheter we like it or not most people live in some kind of delusion and denial, it's what keeps people sane. Metacognition for example can be extremely exhausting.
Something that often gets left out of this conversation is the ablism of the way we view college. In a world that values “pulling yourself up by your bootstraps” (more so in the US but I’m sure there’s some of this in other countries as well) it is ignored that educational institutions were designed for the most neuro typical person while everyone else has to scramble to catch up. Yes, there are amenities. But as a learning disabled person, I can confirm that the amenities I’ve been offered have done very little for me. If we viewed education more as an opportunity to grow your mind as opposed to a symbol of merit, that would leave more room for everyone to learn in whatever way makes most sense for them.
From my perspective college does not teach individuals to critically think or to think for themselves. They just want to make sure you understand the professors interpretations of events, history, philosophy, etc. They do not truly truly force students to think critically. The statement above is mainly speaking about undergraduate students. **I do not know about grad school students/professors yet.
Reading is a great way to encourage people to critically think because you are constantly being exposed to different perspectives. Let me know if anyone disagrees
We're having the same problem here in Brazil with our unis. Nowadays is SO HARD to get in that only the rich ones that can prepare themselfs for the test have a chance to enter. With all this, private universities are now fulled with low classe students that pay for YEARS for some education and the public ones have only rich kids.
It was your critical thinking slide (9:52) that made me realize how impactful it was when I switched my degree from Human Resources to Sociology. It's true, my human resources taught me more how to do a job vs question and interpret the world around me like Sociology did. Surprisingly, the part I most related to with this video (and there were many) was "and read, and read, and read, and I was so happy". It's been about 3 years since I graduated university, and I forgot how much I missed learning by reading. Its funny because now thats translated into watching your videos which tend to problematize different social phenomena and list sources (much like the essays we used to write and read). Thank you for posting these videos! I couldn't help but start taking notes :) lol
@Tyler H If you knew his policies and what he did, you wouldn't be saying this. Maybe his policies didn't negatively affect your community so you don't care.
Ah yes.... I have to say that the only reason why i got my masters was so i can get paid better. Money is a valid motivation, but it shouldn't become the only reason why anyone studies. I am also thinking about getting a PhD just because i am in the academic field, and it'll pay me more (but only a bit more, i don't really think the potential payment is actually worth 5 years of my life where i will only breathe one topic and one topic alone, and the streess attatched to it is just too much). But also... i am in a stem field and i was privileged enough for my parents to pay for all my education and not owe a single cent to anyone. That obviously isn't the case for the majosrity of people where i'm from (Colombia), who are right now protesting for a better life and even a chance to study in a public university in the first place.
Not only does turning education into a commodity make it harder for poor people to get one, it also hurts the quality of the education itself. Most people's mindset toward education today is that it's a series of hoops to be jumped through to prove your merit to future employers through your grades. Most of my classmates want to learn and think the absolute minimum they can while keeping their grades up.
Uhm, IMO, university really doesn’t teach critical thinking unless you’re in the Humanities faculty but generally university just teaches you to be a reflector of another man’s thoughts. Also, there’s a reason why you’re only allowed to share your own ideas at Masters level, when your thinking is already conditioned to perceive ideas in a certain way.
I see what you mean but I don't really agree, I feel like at uni you face different professors with different theories and different ways to approach your field of study. Biases are inevitable and I always prefer when teachers state them right away but yeah, I still believe that uni opens the door to the world of research, its methodology, etc whatever the subject you're studying and that even if a teacher keeps on focusing on that one theory they're obsessed with well now you can check by yourself with the same tools he uses. You can check what other researchers say about those theories because you understand the vocabulary and the concepts and then decide on what you want to believe or not. There's no better feeling than challenging a professor's biases (in a respectful way of course!)
that wasn't really my experience. We were encouraged to share our own ideas pretty much from day one in the BA course, not just reflect on others' thoughts... I suppose it may vary from uni to uni, possibly also from subject to subject (I studied theology and comparative literature).
@@AliceCappelle So I did a rather risky experiment for myself; I am doing my final year of undergrad in Business Economics and so I used a 1st year textbook (not the prescribed textbook) for a research assignment which I got an A+. But from all of that I just got that the main idea of concepts come from “one person” which is my big problem. I don’t think that’s progressive in an educational sense because there’s learning from that one idea and little different opinions here and there. I can’t oppose an idea at undergraduate level, why?
@@peaceblossom8 guess it differs from faculty to faculty but I know with commercial degrees you have to reference from scholarly articles or books etc for assignments. “In your own words” has to be backed up by some scholarly source.
@@_Palesa_M well, obviously we had to do that too! If you don't reference anything it's not actually research. However we were always encouraged to engage critically with the material, point out where we saw shortcomings in arguments etc. instead of just repeating what someone else said.
I've had a complicated relationship with education, to some extent it was because I was always very insecure about my form or lack of intelligence. Since I found out about my autism not long ago, things made much more sense to me and I started to wonder if I wasn't evading the opportunities for academic growth because I never imagined there was space for me there (or anywhere). I have changed my degree after my first year of university, and I'm now very happy with what I'm studying...though I must admit, I still feel inadequate a lot of the time. But I am hoping that the more we talk about this and the more open-minded we become, eventually no kind of intelligence, or background, will be excluded. Also, thank you for your videos Alice, you've inspired me to branch out a bit more with my own channel :) It's been a long and tiring process for me, but I'm now slowly beginning to steer it in broader directions, hoping it will figure itself out, and your channel is one of those that motivated me to do it, since I find your content very insightful.
I think getting an education is a wonderful opportunity for plenty of people. But I also think it's a good thing that those who - for whatever reason - missed out on that opportunity, still have some chance of bettering their knowledge or skillset by learning through other means (say, courses), and then companies and/or individuals still giving them a chance to contribute/work/etc despite not having a "classical" degree. As for critical thinking, higher education surely cannot be the only path to acquire such an ability?
I'm going to unload my biases and personal experiences here as a middle class American who grew up in their public schools and went to a normal public university. As far as I understand it, the exponentially rising costs of Education are the byproduct of the 26th Amendment. Politicians were looking for a way to appeal to an 18 year old voting block, and college loans were the way. Banks accepted because the government would pay if the young adult wouldn't, and colleges realized they could increase the pay and get more profit. This began what is currently an arms race towards attracting students, because student attendance meant student cash. Pools, gyms, food halls and sport stadiums, anything to appeal to students. Colleges became more about partying than about learning, and now they're very, very expensive. From what I've heard from the experiences of grad students, it's rough. Mounting debt to pursue higher education, little job market to enter into, and being worked excessively by their university in exchange for maybe being noticed by a professor or maybe being able to do interesting research. Meanwhile, budgets are thrown into attracting the next wave of students, as well as supporting a bulk of administrators and marketers that aren't really needed. It's all an unnecessarily inflated bureaucratic mess. On top of that, Professors have to deal with a massive influx of students, many of which care only for college as a commodity and many of which are just there to have fun in their early 20's but pretend like they're entering adulthood, and then also have to juggle university politics and budget concerns with their own private research, and professors that are taken on by merit may not be able to teach as well as they can solve problems and do what the colleges consider as research. So, as an American interested in education for knowledge's sake, rather than as a commodity, I am paying thousands on thousands of dollars for the chance to get into a course taught by one of possibly a few different faculty. I then have to pay hundreds to obtain a textbook, and then gamble as to whether or not the professor is qualified in their subject, has interesting things to contribute beyond the textbook, and whether they can teach well or if they're interested in teaching at all, versus taking a professor position for research purposes and/or prestige. I am then forced through a series of possibly poorly designed assignments and discussions which are limply and passively carried by the student body (most of which aren't there for the learning itself). The professor, good or not, will not have time to truly answer my questions or discuss inquiries due to the juggling act colleges require them to do, and I will be left to Google most of it anyhow. The internet is free. You can access a lot of texts for free if you know where to look. The communities collected around these bodies of information are passionate and active discussers of it, and they're operational 24/7. And the journals produced by colleges on various subjects are loaded with difficult to understand jargon, are made to appease whatever funded said research (possibly damaging the integrity of the research itself), and are usually pay-per-view at steep prices. I've personally seen many in education who pursue it outside of its commodity use trampled by the colleges themselves. As an American, in my personal experience, college isn't worth it to learn. It's bloated, it's corrupt, and they don't care about education.
I had to watch the video a few times to make sure that I understood your point of view correctly and to ensure that what I am about to say is as least biased as possible. However, I felt that the overall tone of this video looks down upon self-starters or even deem them incapable of critical thinking, which I must say felt quite condescending. While I fully agree that higher education and research are essential elements, they are not the only elements that are required in advancing a country. If everyone were taught to take the same process of critical thinking, the results would most likely be monotonous with little variations. The world does need people who are capable of independent thinking and come up with novel ideas that challenge the dogma in order for innovation to occur. Ideally, everyone SHOULD be able to participate in higher education, but we must also take into account that life is often far messier and more demanding in reality. As you have rightly mentioned, the commodification of higher education has limited its accessibility to many people who could not afford it. And to these people, they have 2 options: keep lamenting the unfairness of life and make nothing of themselves. OR start something for themselves because otherwise, they would starve to death. I cannot speak for the rest of us, but I would argue that the people who opted for the second option would be far more valuable members of society than the people who chose the first option. This is because by deciding to provide value for others, they would are far more likely to be able to sustain themselves and not weigh down the rest of society. Unfortunately, in the current economic situation, even people with higher education and degrees are not guaranteed to get a job. With the large influx of degree-holders coming into the workforce, the supply for talented workers seems to greatly outweigh the need. Therefore, the only other differentiator would be grit, determination, and willingness to learn. TL;DR just because there are people who decided to become self-starters, does not mean that they are incapable of critical thinking, maybe they simply do not have the luxury to afford it. More often, they are more beneficial to society than those who rely on others to support them without even trying in the first place.
What a fantastic video! I think it's really sad (and so important) that you have to point out what should be obvious...here in Brasil we also have free public universities. Their numbers have increased considerably during the decade we had a left wing government, and they are mostly considered to be better than private universities. The right-wing politics who advocate for the end of free higher education consistently use the "education is an investment the individual makes on their own future, so the state should not pay for it" speech. I didn't know about the way universities used to be in the U.S. and the whole Regan thing, so I found it very scary, cause it looks a lot like the kind of strategies that are starting to show up around here - though, unfortunately we have even bigger problems going on right now...thanks for the video, Alice. It's always great to hear from you.
I’m graduating from grad school this summer, and if I could go back in time I would have probably have never gone to school to begin with. In fact, I think it’s more important to to build your skill set and to find something that you are good at and sticking to it.
but if you never went to school to begin with you wouldn't have this insight, and instead may have had regrets about not going to school. It's impossible to tell which path would have ultimately been better. All one can do is try to make the best of their current situation...
But I feel like without a college degree background, a lot of people would be missing out. Even the networking possibilities alone is worth something. You have a point on work experience contributing to finding yourself. People say they just want a job based on their talent or experiences. I argue that actual work experience is a good perspective to use for yourself. Less theoretical and more experimental/relevant experiences.
me and the bois, touring cafes and building a time machine to go have a word with Mr Reagan. Seriously though, great vid. It's a shame higher education is in such an awful place right now. Would love to hear your thoughts on potential improvements!
As a University of California graduate with a good amount of debt, send the invite over once you have the time machine up and running. I love dialogue.
8:52 similar sentiment is quite common nowadays in my country, Malaysia. Some people online have been promoting their 'I did not go to university but I managed to make million bucks from doing business' story and it's worrying to see people sidelining the importance of education in life. They only see money as the only way to get out of poverty, when indeed, education is the best way. not money. anyways , great video, Alice :)
i love how you take the conversation from this crazy individualistic view that is becoming more and more prevalent to the need to create a more collective consciousness. honestly i hope more people would understand that because I feel it is one of the keys to a better global wellbeing. And I love specially how you put it in this video with something so key as education, which is essential for any revolution or societal change. Your channel in general I think portraits a great picture of the current world with an amazing critical view so congratulations, honestly❤️❤️
There's a logical fallacy in there. Those are not the only options. The opposite of higher education isn't self help and neither Peter Theil nor Elon Musk are self help gurus. The organisations they run have changed their hiring criteria to reflect their opinions on the modern education situation.
In Denmark it's free and you get money to live for while studying. I only recently learned the term student debt and feel really sorry for US citizens.
Not gonna lie, I do feel a bit trapped in university, even in a "creative" program that is supposed to encourage experimentation, inovation and originality of concepts. That's not how they responded to me when I did came up with an original "outside the box" concept. I realized that what they were really expecting of me was to repeat the same type of project that had been done for the last 20 years... It took me a year to figure out my own idea because every time I'd try to talk about it with my project teacher, it would end up in him trying to convince me to just stick to what I've been tought. But there's hope guys, after 8 months of struggle, he finally listened and understood what I was trying to create and is now encouraging and helping me with my idea. I do have to wait for the professors' approval before I move on with my project, but It's worth trying. I guess what I'm saying is if you feel like your program or your teachers are limiting you, or imposing their views on you, have that conversation with them. Write a letter to your head of department if necessary. They are humans, they can listen, and if they don't, talk about it with other students. Universities fear being obsolete, if enough students show them that they are, they will move.
I can relate to this video a lot! I got accepted to a very good uni in the UK, but as I couldn't afford it I stayed in my country as we have free higher education (Poland!) fortunately, I fell in love with the degrees I'm doing and thanks to them, I've grown so much, so quickly! Not only I can attend many amazing classes but also I have access to other resources such as academic libraries or online pages with academic papers... god bless the free education
You don't need a college degree statement is true but it requires context, if you want to become a engineer, doctor, lawyer, etc, you need a degree and you cannot get a good job without it, but the Arts degrees like psychology, liberal arts, gender studies, etc( mostly in the USA) costs thousands of dollars and puts people in degt and wont give you good job unless you are very good or go into teaching these subjects. So instead of wasting money such degrees just work, get a unpaid internship, and rise up. ALWAYS CONTEXT IS KEY. If you want to know about the useless degrees then do your research.
I’m in love with your channel, it’s just so eye opening and so interesting. I really liked the part where you talked about the French education system. I’m also French myself and your explanation was on point. I’m 17, and I have to chose a school for next year but because of the “prestige mindset” the schools that I want to go to are really selective. It’s like student have this constant pressure to compete with each other if they want to study in a good school.
I am on my first year of college and I am totally changed, I knew college was supposed to be more than getting prepared for the working system, but certainly, since I started I have been thinking ab this, ab how the make me cultivate myself in order to follow my thoughts thank u for sharing this:)
I'm still reeling from learning that my school determined which labs would be in-person during COVID based on machinery contracts the school needed to fulfill, and not on the skills students needed to learn in person.
Elon Musk: Hey fellow kids I just finished a massive blunt, you know you don't need a degree just buy my stocks! Muskrats: gleeful screeching (Why do these people who went to college and benefited so much from them say we don't need them? Interesting)
@@sevehrsevehr6001 You do though. Bezos has an engineering degree, Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Ma, all went to university. Many did end up dropping out after receiving opportunities, bit you can't say that their knowledge and experience in University wasn't a factor in opening door's for them. Additionally, Jeff Simmons has a PhD in Mathematics and made billions in the stock market. If you look at the list of the richest people in the world you will find they all went to expensive private schools or universities. Even the ones that dropped out already had found a job that would eventually be making them a lot of money. Where are all the billionaires who came from underprivileged homes that dropped out of HS??
I'm thankful to the algorithm (for once) to see this. My experience with high education is much more grim than this. I come from Serbia, maybe it's because we're an ex-socialist country, but even within academia "It matters what you discover" is overshadowed by "Michel Foucault isn't a real philosopher" (if you study philosophy) or "There's nothing we can learn from Marx" (if you study economics) etc. And these statements come from professors. The academia is still akin to a religious sect when it comes to the open-mindedness.
I think the way subjects are taught has a big impact on how we view them. Everyone knows that with maths in particular, it seems very arbitrary and pointless for those who are forced to take it past basics, and for most, extremely difficult. And yet, we’re always told that we’ll use maths everyday, and we need it for problem solving and analytical ability, whilst the magical formulas on the sheet we barely recognise say otherwise. If they just taught us the actual _maths_ behind stuff and applied it to realer examples in life, people may understand it better, and enjoy it better and persevere with it more. I know myself that my grade went from a C to an A when I taught myself the actual maths behind what we were learning, instead of just having to memorise a formula and hazard a guess at the problem solving questions.
I understand (and kinda idealize) the concept of universities as places where people were exposed to different knowledge that basically helped our minds flourish. Sadly, at least in Latin America, public institutions have been turned into merely skilled worker factories.
even though I’m someone that won’t be attending university, I completely agree with you. Honestly, I’m constantly appalled by the anti-intellectualism and disregard of data of my peers, even those that attend/attended university.
I can say that college definitely sharpened my critical thinking skills. I majored in history and it forced me to be far more rigorous in my analysis and argumentation. I also took some philosophy courses and they were very valuable as they required you to really think deeply about issues, and poorly constructed arguments lacking logic and rigor just didn't cut it. It's all about critical thinking.
In Argentina education is free and I'm so proud of that. I went to a private school because that was my mom's decision but I chose public university for me. I don't see myself paying to get education ever again and I LOVE THAT ❤️ Edit: I feel like I've had the same thoughts for a few years but never quite managed to put them into words. You said it perfectly! 🙌🏼
I'd say it's either or.....after highschool i automatically just went into the workforce for experience through connections(not rich ones I'm the furthest from it) . If anyone skips college....you better know how to network well....if not I recommend college.
I am from India and will finish high school in the spring of next year. These days I have been looking into colleges and stuff, and boy oh boy, what disappointments every step of the way. Since childhood, my parents (both from middle class backgrounds) have told me that higher education is the only way people from our background can better their lives. We don't have a lot of money or connections, so study very very hard because education is the only thing we have. So I always thought of college as this romantic place, where you can study whatever you like, spend hours in the library and have interesting discussions with other intellectuals all the time and come up with new ideas blah blah blah. At least these were the stories my parents told me. But over the past few months I have discovered, it's only if your degree reap a profit does all of that matter. I want to study economic history but expect my mum and dad, literally every one else has told me in no uncertain terms that I will never be able to be 'successful' or 'settle well' with that degree. And I don't really blame the people for thinking that way too. I get it. Going to college is a huge investment. Studying in any of the more prestigious colleges in the country is hella expensive. Government higher education infrastructure is crumbling all around us and private institutions will leave you with a huge debt by the time you graduate. Admission is becoming more and more selective day by day- the cut off marks in good colleges hover around 98% - 99% each year. Then there are issues of accommodation- most colleges only offer hostel facilities to the students with highest marks. Seeing all of this is disheartening but it hasn't convinced me to change my plans- yet. I feel that I am gonna do whatever I want, everything else can go to hell, but I know it's going to be extremely difficult. I am prepared for it I think. I can still afford to dream but I know many who can't. Sometimes I wonder, what is the point of our higher education Institutions? To give education to whoever wants it or to give it only to the best of the best and the most affluent?
Higher education and knowledge in general was never free. It was only ever meant to be in the hands of a few, its because of this that so many people view college as a waste of time. No matter how smart you are or what degree you have, you can not change your circumstances. The poor will stay poor and the rich will stay rich. So instead of learning in the hopes of making it to that dream home you have pinned up to your wall, might I suggest you live your life to the fullest and learn what you enjoy. Make yourself happy because no one else ever will.
In europe, universities focus more on education and research is mostly done by research institutions. This separation will improve the quality of education in the US.
Bonjour à tous !
Quick update: Closed captions are now available on my most recent and also most popular videos 😊 I'll progressively add them to more and more videos.
Hi Alice! I'm studying to be a translator. If you're interested I can translate the captions into Spanish. All for free of course, in return for your wonderful videos.
@@guadalupearaoz2040 That is super nice of you ! I'll make a YT post when I finally set up everything to receive your translations 🥰
@@AliceCappelle great!!✨✨
@@guadalupearaoz2040 ¡Ay si! Así podré pasárselos a mis amigos y discutir sobre el tema ❤️
‼️ You should consider to make a video about Solarpunk genre 🤓 ☀️
It angers me when Musk says you don't need to go to university to achieve what he claims, but all that he claims to have achieved was done by his engineers and scientists, all people he hired and that have actually gone to university. without university people, he would have achieved nothing.
He himself went to UPenn and got into Stanford for a PhD in materials science
@@smoscorpio And this doesn't include that he grew up affluent.
Higher degree helps, but it's definitely not for everyone, and not all jobs/career paths need it. Also it definitely IS a commodity. It's something that can only exist if there are people that are willing to provide it. But those people need to be compensated as well, and who's going to pay them, if not the people receiving the benefits? If I don't want to go to college, why should I partake in paying for those who do? Naturally, redistribution of wealth will only cause tensions in society, as well as other issues as well.
@@goldstein10493 exactly. Not everyone who goes to uni is studying to be an engineer. Most everyone else is probably better off using relatively inexpensive paid courses and free resources...like youtube or the library.
@@mikochild2 yes. You don't even need college degree to be a programmer, just take courses or bootcamp. And programmers make a lot of money. In this day and age where the government is causing college tuition to be high, we need to be proactive and seek other alternatives, to force colleges to lower their tuition.
People forget that those "don't go to college...make money" people usually come from very rich families and are trying to sell the dream to highschool drop-outs with lower social standing;
+luck
Affording and being able to go to college is just as much a privilege.
Tell that to trades people lol
Or they go to trade schools and make significantly more than the majority of college graduates without going into massive debt.
@@AmIWhatIAm if you calculate everything then you leave nothing to luck.
Look at Zuckerberg. People glorify him dropping out from Harvard like its Harvard thats gonna make him great lol. It’s not widely talked about that he went to Philip Exeter, one of the most expensive boarding schools in America.
And the most important contributing factor was that his parents could foresee the internet boom and sent him to programming classes before everybody rode on the bandwagon. Mind you, he was just 11 at this time, just how more perfect of an upper middle class life can you get??He went to Harvard more prepared than most kids his age were.
Its good for them, of course, but other people should not aspire to make the same decision as him(no college), because everyone’s starting point is different and some may have more safety net. Instead, people should evaluate themselves and be honest.
Edit : okay fine, the important things that he got out of Harvard was his business contacts & his wife who was there before he became a somebody, but thats all, really. Even if he attended lesser-tier colleges, he probably would have founded something else with a different set of housemates. Someone like him would go out of his way to achieve things, umm FB is Winklevoss twins' idea? Yes ideas are not patents, but you could already see his inner snake. Dont underestimate ambitious nerdzz
Hey this was pretty informative . 👍
The same with Gates, Jobs, and Wozniak. They didn't drop out of college because education is useless. They were just so far ahead of the computer sciences niche they learned everything they could in a shorter period of time. They also all had the good fortune of coming around when IBM was in the middle of an antitrust lawsuit.
Ppl really shouldnt look at outliers for advice, including this idea that the secret behind every success is having a supportive rich family.
he even knows latin
I hate Zuckerberg and he dropping out from Harvard shouldn't be exalted for a myriad reasons (observation bias, etc.) BUT a bunch of other kids had the same privileges he did and HE was the one who built facebook. Your comment makes you sound like a sore loser.
I have a BA degree and I'm proud of it (mostly because I achieved a good life balance) but what I realised was that some of the very high-grading people I met had very little social or emotional intelligence. They got straight As but were braggadocious and arrogant, portrayed themselves as 'woke' but never actually stood up for social causes, couldn't really use logic very well in a debate, and mocked people for wanting a work-life balance and not pulling all nighters every week to get those top grades. It made me realise that our idea of academic and educational 'success' is amazingly narrow.
Out of curiosity, what field do you work in? I’m 18, and I really want to go in a path that gets me work life balance
@Tyler H I'm sorry, but I know not 90% of uni students get straight A's
Idk, I’m having a hard time buying that straight A college students can’t make logical arguments. If you’re in a BA program and can’t support your opinions logically, you won’t have an A in any class where you have to write essays.
@@astrojude allow me to introduce myself
This is just conjecture. People all along the the grade scale spectrum will display everything you have said. Secondly how do you even measure emotional intelligence, I love how people use it as a metric but have no standard for how it is measured in the first place. Thirdly, it looks like you're just trying hard to sound smart and make these ad hom attacks, but again, you have nothing backing up anything you have stated other than anecdotes. Fourthly, not everyone who gets good grade in college need to spend 8+ hours studying. There are people who are just naturally gifted with understanding the academic field they followed, and there are academic fields which doesn't require that much studying to begin with to get good grades. Why are you judging people based on the grades they get, seems very bigoted to be honest, but that's just my opinion.
I'm currently undergoing a serious career crisis. Studying has become plane, mediocre, automatic, uncritical. I read the assigned material, to engulf it and then regurgitate it in exams that are as far from critical thinking as they can be. But there are some moments in which I believe I can build myself a better path by using all the tools I'm offered as well as the privileges of having access to free education (I'm from Argentina). Even tough, academia has proven to be quite rough on people with mental disorders like me, I'm taking my time and trying to focus on the real goal: acquiring knowledge and the abilities to create, discover, criticise and accept criticism. As usual, I loved the video and your reflection was really useful.
Kudos to your spirit 🙌🏼 Keep going friend!
@@kppp3653 thanks!!
vamos que se puede, carajo! jajajja
abrazo compatriota!!
@@titatesta4577 siii, carajo, graciassss!!
Tbh, I'm so tired of rich influencers and celebrities (many of whom grew up with parents who were also rich or middle class BECAUSE they got a college education) telling the rest of us that getting a college degree is "useless". I'm so tired of pop culture degrading education and invalidating experts in certain subjects because they're offended by what they're saying.
It's no coincidence that this phenomenon is happening while we live in time where anti-vax and flat Earthers are taking over.
I'm glad I found this video, because I agree that college education has been degraded and taken or granted too, and that a lack of critical thinking has become an issue.
Now if only higher education was more accessible for most people rather than hundreds of thousands of dollars sometimes.
You couldn’t have said it better
In all honesty I do think college isn’t the best option half the time as a college student. Like realistically half of the degrees that colleges offer shouldn’t exist. In my opinion it’s just natural selection we all can’t be successful. And there are also other ways to be successful but with my experiences a GOOD college degree is the greatest investment one can make if they don’t go into massive debt they know they won’t be able to pay back within a limited amount of time.
@ThatOne imagine how many professors would be in unemployed tho...😳
@@bryan-zp6ty well, there’s no good or bad degree. Just degrees that are more or less in demand. If you need job security you can be a teacher, doctor, lawyer, cyber security specialist... the list goes on. Everybody has their niche and can make a job out of it. Would I recommend a Bachelors of Arts? No. But it can be used and you do walk away knowing more than you did before
I think the part where you said that "studying can also be for the country" is actually common in a collectivist society like the Philippines. As a student of the national university, we call ourselves "scholars of the nation" and the concept of "studying for the country" or "to help our countrymen" is part of the school culture. Its also common for students all over different universities to use the quote "Kakayanin para sa bayan" which means "I'll get through this for my country" during finals week or if academic work becomes heavy. It's interesting to see the individualistic perspective from the West in comparison to the kind of mindset that I am exposed to.
Apologies for the number of comments I have posted, I get way to excited to contribute my own thoughts and experiences whenever you post! I enjoy this community and I look forward to learning from the discussions in the comments. Thanks for such an insightful video Alice!
That is awesome! I didn't know that :O
@@mikaylab.4913 It's so exciting to find a fellow Iskolar ng bayan among the comments section. I owe my college degree to generous subsidies from the government and I'll always be grateful for that privilege. It was in UP that I learned to think for myself and opened my eyes to the broader world around me. However, having graduated years ago and watching my peers leave the country for more lucrative jobs abroad, I'm not so sure if the gov't is doing enough to stem the flow of this so-called "brain drain". I'm thinking of leaving myself, not out of greed or personal gain, but just to look for more greener pastures. Anyway, I've rambled too much but I'm really thankful that I found this channel.
Lagi't laging para sa bayan! 😊
Yup in my country, Indonesia too....i study in national university...many people can't afford to go to college. So yeah.... We study to develop our nation, to help others, etc...one motto of the campus is "For God, nation, and alma mater"
Everyone actually encounters contrasting opinions in university. So, when the accent is on the critical thinking, nobody really can teach you what to think. You have to decide it for yourself.
The most impactful thing my uni professor said was "Don't believe anyone. Don't believe me. I could make mistakes or lie to you. If you want to have an opinion, go home and check what I've said, check multiple sources".
Great video, btw! It's important to cover such topics, especially using many examples :)
I love your what your professor said!
Schools are not teaching you what to think, they teach you how to think in so many ways that just isnt explained, or is explained but people do not retain, nor listen to know. Of course you make your own decisions on what to think, but schools teach you to take something in front of you, and question it in many ways.
OMG THIS HERE!!
god i fucking love that so much for the longest time couldnt explain why i cant make decisions for other people!! kind of like a "i dont wanna hold you back" type thing i cant explain
but yeah this!! also hope i wasnt mean i just cant explain in general :""D
True, but for some people, thinking for yourself is hard no matter what. And yes, that includes me. But I try to.
@Luís Andrade uh, even if those studies talked about that, without those courses we’d have no place to talk about that stuff. Education is just retaining knowledge. You don’t have to agree with it? Like you can take a whole class about a fictional alien planet and talk about their politics, doesn’t mean you agree with them ur just thinking critically. Same thing with this. Ideologies don’t help people, knowledge does. Honestly i dislike how capitalism has played out but sign me up for a capitalist-theory course I wanna see the thought behind it! Education doesn’t have to have a reason behind it for me to want it. Some things I just wanna know.
Gyal you killed this one. As a Political Scientist, we observe the decline of critical thinking in the 17th century with the birth of "isms" and "ologies" because they deliver prepackaged ideologies that you can subscribe to rather than formulating your own.
Agreed. Many people are so focused on finding the right label and community that they go along with ALL their ideals instead of cultivating a unique perspective through critical thinking
Can you further expand upon this? Perhaps with examples?
@@stepahead5944 sure so first ting comes to mind is Liberalism (no, not what Americans today know to be Liberals) but Lockian Liberalism as it was the first "ism".. Well ever. This was around the 17th century. Before then; ppl would simply read political theory. This was good because it created a polis which is essentially a public place in which politics took place and allowed for a healthy discourse to ascertain the parts of political theory that would work versus what would not. After Classical Lockian Liberalism, more pre-packaged idelogies popped up such as conservatism, epiricism etc. The danger was that ppl simply subscribed to an ideology which did the thinking for them. For example; i say I'm a Classical Liberal which can mean a litany of other things (social contract theory, pursuit of property etc) but I may not even know what all this ideology entails! Moreover, there's no debate because we already assume we know what these "Classical Liberals" are thus if we don't agree with them, we don't even inquest as to why we don't.
I don't think that the use of labels like all the "-isms" you might see in various subjects, fields, or disciplines is inherently a bad thing. Labels can be useful for providing a shorthand for various bundles of concepts and abstract trains of thought. Granted, people do need to have an awareness of at least the key concepts or reasonings related to an "-ism" before using it in discourse in order to get the most out of their use. However, at the very least, it would seem more useful to have such labels tie together concepts or wrap them up together, so that when they are used in language, bringing them up in conversation may allow others to better interpret or understand what its user means and what its user might be trying to say with them. Otherwise, without such labels and the semantic conventions that go with them, people would have to go through and explain every concept or idea that might be bundled within that "-ism" label every time they might wish to say something about whatever is related to the things they wish to speak or write about.
I think the problem of where the usage of labels like various different "-isms" went wrong is that they can be overused. What began as a convenient and handy set of cognitive tools became potential cognitive crutches. As people got more comfortable not having to expend a little more mental energy thinking through concepts they bring up, they became less inclined to bring their own mental input to situations where such labels might be applied, resulting in tendencies to just carelessly or blindly throw around semantic labels without applying the thinking those labels were supposed to convey through shorthand in the first place.
A chair is not necessarily useless or bad for walking just because people could potentially develop an addiction to a more sedentary lifestyle and develop habits of not walking or running enough to be more physically healthy. Likewise, I believe conventional labels for concepts are not necessarily inherently bad for critical thinking. They just need to be used when needed and not relied on when not needed. Like any other kind of tool, it serves its user well when handled properly and relied on in moderation. But if the user becomes overdependent on the tool due to letting their own abilities related to the function of the tool decline or atrophy from laziness, then indeed the tool can become the user's master, while the tool also suffers a decline in usefulness (for the one who once used it is no longer able to use it to its fullest capacity due to their own atrophy).
- - -
Ironically, the world of ideologies came to be in the Critical Thinking breakup of the Enlightenment.
There is something to be said for how libraries act a centers of adult education. I see people of all ages interested and curious when they come to the rural library I work in, sure there are plenty coming for entertainment from the DVD collection or the Fiction section but all media exposes people to ideas. It's a good resource for the autodidact, just as the internet can be. Everyone learns in different ways, I would not presume one way of learning is better than another. When I entered college no one had really told me that whatever you study will be your career, or that it was necessarily what you needed to get a job. And it was entirely unrelated to any occupation I have taken up since. I did cultural and linguistic studies but it was entirely for personal reasons. Do I regret it? Not one iota. The act of learning was the purpose.
Thanks for sharing, I love your perspective on learning 😊
That discussion among students (instructors welcome too, sure) is one thing that I found really, really important at university and it's not well replicated in our internet self-education. Discussion groups at public libraries would be great, but particularly when physical isolation is something we're stuck with, there ought to be better ways to cultivate it in online spaces too.
I feel a little better after reading this, i studied a degree that is not very profitable in my country, i just choose it because i didn't know what to study, and i liked the industry, not thinking further, and now i feel that my degree is useless for not being able to compete in an international setting and some other reasons, anyways, your comment made me feel like it was not time wasted.
This is becoming more and more common. I studied art for almost 10 years, before making up my mind what I wanted to do...and it was related to medicine, so I had to study all over again. The interesting thing, is that in current institution we get asked all the time whether we plan to work in this field or are we studying for ourselves, because skills we need to acquire differ. It really shows, that an education in the right field is not enough to make one a specialist in that particular field. So you can definitely study something “unrelated” and become another type of specialist - because of the way you think. Hope that makes sense.
I’ve heard that to work at a library you have to have a masters in library science... did you eventually get that degree? If not, how did you get your job at the library?
The real issue is that too many people either see college as the holy grail of success, or as an utterly pointless endeavor. In reality, it has it's pros and cons and does the most good for those who have a post-graduation career plan. There are other ways to succeed though.
Facts
This.
And it may differ from country to country. At least in Mexico, most colleges are funded by the goverment so, the incentive to go without the hassle of tuition really makes the experience more organic in the sense that competition always comes first rather than the money.
Sensible comment
finally something that is reasonable
I think that our education system is very rigid and it hasn't progressed enough to be able to develop every single person to their fullest potential. I do understand that technical knowledge is important but I personally think it would be better if the system and the curriculum sees self-development and, as you said, development of critical thinking skills as the primary goal of education (and not a just a by-product of the technical stuff that we have to study). It's sad to see people work so hard to get perfect scores to be "marketable to companies" after graduation while not being able to fully develop themselves for the real world.
Just wanted to add that I think the ineffectiveness of the education system can also be seen in the rise of side hustles. A lot of people do a side hustle alongside their actual job because 9-5 jobs usually don't pay enough. Building your own small business has also been part of the formula of breaking free from the corporate world and more often than not, these side hustles are not related to one's degree. Why pay thousands and spend years in uni if it won't even allow you to live comfortably? That shows a massive problem in the current educational system. If anything, some people do just go to uni to get a piece of paper and to build connections.
And honestly i could be wrong but even professors like Jose Rizal scholar Ambeth Ocampo misunderstands a lot of what's going on with Filipino communities in other nations, as if it is their fault for not "staying true to their heritage" or complaining about issues "the wrong way". It's like critical theory is a big no-no in the Philippines. Then again, anything remotely "left-leaning" is taboo in the Philippines as much as it is in the US (in conservative areas at least).
@@mikaylab.4913 yeah building connections is literally the only useful incentive at this point for many people. And im sorry if my comments seem out of left field. I don't know where my previous comment went. I got too excited to see another Filipino commenter haha
@@MiguelThinks sorry if my reply is insufficient or if I am not able to fully understand what you just shared but i do agree that there are just so many layers to it and I think that the political climate also affects the kind of discourse that we have in the country. Even though it's hard, I still have some hope that the younger generations can push to become more critical of the traditional beliefs that operate within our systems.
Hey, I just want to jump in here, because Alice said that too in the video: a better way of saying his/her is using their. Besides being less wordy, it is also including people who don't identify as he or she :)
Cannot help but to think about how the alternative self help gurus who are sharing this “don’t go to college… make money” advice are people who are traditionally legitimized in society (white men). Meanwhile, those from backgrounds who have traditionally been left out of certain industries need a university degree just to be taken seriously.
Yes ! Shanspeare just made two very interesting videos on that topic!
Also a lot of these people came from rich or upper middle class families and had parents who were able to provide for them as kids most likely BECAUSE of their education. What a slap in the face to their parents for their own kid to grow up and basically say that the effort they put into their education so they could get a good paying job was "useless". I'm not saying they have to get a college education, but at least be respectful of those who do and acknowledge that it's at least somewhat important for a good amount of people to have it.
agree! also, it is exactly these people that hire individuals with the highest college degree
Hit the nail on the head!
Hello racists. 😃
It all depends on what you are studying. We tend to generalize a lot, that hurts.
Agreed. My parents forced me to go to college against my will and didn't care what degree I got, so I majored in art. I've literally never used my degree. It was a huge waste of money. Everyone benefits from *education* but higher education as it currently is is the wrong choice for many, many, many people.
Yeah definitely. I watch Graham a lot but I never really listen when he talks about college because I know I want to become a doctor
@@lindan7238 bruh he obviously isn't talking about medicine LMAO he refers to the general public who won't go on to pursue essential careers. Obviously he can't tell a STEM person to leave their education because they won't get any job without it. However, for example, business majors are probably encouraged to think twice about their degrees since liberal arts degrees usually don't need a higher education unless they're going into academia.
@@RenuNohbar mhm
What you are studying is part of it, but there are also a lot of important and necessary jobs that require a degree or some kind of advanced training that are still considered "worthless" by society. These jobs include teachers, social workers, paramedics, librarian, etc. It bugs me when people say to get a "worthwhile" degree, but they don't really stop to think about all of the jobs in society that require one that pay less than non-degreed work. We do tend to generalize, and in the process, we completely undermine and underpay critically important people in society. We are starting to see the fruits of that terrible attitude in the form of massive labor shortages in jobs like teaching, social work, and certain medical fields.
Several years ago I had the distinct privilege of hearing a Nobel laureate (who happened to be a professor at my university). He told us the point of a PhD is to learn how to do good science. That’s always stayed with me.
As a daughter of an immigrant in America, traditional college education has transformed my and my brothers trajectory to well employed contributing people of our communities. Without it, I don’t think we would have come this far. And for my my mother, as a woman, there were huge limitations to what she could achieve in her home country. My liberal arts college education did not directly contribute to my current profession in the medical field, but it enhanced how I understand the people I see. Thank you for this video!!
Thank you for sharing your personal experience 😊
Hey I was just curious how were you able to get a job in medicine with liberal arts degree and what kind of job it is? I hope you don’t mind me asking I work in the field as well
Many people do not enter the field that they get their degree in. College IS a place to help you think about the world and interact with different people. That's the way it should be viewed. I think that's really what a lot of us should take away from this discussion.
yeah I’m also curious how you got into healthcare
@@moonlightbae333 I can’t speak to what specific career OP has, but pre-health students in America can usually choose whatever major they want before entering medical/pharmacy/PA/vet/etc. school. They would just need to take a certain set of classes as undergraduates. These classes can sometimes overlap with the classes needed for the degree, and some of the classes may not overlap.
The thing that bugs me the most about this general criticism of academia is the idea that things are only worth while if they return a profit. Whereas it seems to me that it's often the opposite. Since capitalism is so driven by profit and perpetual growth, companies must either raise the prices on necessities or market more and more things that are totally pointless. The result is that the more pointless a job is, the more profitable it's guaranteed to be, a classic example being a stock broker. As you alluded to in your video, the only way to stop this cycle is to reform the system, and more accessible education is imperative in order for that to happen.
A stockbroker is not necessarily a 'pointless' job. A stockbroker can help people invest their money far more effectively than they could on their own. How is that any less necessary than a grocery store clerk or restaurant owner? Maybe you're still under the impression that stockbrokers only service extremely high net-worth individuals, which is now a thing of the past.
"companies must either raise the prices on necessities or market more and more things that are pointless" what are you considering as necessities? This statement is extremely vague and not generally true. There are tons of things that go into the price of a certain item (e.g. supply, demand, cost of production, value of currency a.k.a inflation, ethics, etc.), one cannot say that the increase in price is necessarily due to a sinister fixation on increasing profits.
@@kockarthur7976 I'm sorry if I was vague. My train of thought was something along these lines: any person or society has a finite amount of needs. Obviously those needs will change from year to year, but in general they won't grow exponentially. Unfortunately, capitalism is driven by profit, which means that in order for a company to sustain itself, it needs to make more money than it did last year. Obviously you can cut costs, but only so much. So you need to increase revenue. To increase its revenue a company has two main options: it can find more customers or it can raise prices. For companies that deal with necessities i.e. housing, food, clothes etc, they generally prefer the latter, since there's a very finite need for these things (especially houses and food). For those who provide services that are unessential, such as chia pets, glitter or anything you might see on an infomercial, they're mostly attempting to find new customers, because if they raised their prices people would just lose interest. Obviously this a bit of an oversimplification, but my main point is that capitalism doesn't concern itself with the welfare of individuals. It cares about profit and growth. And there are some silly things that are absurdly profitable.
To answer your first point, my beef with stockbrokers is just that I don't feel like the stock exchange is that useful. While it nominally helps companies raise funds and distribute risk, in practice it's a bunch of suits speculating the value of stocks in a multi-billion dollar game of chicken. It's totally detached from reality, as shown by the fact that the stock market performed great last year even though...everyone else had a pretty rough go of it. And while I'm sure you're correct in saying that stockbrokers help some people, I still feel like it's mostly those from the upper-middle class.
@@jonathanjackson1388 I disagree. The stock market is far from useless. Especially today, where anyone can invest from their smartphones. Investing in stocks can benefit people from any socioeconomic class. It allows an average person to grow their pension fund to retire or for average people to acquire ownership assets now that stock investing has been democratized by apps like Robinhood. I think capitalism inherently benefits the welfare of society. It provides incentive to create products that benefit people such as the case with the COVID vaccines. I think the problem is when capitalism isn’t properly regulated and corporations abuse it such as the 2008 bank bailouts. Crony capitalism aside, I think with a robust social safety net, a society can flourish with a capitalist foundation.
in a world run by money not everyone has the resources to get a degree for fun
@@jonathanjackson1388 I think you forgot to account for a really big factor: efficiency. Many companies that deal with necessities try to raise efficiency in order to increase profit, and both the costumer and the company benefit from this. You actually have a curious case in Brazil, where the introduction of more efficient and affordable air conditioners lead to an increase in money spent on air conditioner per household (as it was way more affordable and many people bought more than one AC to spread throughout the house). The same thing happens with the food and energy sectors, we are the generation that spends the most money in food and energy in the entire human history, and yet we are the most efficient generation in doing so. And don’t forget that many “needs” change quite rapidly, in just 15 years a phone became a “need” to most teenagers, internet connection became a “need” in any household, etc
Higher education crisis is too real in Brazil too. Students have to study a lot to get into free universities and, after getting in, it's hard for them to get a job because of the hours (and also the strikes make the course run longer and longer). We also have private universities, a lot of the, commodified education as you said. Something weird here is that poor people go private (some are not that expensive, some are "easy" and students can work and study with no conflicting hours) and rich people go to public unis (because they can afford to spend hours and hours studying to get in and even not work until after graduating). Alas, for the past couple of years, we are all suffering from unemployment, regardless of education.
The case is similar here in India..
sim. tô vendo esse vídeo no intervalo do meu terceiro ano de cursinho. e mesmo assim sei que sou sortuda por poder só estudar.
As a Brazilian, everything leads to believe that not having a degree will not change many things due to the rise in unemployment, but even so I believe that those who have the opportunity should try. Being able to choose a career and filter the opportunities is much better than just taking the job that comes (if it does). You can choose something for passion and personal development, or something for money and that has a good job offer. It's not wrong, it's our reality
@@yasminfranco5736 in this current scenario (the pandemic and economics crisis) I don't know how much changes, but I've actually read a study that stated that in Brazil, getting a college degree still has a great impact on how much you earn and on the risk of unemployed, when compared to other developing countries.
@@analupelosi3319 ter graduação hoje é quase como ter ensino médio completo. Ao mesmo tempo que cursar e concluir a faculdade é um privilégio, também é banalizado justamente pela comodificação da educação. Já perdi as contas de quantas vezes vi vagas de emprego pedindo graduação quando era completamente desnecessário. E com isso as pessoas se sentem obrigadas a cursar uma faculdade, não porque querem, mas porque devem, porque tem oportunidades de emprego (um pouco) melhores. É complicado.
I think a different solution for this could be to focus more on teaching critical thinking skills in highschool and compulsory education. I don't see why college is necessary to learn some of this stuff, and it also varies a lot depending on what area of knowledge you're studying. As a second year biology student I haven't been required or encouraged to do too much critical thinking yet but I have been introduced to a lot of resources to do research on my own that I would have loved to know about in highschool. It's not so hard to make stuff like political and literary analysis, sociology, how science actually works... more of a focus in compulsory education even if we can't go into it as deeply as we do in college. I know most teens don't take highschool as seriously but idk I'm thinking of going into education and I think we should try harder
I completely agree! I have always grappled with the concept of teaching critical thinking skills in higher education when it is common knowledge that colleges and universities are not accessible to many people on the margins of society. I believe it does everyone in society a great disservice to reserve that for university-educated individuals.
In the U.S. at least, what gets taught in the early compulsory education is far more dictated by local political bodies, which skew conservative. Even the suggestion of teaching "critical thinking" sets off alarm bells for them. I absolutely agree we _should_ be teaching students how to learn and how to avoid bullshit in grade schools, but getting there is going to take a substantial fight rather than mere work and attention to it.
Another thing to keep in mind: developmentally speaking, while children and adolescents are not incapable of thinking critically, they can’t do it the way adults can. So I suspect that although it’s undeniably helpful to instil these tendencies early on, part of the reason so much of the development of critical thinking happens in higher education is because university coincides with the developmental stage when people’s minds are best suited to it.
@@willemjohannes9007 Good point. It also underscores the needs (1) to make continuing education for one's own sheer self-development as a human a normal expectation, and (2) to make it readily available to people without the ability (for whatever host of reasons) to get it in a university. People need it, but they may not get it well enough when we've got all their time and attention.
@@jeffengel2607 Honestly the critical thinking have to be taught after 25. There's a level of maturity needed before you can learn these critical thinking skills, and I'll say most people below 24 aren't mature enough to understand them. We probably need to give people the ability to take free courses at 25 and above that will help develop these skills, such as a leadership conference or a college semester on critical thinking and politics. In a democracy, or a constitutional republic, this is very important since everyone vote does matter and a well informed population is the strength of a democracy, but I also think on average people tend to have a stronger grasp on the concept of critical thinking above the age of 21. Give 3 years for real world work experience and 25 seems like a good time to train the mind on these concepts.
University saved me. I grew up in a very religious household (some would call it a cult). I had no critical thinking skills, and I only learned that because I went to university. I did get a career in my degree, but I would have never left that religion and lived my own free and happy life if it wasn't for the critical thinking skills I learned, so for that alone I'm grateful.
If you don’t mind me asking, what religion was it?
This is such a refreshing perspective. People laugh at the thought of education for the community or as a public good, but they've never been introduced to any other way
We've lost track of thinking of public goods or communities at all under neoliberalism. It especially warps the conception of higher education.
You made me think with this video: at my uni, most of our group projects are done by looking at projects from previous years and then going "they did it like this so we should too, to get good/higher grades". Even through my first year of uni, whenever a colleague of mine suggested what essentially is borrowing ideas from others without thinking about them, I wondered about whether we were really learning or if we were just trying to crank out the highest number on a sheet of paper, disregarding the point of the project itself (which clearly was to apply what we had been taught in class, in our own way, making our own mistakes and learning from them) - and now that I've watched this video I'm pretty sure I have the answer. Thank you for that.
You're welcome 😊
Congratulations on your first sponsor! You definitely deserve it.
The smartest, most well read and well informed guy I know never even finished high school. He was also genuinely lovely, a family friend who took me in as a pregnant young woman with no job and no home.
But he was entirely self taught. The way that they taught at a mainstream high school (especially in the 80s), just didn’t gel with his learning style. Looking back now, I’d say he’s very likely neurodivergent. But once he was free to study on his own, he just blossomed, educationally speaking. He’s the person I would go to for information on what was going on in the world, he’d always know the very detailed ins and outs of a situation the news barely skimmed.
Unfortunately, he was very down on himself, calling himself a high school drop out , not very smart, etc. and that’s such a shame. We put so much emphasis on one way of learning that we disregard other avenues. Especially avenues that are purely for self edification, and have nothing to do with climbing a career ladder. I hope that with the rise of RUclips and educational channels, that this is something that is slowly changing. I can’t study at university anymore thanks to disability, but I still love to learn, and do the educational side of RUclips has been a godsend to me. And as a career is no longer a goal of education for me, I’m able to enjoy my learning that much more.
I did a business degree and it was very beneficial to me, and it did help me become a better thinker. It's easy for me to justify because my degree cost about $10K USD and I had 3 paid work terms..
I wish education was cheaper and more accessible so people don't have to get crushed by massive student loans just to get an education.
alhamdulilAllah university in Kurdistan region is free, cause we not western less go.
Education can be found elsewhere BUT a degree is needed if you want to get hired and work for a big company, that's the difference between a degree and not getting one
The better the access, the smaller the tension between classes. People wouldn't have to worry about getting a degree because it is accessible by choice rather than affordability, and therefore no longer an argument.
EDIT: Also no longer a "gatekeepy" subject.
There’s access to free education on the internet!!! Why are people so ignorant of this?
@@illness1623 it doesn't give you a certification.
Does America (or france) not have apprenticeship? In this videos it sounds like it is either college or being completely fucked.
In Germany people who are not interested in going to school for higher education can do a apprenticeship to become nurses, cooks or Handy man and much more. It is not as prestigious as going to college but you will be recognized as professionally trained.
Where I am in Canada we do have "apprenticeships," however due to regulations and (usually) necessary certifications to practice in certain fields, most apprenticeships are through university/college/student "co-ops" where you're being paid due to your academic achievements and aspirations (through a job-term associated with your field). Apprenticeships without formal education are only normalized in art spaces (tattoos, fashion) or the service industry (Bartending, cooking, autoshops, etc.) and even then, you need to know people to be given opportunity to learn without background experience.
America apprenticeship= military. Every other corporation or company will ask for 3 years of relevant work experience for a starting position, its a contradiction.
my thoughts exactly. many pretty well regarded and incredibly necessary jobs like mechanics, electricians and carpenters are based around apprenticeships. There are artistic professions like hairstylists and goldsmiths, office jobs like travel agent or banker, "intellectual" professions like bookselling or librarians or jobs with and for people like drivers of all kinds of public transportation or carers. And you can start from the age of 16 after finishing 10 years of schooling. Most apprenticeships take 3 years and then you can actually start earning a salary while your peers pursuing a higher education are just finishing high school. Plus you can continue your education in that field and become a master of your craft. Financially, it is a very sound decision at least here in Germany. And I'd argue in most fields it is easier to get a job after an apprenticeship than with a university degree because more and more people go to uni creating a shortage of skilled professional workers.
In America, trade schools would be the equivalent to apprenticeships. They’re 2 years and tend to carry less debt than colleges, but the education system tends to put them by the wayside. Jobs like mechanics and electricians would involve trade schools
America does have apprenticeships, available from various trade unions. I nearly took an apprenticeship with the local branch of the electrician's union, for example. You won't hear about them in high school though, I only knew the IBEW was hiring because my grandfather is a retired electrician. It's not that you need a family connection, they'll take pretty much anyone who can read and shows up to work on time and sober, but kids are taught in high school that they'll never amount to anything without a four year degree, so they don't bother even looking for trades.
I barely know you but i’m so happy for you for having your first sponsored video
Thank you 🥰
Olha o Spartakus aqui ❤️
and let's stop and say "aww" because of her cute French accent in "sponsored"
@@thaisvalentim962
fique surpreso também. Kkkkkkk
Br's de cultura, representando
I really like the point that you made: “by getting an education, we are helping our country to get richer”.
I wish that they understood that in the USA. Certainly, many people can learn on their own, as long as they have a lot of discipline and integrity. However, much more of us do not have this aptitude to carry on and finish a project on our own.
Sadly, everything in the USA has to be achieved by taking loans on top of loans, they don’t see that it will discourage a bunch of people from getting an education.
Hence, this lack of education and development of the mind will not only slow down the economy of the country, but it will also impede lots of creativity and innovation.
I also want to add that, the fact that many people no longer want to go to college or university school will also have a huge impact on world’s economy and progress.
Thank you, you made some very good points 👏🏼
You're so right! I'm American and I would absolutely love to get a higher education but the unbelievable tuition fees and all those loans is not only keeping me from going to University here but is also one of the biggest reasons I keep considering leaving this country. I could easily get a Lithuanian citizenship which would gave me access to either free or just way more affordable education, but I would have to give up my American citizenship. And at this point? That doesn't sound too bad anymore.
And I can't be the only one considering this.
@@hippl32 I am sorry to hear that. If you do want to live in another country, research a lot about it and be ready for the difficulties that you will face. However, if you want to stay in the USA, I would get a cheap technical degree that pays a lot. I would then save as much money as I can, and then, when I am ready, I would go to college. However, while you work, keep on learning on your own, watch videos, and talk to people so that you can develop your critical thinking and stretch your brain for further learning.
For example, I have a cousin who studied massage therapist and he makes about $20 per hour plus tips. Right now, he is studying to become a physical therapist. I wish that I knew these options when I was younger. Sadly, I did not research much.
@@cookingwiththehaitiantwist I'm really happy that there still are places like technical and community colleges that make education more accessible to people! And I'm really glad your cousin found a path to get to being a physical therapist because of that technical college. However, what I want to study isn't as "job-safe" as something like physical therapy and all that extra work to get there just isn't for the type of person I am haha.
I definitely know what it takes to move countries, I'm not as young and naïve as I was fresh outta high school😄😄 I'm definitely very privileged that I already have family back home in Europe so it makes it a lot easier. I also have a few more reasons than just education to get outta here lol.
I just wanted to further emphasize the point of accessible education being good for the entire country and its future.
Thank you for the advice!
@@hippl32 yes I understand. Definitely go for it when you are ready. I think we have an innate intuition that tells us where we belong. I wish that you accomplish your goals. Good luck! Also, a quote from JOrdan Peterson: Imagine who you could be, and then, aim single-mindedly at that.
I do not know if you are into arts or humanities, which are fields that people tend to belittle. It is sad that we tend to believe that they are career paths that seem to be a waste of time. Art, philosophy, social studies, etc… are so important for the development of a nation. If we were to prevent artists from existing, we would suffer a whole lot.
I don’t believe that there are worthless careers.
In Ireland, if you're family earns over a certain amount of money you have to pay for university. Otherwise, you can apply for a grant. You can get half grants or full grants depending on how much your family earns. This grant also includes expenses money that you get each month which is supposed to be used for rent etc. I really appreciate it when looking at America
That's terrible, why should i be forced to pay for something if i don't want to just because i make a certain ammount of money.
@@somedudes6455 why should every child be completely dependent on their parents financial situation? Obviously, children are dependent on their parents somewhat, but I don't think this should be the case for healthcare and education. If the government funds healthcare and education, children have the ability to make career choices independent of their parents. In the long run, this works out better for society - for many reasons, e.g. people have more freedom to choose what they're actually good at and interested in and therefore will likely be better at it. Obviously, you don't want to be taking loads of money off rich people, people have the right to be rich - it can be looked into in a more efficient way. For starters, college tuition in America is insane, it's nowhere near that in Ireland, I don't know why that is? Maybe when the government are partly involved in paying college tuition they can lobby with uni's and prevent tuition prices skyrocketing just because uni's can / there's demand
@@somedudes6455 Sorry if I'm wrong, but it seems you didn't understand what OP said.
No one is forcing you to pay anything. In most countries in Europe, studying in Universities tends to be cheaper than in the US, but you still have to pay, doesn't matter how much your family earns. The difference if that people from families with not a lot of resources can also apply for grants, which gives them money so they can afford tuition and materials, as long as they comply with certain terms, like passing a certain number of classes (At least in the region of Spain where I live). I f they don't follow those terms they would have to return the money of the grant.
But that doesn't mean people who's families can afford with not a lot of problems can also apply for other grants, most commonly those associated with good grades in class, which everyone can have access to if they are good students.
For example in the region where I live they where giving a lot of grants to people with either few resources or good grades, depending on you families salary you'll have more or less (the more money you have the less you'll receive since you don't really need it). But the better scores you have the more money you'll receive regardless of family background.
To summarize there is an initial tuition everyone has to pay, but those with few resources can access grants from the government which helps them pay it. Those grants come from the taxes everyone pays.
We have grants here too
I personally feel like the concept of proletarian autodidact may be dead for now, at least in the US. I’ve worked many working class jobs and the majority of people work 10-16 hours a day at a tough job, and when they get off they want to spend their time resting, relaxing, or taking care of their family, not necessarily educating themselves about something that at the moment feels so improbable.
I think in general this is the problem I have with how some leftists approach the self help community, as they somewhat antagonize it. I understand that as I’m not a fan either, but a lot of it comes off as condescending or unrealistic as this community is providing people who may be priced out of an education real hope for a better life. In addition, almost all of my friends who went to college feel like it has lost its magic, I personally felt the same mainly because of what the internet has enabled, which is the biggest contrast between the golden era of the 60s and now in terms of access to information. College back then was cheaper and actually held a resource which was scarce(credible information). Now, even though reading books or watching lectures on RUclips obviously doesn’t hold the same value as a college degree, many people perceive the value you get for your money as magnitudes better than a college education, something that I find hard to disagree with, especially if you are pressed for money. Sure, a college degree gets you accreditation in the white collar world, but I’m speaking simply at the level of acquiring knowledge/critical thinking. I personally think we may have to experiment with new forms of teaching/education and technology that adapt to the modern age, rather than try to revert back to an educational infrastructure that seems impractical now.
Yeah. There's that precious value of the classic college experience that needs to be encouraged and preserved where we can do so, but recreating it or something like it elsewhere where people who have to work hard and long without an income surplus can still get some of it with little time, energy, or wealth.
The concept of focused learning at academic institutions taught by experts should not go away. I think it is the most practical approach. But the paradigm should shift: knowledge should be a right, not a privilege. We should also take "classes" endlessly because the world doesn't stop after you "graduate". Ofc bare minimum is we stop treating education as a tool for a job: there's plenty of better tools for that
@@nickallbritton3796 Building on that - I take it, anyway - _both_ professional training AND general liberal humanistic education are rights, and should be available and supported lifelong, and they deserve to be conceived and supported each as such without one of them being erased in the shadow of the other.
I love that you talk about the elitism in academia because it is not only classist but greatly affects women and people of colour.
The world of academia like many things was designed for rich white men and is used as a tool to help them succeed.
Yes yes yes! That is why we need to keep/make it free so that anybody can have access to higher education and change that system from within
That's absolutely true, and the systems put in place to make education more exclusive and elitist also prevent a lot of nuerodivergent people from being able to get educated in schools and universities.
University is affordable in New Zealand and yet the exam-based structure and generally inaccessible teaching methods create a situation so hostile to the way my brain works that I'm better off as an autodidact!
I barely made it through the six month course at community college that was absolutely necessary for a job in my field despite having an innate love of learning and a passion for the material. There's no good reason for it to be like this.
@@PitchBlackForge
if [topic initially brought up true], then why do [misconstrued information based in a lack of nuanced thinking], hmm???
@@seachelle2316 nice job analysing the meta of his comment, but it would've been constructive if you actually made a proper point rather than trying to be a smart mouth.
Why do you think the info is misconstrued?
@@AliceCappelle I heavily disagree, when you have something that's free, it will inevitably be abused, Universities have always been the starting point of a counter-culture, or some kind of "movement". For that reason Reagan wanted university's to start charging a fee was to keep people ,who were only looking to push a political agenda, out.
I come from a developing country and the amount of information I learned by going to college is incredible. All the knowledge I have about other cultures/religions I learned at school, even though my major was computer science. And the things that I think are common knowledge are not viewed that way and it baffles me. Therefore, it depends on the person willing to learn and think critically while absorbing information and I really do think higher education is incredibly important
That is a college here in US.
I come from a developing country as well, I have 3 degrees, one of them European. None of my core values came from the institutions but only from self study and experience. It’s all very anecdotal i and very much depends on what are you studying, your background, work, etc.
Good points, but I'm afraid I have to disagree with you. I did a lot of reading before going to college. The entire time I've spent in it, I haven't learned a single thing. I took a neuroscience course and had already memorized everything from day one to the final exam just from the time I spent reading textbooks in my free time. Im aware that sounds awfully pretentious, and I hate it, but that's just how things went down. I was frankly very disappointed.
I get what you're saying about self-help gurus, though I wasn't aware Big Tech leaders fit in that category. I had an interesting conversation about Student Debt the other day with people just 20 years older than I am. These individuals went to college for an entire year for just 10k at a state university. I would have to pay 100k if I wanted two semesters at my state university today. For the wide range of accessible knowledge and the ever-accelerating pace at which knowledge IS becoming accessible, college isn't keeping up.
Besides, your whole video is resting upon the idea that college is actually promoting critical thinking. I really think that alone is up for debate. It doesn't feel that way. I felt as if I was more of a critical thinker, and a free-thinker to boot, when I read books outside of institutionally structured reading.
I do agree with you that a lot of the college experience is today about the " little paper at the end." We often like the assurance of a set of certified credentials, but that's assuming they really mean anything. I think now might also be a good opportunity to inset I am talking about the Liberal Arts here. I do not mean STEM careers. Unfortunately, college is failing us in those departments and isn't as needed as you might think. The argument against that, that it doesn't turn over a profit, doesn't exactly apply here. Not only is it not exactly turning over a profit consistently, but it's also very political, biased, and focused on indoctrinating students.
Hopefully, that's objective as to your argument. I sometimes get these kinds of comments on my own videos and they can just be a little mean-spirited so I want you to know you did a great job on this video! Those are just my two cents, and I enjoy you opening up the conversation on this topic as it catches on.
In my experience, critical thinking comes from meeting different opinions which is not what happens in universities. Commerce students all have the same values, sociology students same, law students same. They are very homogenous in their ideas. In order to learn critical thinking one would have to spend one moment in law school and meet those people, then one year in sociology or art school. You get the idea.
Yeah your comment has legs agree with it entirely! The term university is broad, quality varies and often people do whatever they have to do to obtain the GRADE not the knowledge 🤷🏾♀️
It’s unfortunate that degrees like psychology and neuroscience don’t really stress critical thinking. It says a lot about those fields.
I know in many engineering/math-based degrees coursework is based on problem solving, which seems to be a much more effective way to teach.
Why would they put in critical thinking in a (I guess introduction level?) course about neuro science? On that level you have to learn the things people have learned before you. The STEM field is pretty much aquiring knowledge, working on problem solution, doing smaller labexperiments and rewieving others work before working on your thesis(es) and then developing things after you graduate or start a phd
As a 17 year old student living in Asia, this is so relatable. I feel sad that a lot of (Asian) students regard education as a painful stage in our life that we have to endure in order to get to a good college and attain a good job.(defining a good career or a successful life in a very narrow way) What we do at school centers on studying (memorizing stuff), but no one really understands what learning is, not to mention enjoying and seizing the opportunity to learn. A really funny thing is that our government is now adding "critical thinking" to our curriculum, yep, we are now studying how to do critical thinking and the right ways on critical thinking. What's even funnier is how all the critical thinking focus on certain topics that is considered ''important'' and "useful".This is it's just another kind of spoon-feeding education to me. Since when do you care about what we think, The idea that we must choose a "correct answer" and achieve "high grades", otherwise you're failing in learning, not hard-working enough, and is simply a valueless person is deep rooted into our mind.We are stripped of the ability of critical thinking by the rigid education system that is now going to teach us critical thinking, how ironic it is. Still, I'm glad that our government tried to reform the education system, it gives me hope that one day our education can be meaningful and children can enjoy learning.
Wish me luck on my college entrance exam : ) , counting down to 214 days.
We can never have too much education, at any level. Instead of career wage-slaves, we should all be students, with jobs on the side. In other words, life-long learning. For many, time spent at university was the most rewarding. Imagine the freedom we would have if we could continue our formal education indefinitely. Our self-education, which is what the producer seems to be into, should always continue, and would if we were not overworked. Viva the Yellow Vests!
For my job, I work on construction projects to get them ready for contractors to be hired for the city. It's as you'd expect a full time job that prevents me from going back to school(I already have a degree so no worries on that). If we could live in a world where people continued to be in school but didn't just learn... also contributed to research and innovation... I'd be down for it. People should go to where they are needed the most or can contribute the most. I'll keep working to make society a better place and life-long students can help from their campuses :).
"we should all be students with jobs on the side." - great quote, I'm borrowing it.
I've graduated in the Netherlands and throughout my studies I even got paid ~500 euros a month by the government to study and free transportation until I'd finish my studies! Tuition fee was ~2000 euros per year and every University charges the same fee unless it's a private university. My boyfriend graduated in the US and he's saved a lot of money just by doing an exchange year in Germany. He regrets not doing his full program in Europe though. He has a huge debt back in the US. To anyone who's a US citizen looking into education options, I'd highly recommend looking into European universities!
Rather than solving the social issues students were protesting, they chose to trick them into being unable to protest and then act surprised when that caused further social issues
I’m 25 and starting college full time this fall at my local community college. Better late than never I guess!
Congratulations! And good luck :) wishing you all the best in your studies!!
good luck, Mr Hyde!
@10:30 "Criticism targeting higher education shouldn't come from people who only care about becoming the next richest man in the world."
- Let's not kid ourselves, making more money is why people go to college. Without that promise, they have nothing of value to offer. Libraries are free, books/literature are readily available, and people can socialize on their own time. The college system had its chance to self-correct for decades and they only raised tuition costs instead. Now that they can't hide it anymore, people are refusing to buy what they're selling. They're getting EXACTLY what they deserve.
This is honestly really interesting if you think about it. I honestly think college for some people is still about not making money and just to learn but for many people honestly it is about making money. BUT now with the whole internet thing its pretty clear that college isnt the only way to learn things if you want to learn and it isnt the only place to actually socialize. Right now the current stand up college has compared to other learning resources is costly tools (which is a another whole discussion).
You don’t need higher education to be knowledgable about a subject or competent at a job, but you might need it to be taken seriously by others
You need curriculums to even have some roadmap about something.
Yes, although many people who dropped out first were going to ivy league schools and that is impressive all by itself
Disclaimer: this was my personal experience in uni. Maybe your college experience was/is different, which I would love to hear and learn about too if you'd like to share
When I think back on the most impactful and valuable things I learned in uni, they were during required classes I would have never have chosen to take on my own, learning about ideas I wouldn't have had the interest or resources to really engage with. The structure and environment of uni forced me outside my own judgement of what is valuable and worth learning, and that led to significant growth for me personally. Outside of the more specific skills and knowledge I learned in uni, the experience of stepping outside my own value bubble is something that is important in life, at least in my opinion.
Also, I wholeheartedly believe that significant growth, intellectually and emotionally, requires active engagement with other people. In uni, I had classmates and professors who come from different backgrounds, who approach the subject in different ways than I do. Having the space to learn subjects with other people in uni is sooooo enriching, because others' pov often led me to examine my own pov and develop new ways of understanding them, myself and the subject.
I'm not saying this kind of intellectual and cultural diversity are exclusive to higher education. For me, uni simply gave me access to it. Higher education is not perfect by any means, but to me that's no reason to abandon it entirely.
Great video, Alice! This is really interesting topic and I'm enjoying the discussion from the video and the comments section as well :)
yes, i completely agree... i think active engagement in discussions is one of the fastest ways to reflecting your own thoughts and path. from my personal experience as well, college and uni is a great place for diverse discourse!
Couldn't agree more with you! As an academic, this topic resonates strongly with me. I like the way you frame it: university is not just about acquiring knowledge for yourself. You can, indeed, acquire that on your own (hence all the hype about self-help, the 'university of life', and patati patata [haha I absolutely loved the expression!]). That's why free speech and a free press are also so important, btw. But what university gives you is access to a particular way of acquiring and applying knowledge that makes you answerable to society; in other words, it makes you a 'professional'. Universities are gatekeepers to those professions (like the law, medicine, engineering, etc) that as a society we don't want to simply entrust to anyone because of the great risk of misuse of that knowledge. Of course, professionals also misbehave quite often, but that's why we have universities, professional associations, courts and similar institutions to keep an eye on them. Thanks again for sharing!
I honestly cannot agree more !
' Universities are gatekeepers to those professions (like the law, medicine, engineering, etc) that as a society we don't want to simply entrust to anyone because of the great risk of misuse of that knowledge. ' 😂 Literally translates to these professions are lucrative; hence we need to gatekeep and obscure them from the public in order to benefit from the masses suffering in all manner of ways. Nothing about going to a university makes one a professional either. One would hope your 'academia' syco phancy would have taught you to paraphrase your bias in a more discreet manner. Alas! that wasn't parroted at your particular archaic institute.
@@sevehrsevehr6001 lol I agree with you, I feel like their comment was just bs and elitist, like most academics 😵
some of the professions that are being gate kept should not be university courses AT ALL. In these professions the only way we learn to do them properly and safely is through experience in the fields. Therefore, they should all be apprenticeships or degree apprenticeships.
On the 'academic' side, we can't develop critical thinking because we have to learn and memorise ideas and mechanisms that are decades or centuries old, because not knowing these things could lead to us doing our jobs wrong in the future, and potentially hurting people. In med you have to know how the body works, treatments etc.. in law you learn the law and civil codes etc. you get the idea. With university, you literally are just entrusting these professions to just anyone - most of the people on these courses for the most part come from some sort of privelaged background, and or power. That's why so many of these type of professions have professionals who misbehave or have some kind of superiority complex, because they've been screened from these areas of society, through money and selection criteria and aptitude tests etc.
These professions also end up being extremely elitist and do not reflect the communities they serve.
Honestly, love this channel, the short format of videos and topics discussed, but sometimes they feel rushed. There are some topics that can be discussed like this, and others that can't. We are killing critical thinking, but university is also killing it, alongside those self help gurus. it is way too commodified under capitalism. just a disclaimer (I personally do believe going to uni and formal education is important. however, i don't believe that they're generally places that allow critical thinking. If they did, they would not exist as they would not be profitable).
@@caaaaats9890 degrees are obsolete periodt. Concord with the rest.
I feel that this video unnecessarily lumps everyone who doesn't go to college/uni into the same category. There are plenty of reasons why someone might not go, aside from being convinced by 'influencers'/influential people. I would know since I'm someone who doesn't plan to (at the moment).
It seems from what you've said here, that France is in a very different position from where I live, Hungary. So much so, that none of your points ring relevant to an everyday person here (or at least, I don't think your explanations and points in these topics are accurate) except maybe for the last one about elitism. I have encountered the idea all too many times that people expect you to go uni because you have good grades and you're clever. If people perceive you to be these things, then it's baffling to them if you choose differently. And not even just about uni, but long before that as well.
How things work around here is basically that, after you finish 8 years of elementary school, you must take entrance exams to either high school or vocational high school/technicum (more about these 2 terms later). Still, there's been a prejudice against going to a vocational high school. Since high schools providing better quality of learning are hard to get into (yes, there's a difference in the quality of learning, one can see it if you look at the average achievements of students throughout the country, there're also so-called 'collecting' schools, for students with bad grades who couldn’t get into any better schools, these tend to do the worst), lots of people go to vocational high schools instead. But there's also a large number of people who go to these kinds of schools because they care about the vocation, or they want that in combination with a regular education. I also go to a school like that, because of the latter point. Still, when I decided on the school, everyone was appalled, since I was a 'good student'. That was the first time. Now it's happening again with the whole college talk.
I'm now in my 4th year of vocational high school (out of 5), and I've been seriously thinking about what to do later. Despite going to this kind of school, I don't think I want to do the vocation I've chosen, but I don't know what I 'want to be'. I've always known that I didn't fit into the educational system, I've always had great difficulties, because classroom learning doesn't work for me (a.k.a. attending classes, then going home and having to study for tests, do homework and assignments, and repeating all this on weekdays). I prefer to simply do the work and tests alone, if it has to be done, without having to go to lessons. That is because I often feel that I don't get anything meaningful out of them. I don't like how sometimes, we even have as much as 9 lessons a day and only finish at around 4pm (this is just the mandatory lessons without extracurricular activities, and school starts at 7:30 am), then study after we get home. It makes me lose all motivation, to the point of not wanting to get out of bed. The worst part is, we have lessons where we don't even do a whole lot while we're there, but have to learn the material at home for the exams we'll have to take in the last year.
I feel that uni is slightly similar to this. Although you don't have to show up all the time, and not all classes are mandatory, you still have to attend classes sometimes. I'm not sure if those will provide enough value for me to feel like it's worth it. Besides, I don't even know what kind of job I want, so I don't know what course to take. People tell me I could just go to figure that out, but I don't think you should get into a 5-6 year commitment, which could potentially cost a fortune, in the case that I can't get a scholarship (I know myself enough that I'm almost sure I won't, unless I could muster any motivation for it), just for the vague hope of 'maybe I'll know what I want to do for a living if I'm there'.
At this point, I'm sure it looks like a typical problem people my age have, but it goes deeper, and a lot more Hungarian specific. You mentioned in this video that getting a degree should be about more than just acquiring knowledge and a paper, but about enriching your country. Still, this is a very privileged mindset. After all, wanting to get a better job and making more money isn't about greed for everyone, but about needing it to support yourself and your family. Not only that, but personally, I have all too many problems with this country. I could probably write an essay 5 times the size of this one about that, but I'll keep it to mostly this topic.
To begin with, Hungary seems like a very 'cheap' country to many tourists, but the reality is, that's because your currency probably has more value than our forint. As the years went by, it has been getting worse and worse, yet wages haven't been raised enough to account for that. I wish I could pull a percentage of the inflation that's happening to illustrate my point here, but sadly, the government hasn't released any and even if it did, it would just be a falsified one that doesn't reflect the reality of the situation (which is fairly normal here and people with common sense and any connections can see it). Still, generally, it's easy to see as a normal consumer who lives here, as it's basically month-by-month, and often on everyday products like food.
Here, you might think, 'that has nothing to do with higher education' and I guess you'd be mostly right. I only wanted to give a taste of what's happening here. It’s hard to get by, which puts pressure on people. But there’re of course more education and work-related issues as well.
It’d be awfully long if I went into specifics, but the government has been changing too many things. It changes the high school system constantly, in fact, the classes who are a year below us go by a completely different system, and the curriculum is different than it was for us at that time too. Same for the current graduates and the graduates before them as well. It’s nearly impossible to navigate. On top of that, many trainings, uni courses, etc. have been changed or entirely dismissed recently as well, so once again, no one really knows what’s happening.
Similarly, working rights and conditions are also being changed by the government, making people quit their jobs (even as essential as surgeons!). This of course, opens up possibilities for many, and yet, most don’t want to take them for the exact same reason as those who quit.
Overall, I don’t feel that this country deserves people pursuing higher education with the mentality of ‘it’s worth doing to enrich the country as well’, especially because no influential people, or even the government, views it that way. People are caught up with their own money problems only, not having the time or energy to care about others, which is understandable, since no one cares about them either. Therefore, I don’t see this point, along with most made in this video, as applicable to Hungary, or other countries in similar positions.
If you made it this far, props to you, random person reading the comments! Hope you have a nice day! :)
Thank you for taking the time to write such a complete comment!
I understand where you come from and I do share some of your points. Actually, today I was talking with a friend about how good students are pushed to higher education and aren't offered the option of technical education. I'm studying right now for a technical degree because I wasn't able to find a job (I'm from Spain, with 38% of unemployed youth). In Spain, we have a huge problem right now with people who have higher education but are unable to find a job, so they have to come back to study for more technical degrees or just taking "low-qualified" jobs (sorry for using this term, I don't know which one would be better to use). How is the situation in Hungary? Do you have more employment opportunities with higher education or with a more technical one? I'm sorry if I missed something you already said, but I'm curious about the situation there. In this kind of conversations about higher education, I miss the opinion of people from countries like ours, that have particular social-economical contexts.
Just commenting so more people can read this
That's the USA too
The third part reminded me a bit of that infamous Jubilee video on intelligence. I think now more than ever, people are noticing that having advanced degrees doesn't necessarily mean an individual has a higher-than-average level of intelligence, and that it's possible to find a meaningful, fulfilling life outside of the realm of academia.
I find it funny that these upper class/rich people born into upper class/rich families are telling us not to go to college and what we should do for a successful life. They didn’t need to go to college. They had all the opportunity to start up their own company when they had a fail safe. It’s required to have a college degree for a lot of jobs. I’m sure college is beneficial for other reasons, but I haven’t been to college yet.
I’ll also have to look into Ronald Reagan because I currently don’t know anything about him,other than him being president.
Ronald Reagan is the antichrist
Exactly! People who tell strangers online "Lol you don't need a college degree to become successful." Scream privilege to me. Gender, racial, and *especially* economic privilege. Like, no Jason, YOU didn't need a college degree, because your daddy let you take over your huge family business with no knowledge in the subject, you have a trust fund, and you went to a private school. Not all of us have that. If we went to an interview, asking for a certain office job with no degree, they'd laugh at you for feeling "entitled" for even thinking that was a possibility, even though you're just going by what you've been told. It leaves young and impressionable people this false idea that education is bad, or them not being able to afford college is fine, and it perhaps may keep people from not protesting against these institutions who keep college tuition unaffordable. Maybe.
@@mynameisreallycool1 Agreed. The thing that can't be said enough is you basically get a degree in advance prior to promoting to a job that uses it. It takes 3-4 years to get one and you have to be working on it as soon as you can. You can't just tell the interview panel "I'll get the degree in 3-4 years" when the job itself requires the degree upon being hired.
Can you imagine if your dentist get their "degree" from Skillshare? Or maybe your therapist get their "degree" from online coach that charge them hundred(s) of dollar for 3 hours zoom meeting? 😂
😂😂
What is ridiculous is that you believe that a degree is a pivotal point in becoming adept at ones vocation. Truly worth laughing at. What a close minded and entitled manner of thinking. Even after obtaining these so called degrees medical practitioners aren't ever let loose on the general public but rather complete apprenticeships of sorts for many years before becoming consultants in their chosen field. So yes a person who has obtained their knowledge of a subject even medicine online and completed exams and their apprenticeship period is as able and competent as someone who has gone through a university course. It'a funny how Alice makes videos on inclusion to stay relevant yet mocks the methods that underprivileged and bright people may pursue to bridge the gap. A degree is just a label ;one that has little correlation to capability or excellence.
@@sevehrsevehr6001 Agree completely. Some of these comments are so unaware that not everyone has the same access to equal education opportunities
@@0Rachizzle0 A lot of the commenters are a hive of privileged people from a certain demographic. What's more performative for me is alice. I have been watching her videos as of late and i truly feel she is reaching. Has made videos on poc without real insight covering such topics. This video was highly biased given she is an attendee of such an institution. Its just a justification for her own choice. I am truly glad we live in a world where anyone can attain education in any topic regardless of background. Do not have to go through the toxic and abusive playground that is universities. It's sad that brainwashed people like this exist who believe in paying for 'education', going into substantial debt for 'education'. When you should be paid for your time and energy in any worthwhile institute.
@@sevehrsevehr6001 understand what you are arguing. But I don’t think the original comment has to do with the scenarios you are arguing tho. I think you are talking about online college and university. The original comment is talking about general online media platforms like Skillshare or RUclips which are very different from certified online programs that offer degrees in professional fields in this given situation. Not that what you said wasn’t important, I think your argument about online degrees make lots of sense and you’ve pinpointed some of the critical problems
Even though Elon claims that a college degree isnt necessary, I'm pretty positive you wont get through the Tesla interviews without one.
how does it always track back to ronald reagan?? it's almost impressive how much damage his administration caused
I think that it’s simply too expensive for most American parents to send their children to college for the purpose of “learning how to think.” I mean, if college here was more affordable, then I would completely agree with most everything you said. But to gloss over that one very important and most relevant point, that it’s so expensive, is strange to me.
You're right! The situation in the USA and in most European countries is completely different in terms of higher education. It's understandable that in the USA you would try to study more "useful" degrees in order to get a job because it's a huge investment. In France higher education is quite inexpensive (I have family there and it's ridiculously cheap compared with Spain, where I am from) so it's more affordable to just study what you really want to. It sucks that in the USA higher education is regarded as a "luxury"... :(
People forget that there are other forms of higher education. What about trade schools or community colleges?
I also question this notion that we "learn how to think" in college. I'm pretty sure none of these people (that I know) who went to University "learned how to think". They "learned" how to be great at college but that isn't the same as learning how to think. Learning how to take tests and write term papers should not to be confused for "Thinking". Most of us "learn how to think" from our parents and public schools at an early age.
It’s pretty sad that the US is not more interested of the education of its population :((
@@awwtergirl7040 I think most people learn a lot from reading and writing scientific articles. Sure it’s done sometimes when you’re younger as well, but mostly in college/uni. I think it’s very valuable to learn how to build a thesis
I think self learning and going to the educational institutes are both equally valid means of learning, but we, as students must be aware both come with their OWN flaws. Colleges and other institutions are at the end of the, filled with propaganda and an agenda to have their students fit a very specific mold that a socially responsible and useful individual in modern society requires. However, with the free to learn means, like RUclips, we must be aware that crowdsourced information is often coming from imperfect sources, like students or totally unqualified people (and that doesn't remove their validity as teachers of a kind, but we must be critical in how readily we can accept information that comes from youtube or not) and it becomes a personal responsibility to ensure that no matter where you are, you ensure your filters are appropriate enough to let the "nonsense" be left out while we continue to absorb useful information and gain knowledge as we grow. Also make education cheaper and a lot of these probelms get solved. I understand that isn't easy, especially as populations grow and these colleges and whatnot were made to deal with populations of people from the 1800s and whatnot. Fixing the economic and political problems that haunt the education system is important. Also a little more exploration of the topic of how the education system is still majorly tailored the way early industrial revolution era British schools were made- while not literally sorting people into academic or vocational lines of education and work, the system does fail to accomodate people who fall somewhere in the middle of the two. As a future self published comic book creator, I need to learn how to be a "businessman" while also learning the vocational skill of drawing, inking and coloring and the many other processes needed to publish my art. It's a more complex world, and the education system enjoys ignoring the complexity, imo.
You can debate until you're blue in the face which society ultimately benefits more from, but opening a business vs. exploring new ideas via higher education are both reasonable, non-mutually exclusive paths. The college-dropout investors and entrepreneurs are a pushback phenomenon of university education (usually in non-STEM fields) not necessarily leading to financial independence. At the end of the day, it's hard to explore your interests when you're worried about your bottom line, and I don't think you give this point its due emphasis. I think you would be more resentful about majoring in English Studies if you considered your financial situation unstable. Also, I feel you unfairly condemn the pursuit of your own financial interests if you prefer to drop out of/skip uni to start a business or invest. Nevertheless, I appreciate you taking a stand for higher education against self-help gurus who routinely demonize it. Not sure about your choice of certain people in the thumbnail though.
I come from a developed country and education helps me to get out of the poverty line. My family is classified under low-income so I didn’t have much opportunity outside of education. So when I received offers for college education, of course I took the opportunity. I don’t think I’d be anywhere if I rejected that offer. I was also in BA English and it helps me with my proficiency in expressing myself. I think our uni implemented both critical thinking and entrepreneurial skill in our syllabus, so it’s not all a waste of time as tertiary education becomes more aware of the need of the industry. Since people would often say people have to pay the bills etc as their main argument, I think it feels like a defense against people who’re seeking more than being money-making businesses but for their own personal growth as an individual. Although, education in my country is relatively cheaper but there are a huge number of people who still can’t afford one. I didn’t have much issues after finishing college either because most of my classmates received plenty of offers to work in different corporate companies and so… yeah it depends on how you use your course to enhance your profile I think, well at least from my pov.
I was having a tough time lately, I've been valuing my self worth on my individual academic accomplishments for far too long, and as a result it's left me frustrated and doubting whatever impact I could ever make in the world with or without a degree.
Your channel could not be recommended to me at a best time, and I'm so grateful for the content you make. You remind me why I love learning so much, and that it is not the individual gain I could get from this that matters, but that we form ourselves as to progress collectively in a more thoughtful way.
From the bottom of my heart, thank you Alice !
I had to drop out of uni out of necessity and started studying a practical career instead. It's artistic which is nice, but I also feel a safety and comfort in knowing I have a pretty straight forward path ahead of me. I know I will find a job within months of graduating. I don't think I would have gotten this feeling of security had I finished studying uni. I still love learning and do a lot of it on my own. And I kind of enjoy learning more now than I did in uni. Still I can't shake the feeling off that I should go back and finish my degree. I want to do it eventually, but part of me wonders if it's just because of the "prestige" of having a degree or to please my parents. It's a shame that I couldn't continue studying because of money, and maybe I even stopped enjoying learning because in the back of my head I was always thinking about how much it was costing my family. However, I don't know that I will enjoy this practical career I've chosen forever, there's a lot of other things I'd like to explore and I think uni really allows for that flexibility even if it comes with uncertainty. At the end of the day, as long I can provide for myself and give back to my family and enjoy life a bit, I'll be happy, degree or not.
Rien à ajouter ! Tu as parfaitement résumer ce que je pense :)
The more people are now educated (especially girls in the developing world) : the more the country is growing, healthier, richer and open to socio economic change.
Merci 😊
These self help gurus don't express themselves right, they should say : you don't NEED a degree to become an entrepreneur because no school will teach you that as good as trying yourself ! (also when it costs the huge $100k PPP is most countries)
I don't think they would say you don't need a degree to be a doctor, a lawyer, a train driver. Also you don't ALWAYS need a degree to prove your skills, some jobs require more real world skills than what you learn in school.
There is a misunderstanding here ...
I believe that in most cases limited critical thinking is just connected to being a neurotypical human person. Wheter we like it or not most people live in some kind of delusion and denial, it's what keeps people sane. Metacognition for example can be extremely exhausting.
Well I learned a new word today, thanks!
Something that often gets left out of this conversation is the ablism of the way we view college. In a world that values “pulling yourself up by your bootstraps” (more so in the US but I’m sure there’s some of this in other countries as well) it is ignored that educational institutions were designed for the most neuro typical person while everyone else has to scramble to catch up. Yes, there are amenities. But as a learning disabled person, I can confirm that the amenities I’ve been offered have done very little for me. If we viewed education more as an opportunity to grow your mind as opposed to a symbol of merit, that would leave more room for everyone to learn in whatever way makes most sense for them.
From my perspective college does not teach individuals to critically think or to think for themselves. They just want to make sure you understand the professors interpretations of events, history, philosophy, etc. They do not truly truly force students to think critically.
The statement above is mainly speaking about undergraduate students.
**I do not know about grad school students/professors yet.
Reading is a great way to encourage people to critically think because you are constantly being exposed to different perspectives. Let me know if anyone disagrees
We're having the same problem here in Brazil with our unis. Nowadays is SO HARD to get in that only the rich ones that can prepare themselfs for the test have a chance to enter. With all this, private universities are now fulled with low classe students that pay for YEARS for some education and the public ones have only rich kids.
It was your critical thinking slide (9:52) that made me realize how impactful it was when I switched my degree from Human Resources to Sociology. It's true, my human resources taught me more how to do a job vs question and interpret the world around me like Sociology did. Surprisingly, the part I most related to with this video (and there were many) was "and read, and read, and read, and I was so happy". It's been about 3 years since I graduated university, and I forgot how much I missed learning by reading. Its funny because now thats translated into watching your videos which tend to problematize different social phenomena and list sources (much like the essays we used to write and read). Thank you for posting these videos! I couldn't help but start taking notes :) lol
So Mr Reagan really did students dirty huh
I think he did everyone dirty... I don't like to speak ill of the dead. But F that guy.
No kidding.
@@v.958 he has so much blood on his hands that saying bad things about him is a moral imperative.
Ronald Reagan is one of the most evil people to exist in modern history in my opinion.
@Tyler H If you knew his policies and what he did, you wouldn't be saying this. Maybe his policies didn't negatively affect your community so you don't care.
Ah yes.... I have to say that the only reason why i got my masters was so i can get paid better. Money is a valid motivation, but it shouldn't become the only reason why anyone studies. I am also thinking about getting a PhD just because i am in the academic field, and it'll pay me more (but only a bit more, i don't really think the potential payment is actually worth 5 years of my life where i will only breathe one topic and one topic alone, and the streess attatched to it is just too much).
But also... i am in a stem field and i was privileged enough for my parents to pay for all my education and not owe a single cent to anyone. That obviously isn't the case for the majosrity of people where i'm from (Colombia), who are right now protesting for a better life and even a chance to study in a public university in the first place.
Not only does turning education into a commodity make it harder for poor people to get one, it also hurts the quality of the education itself. Most people's mindset toward education today is that it's a series of hoops to be jumped through to prove your merit to future employers through your grades. Most of my classmates want to learn and think the absolute minimum they can while keeping their grades up.
Uhm, IMO, university really doesn’t teach critical thinking unless you’re in the Humanities faculty but generally university just teaches you to be a reflector of another man’s thoughts. Also, there’s a reason why you’re only allowed to share your own ideas at Masters level, when your thinking is already conditioned to perceive ideas in a certain way.
I see what you mean but I don't really agree, I feel like at uni you face different professors with different theories and different ways to approach your field of study. Biases are inevitable and I always prefer when teachers state them right away but yeah, I still believe that uni opens the door to the world of research, its methodology, etc whatever the subject you're studying and that even if a teacher keeps on focusing on that one theory they're obsessed with well now you can check by yourself with the same tools he uses. You can check what other researchers say about those theories because you understand the vocabulary and the concepts and then decide on what you want to believe or not. There's no better feeling than challenging a professor's biases (in a respectful way of course!)
that wasn't really my experience. We were encouraged to share our own ideas pretty much from day one in the BA course, not just reflect on others' thoughts... I suppose it may vary from uni to uni, possibly also from subject to subject (I studied theology and comparative literature).
@@AliceCappelle So I did a rather risky experiment for myself; I am doing my final year of undergrad in Business Economics and so I used a 1st year textbook (not the prescribed textbook) for a research assignment which I got an A+. But from all of that I just got that the main idea of concepts come from “one person” which is my big problem. I don’t think that’s progressive in an educational sense because there’s learning from that one idea and little different opinions here and there. I can’t oppose an idea at undergraduate level, why?
@@peaceblossom8 guess it differs from faculty to faculty but I know with commercial degrees you have to reference from scholarly articles or books etc for assignments. “In your own words” has to be backed up by some scholarly source.
@@_Palesa_M well, obviously we had to do that too! If you don't reference anything it's not actually research. However we were always encouraged to engage critically with the material, point out where we saw shortcomings in arguments etc. instead of just repeating what someone else said.
I've had a complicated relationship with education, to some extent it was because I was always very insecure about my form or lack of intelligence. Since I found out about my autism not long ago, things made much more sense to me and I started to wonder if I wasn't evading the opportunities for academic growth because I never imagined there was space for me there (or anywhere). I have changed my degree after my first year of university, and I'm now very happy with what I'm studying...though I must admit, I still feel inadequate a lot of the time. But I am hoping that the more we talk about this and the more open-minded we become, eventually no kind of intelligence, or background, will be excluded.
Also, thank you for your videos Alice, you've inspired me to branch out a bit more with my own channel :) It's been a long and tiring process for me, but I'm now slowly beginning to steer it in broader directions, hoping it will figure itself out, and your channel is one of those that motivated me to do it, since I find your content very insightful.
Wow! That's awesome! I hope you do go through with making a channel.
@@thegardener3650 Thanks, though I've actually been publishing videos on my channel for ten months now :p
For me a degree isn't always about me but also to open opportunity to my people to get higher education.
I think getting an education is a wonderful opportunity for plenty of people. But I also think it's a good thing that those who - for whatever reason - missed out on that opportunity, still have some chance of bettering their knowledge or skillset by learning through other means (say, courses), and then companies and/or individuals still giving them a chance to contribute/work/etc despite not having a "classical" degree. As for critical thinking, higher education surely cannot be the only path to acquire such an ability?
I'm going to unload my biases and personal experiences here as a middle class American who grew up in their public schools and went to a normal public university.
As far as I understand it, the exponentially rising costs of Education are the byproduct of the 26th Amendment. Politicians were looking for a way to appeal to an 18 year old voting block, and college loans were the way. Banks accepted because the government would pay if the young adult wouldn't, and colleges realized they could increase the pay and get more profit.
This began what is currently an arms race towards attracting students, because student attendance meant student cash. Pools, gyms, food halls and sport stadiums, anything to appeal to students. Colleges became more about partying than about learning, and now they're very, very expensive.
From what I've heard from the experiences of grad students, it's rough. Mounting debt to pursue higher education, little job market to enter into, and being worked excessively by their university in exchange for maybe being noticed by a professor or maybe being able to do interesting research. Meanwhile, budgets are thrown into attracting the next wave of students, as well as supporting a bulk of administrators and marketers that aren't really needed. It's all an unnecessarily inflated bureaucratic mess.
On top of that, Professors have to deal with a massive influx of students, many of which care only for college as a commodity and many of which are just there to have fun in their early 20's but pretend like they're entering adulthood, and then also have to juggle university politics and budget concerns with their own private research, and professors that are taken on by merit may not be able to teach as well as they can solve problems and do what the colleges consider as research.
So, as an American interested in education for knowledge's sake, rather than as a commodity, I am paying thousands on thousands of dollars for the chance to get into a course taught by one of possibly a few different faculty. I then have to pay hundreds to obtain a textbook, and then gamble as to whether or not the professor is qualified in their subject, has interesting things to contribute beyond the textbook, and whether they can teach well or if they're interested in teaching at all, versus taking a professor position for research purposes and/or prestige. I am then forced through a series of possibly poorly designed assignments and discussions which are limply and passively carried by the student body (most of which aren't there for the learning itself). The professor, good or not, will not have time to truly answer my questions or discuss inquiries due to the juggling act colleges require them to do, and I will be left to Google most of it anyhow.
The internet is free. You can access a lot of texts for free if you know where to look. The communities collected around these bodies of information are passionate and active discussers of it, and they're operational 24/7. And the journals produced by colleges on various subjects are loaded with difficult to understand jargon, are made to appease whatever funded said research (possibly damaging the integrity of the research itself), and are usually pay-per-view at steep prices.
I've personally seen many in education who pursue it outside of its commodity use trampled by the colleges themselves. As an American, in my personal experience, college isn't worth it to learn. It's bloated, it's corrupt, and they don't care about education.
Amen
I had to watch the video a few times to make sure that I understood your point of view correctly and to ensure that what I am about to say is as least biased as possible.
However, I felt that the overall tone of this video looks down upon self-starters or even deem them incapable of critical thinking, which I must say felt quite condescending.
While I fully agree that higher education and research are essential elements, they are not the only elements that are required in advancing a country. If everyone were taught to take the same process of critical thinking, the results would most likely be monotonous with little variations.
The world does need people who are capable of independent thinking and come up with novel ideas that challenge the dogma in order for innovation to occur.
Ideally, everyone SHOULD be able to participate in higher education, but we must also take into account that life is often far messier and more demanding in reality.
As you have rightly mentioned, the commodification of higher education has limited its accessibility to many people who could not afford it. And to these people, they have 2 options: keep lamenting the unfairness of life and make nothing of themselves. OR start something for themselves because otherwise, they would starve to death.
I cannot speak for the rest of us, but I would argue that the people who opted for the second option would be far more valuable members of society than the people who chose the first option. This is because by deciding to provide value for others, they would are far more likely to be able to sustain themselves and not weigh down the rest of society.
Unfortunately, in the current economic situation, even people with higher education and degrees are not guaranteed to get a job. With the large influx of degree-holders coming into the workforce, the supply for talented workers seems to greatly outweigh the need. Therefore, the only other differentiator would be grit, determination, and willingness to learn.
TL;DR just because there are people who decided to become self-starters, does not mean that they are incapable of critical thinking, maybe they simply do not have the luxury to afford it. More often, they are more beneficial to society than those who rely on others to support them without even trying in the first place.
all of this 👌
What a fantastic video! I think it's really sad (and so important) that you have to point out what should be obvious...here in Brasil we also have free public universities. Their numbers have increased considerably during the decade we had a left wing government, and they are mostly considered to be better than private universities. The right-wing politics who advocate for the end of free higher education consistently use the "education is an investment the individual makes on their own future, so the state should not pay for it" speech. I didn't know about the way universities used to be in the U.S. and the whole Regan thing, so I found it very scary, cause it looks a lot like the kind of strategies that are starting to show up around here - though, unfortunately we have even bigger problems going on right now...thanks for the video, Alice. It's always great to hear from you.
Thank you !!
I’m graduating from grad school this summer, and if I could go back in time I would have probably have never gone to school to begin with. In fact, I think it’s more important to to build your skill set and to find something that you are good at and sticking to it.
but if you never went to school to begin with you wouldn't have this insight, and instead may have had regrets about not going to school. It's impossible to tell which path would have ultimately been better. All one can do is try to make the best of their current situation...
But I feel like without a college degree background, a lot of people would be missing out. Even the networking possibilities alone is worth something.
You have a point on work experience contributing to finding yourself. People say they just want a job based on their talent or experiences. I argue that actual work experience is a good perspective to use for yourself. Less theoretical and more experimental/relevant experiences.
@@kockarthur7976 You're assuming that he would NOT have come to this same insight without his education. How do you know that?
me and the bois, touring cafes and building a time machine to go have a word with Mr Reagan.
Seriously though, great vid. It's a shame higher education is in such an awful place right now. Would love to hear your thoughts on potential improvements!
😂😂
As a University of California graduate with a good amount of debt, send the invite over once you have the time machine up and running. I love dialogue.
8:52 similar sentiment is quite common nowadays in my country, Malaysia. Some people online have been promoting their 'I did not go to university but I managed to make million bucks from doing business' story and it's worrying to see people sidelining the importance of education in life. They only see money as the only way to get out of poverty, when indeed, education is the best way. not money. anyways , great video, Alice :)
Money helps you pay out now. You can always get education later.
i love how you take the conversation from this crazy individualistic view that is becoming more and more prevalent to the need to create a more collective consciousness. honestly i hope more people would understand that because I feel it is one of the keys to a better global wellbeing. And I love specially how you put it in this video with something so key as education, which is essential for any revolution or societal change. Your channel in general I think portraits a great picture of the current world with an amazing critical view so congratulations, honestly❤️❤️
I find it interesting that many of the gurus denouncing the value of college sell their own knowledge based course
I dropped out of college and I've been doing perfectly fine.
For some that works and for others having a college education is what's best.
Good for you. That doesn't mean that people who go to college don't play an important part in society.
@@starchannel123 Did I say that? No
@@starchannel123 nobody said that.
There's a logical fallacy in there. Those are not the only options. The opposite of higher education isn't self help and neither Peter Theil nor Elon Musk are self help gurus. The organisations they run have changed their hiring criteria to reflect their opinions on the modern education situation.
Yeah, this video is a load of bull
In Denmark it's free and you get money to live for while studying. I only recently learned the term student debt and feel really sorry for US citizens.
Not gonna lie, I do feel a bit trapped in university, even in a "creative" program that is supposed to encourage experimentation, inovation and originality of concepts. That's not how they responded to me when I did came up with an original "outside the box" concept. I realized that what they were really expecting of me was to repeat the same type of project that had been done for the last 20 years... It took me a year to figure out my own idea because every time I'd try to talk about it with my project teacher, it would end up in him trying to convince me to just stick to what I've been tought. But there's hope guys, after 8 months of struggle, he finally listened and understood what I was trying to create and is now encouraging and helping me with my idea. I do have to wait for the professors' approval before I move on with my project, but It's worth trying.
I guess what I'm saying is if you feel like your program or your teachers are limiting you, or imposing their views on you, have that conversation with them. Write a letter to your head of department if necessary. They are humans, they can listen, and if they don't, talk about it with other students. Universities fear being obsolete, if enough students show them that they are, they will move.
I can relate to this video a lot! I got accepted to a very good uni in the UK, but as I couldn't afford it I stayed in my country as we have free higher education (Poland!) fortunately, I fell in love with the degrees I'm doing and thanks to them, I've grown so much, so quickly! Not only I can attend many amazing classes but also I have access to other resources such as academic libraries or online pages with academic papers... god bless the free education
You don't need a college degree statement is true but it requires context, if you want to become a engineer, doctor, lawyer, etc, you need a degree and you cannot get a good job without it, but the Arts degrees like psychology, liberal arts, gender studies, etc( mostly in the USA) costs thousands of dollars and puts people in degt and wont give you good job unless you are very good or go into teaching these subjects. So instead of wasting money such degrees just work, get a unpaid internship, and rise up. ALWAYS CONTEXT IS KEY. If you want to know about the useless degrees then do your research.
I’m in love with your channel, it’s just so eye opening and so interesting. I really liked the part where you talked about the French education system. I’m also French myself and your explanation was on point. I’m 17, and I have to chose a school for next year but because of the “prestige mindset” the schools that I want to go to are really selective. It’s like student have this constant pressure to compete with each other if they want to study in a good school.
I was giving up on RUclips and then I found this channel, thank you!
That's super sweet 😊
She’s definitely one of my favorite channels!
"If you want to get laid go to college. If you want an education go to a library."
- Frank Zappa
I am on my first year of college and I am totally changed, I knew college was supposed to be more than getting prepared for the working system, but certainly, since I started I have been thinking ab this, ab how the make me cultivate myself in order to follow my thoughts thank u for sharing this:)
I'm still reeling from learning that my school determined which labs would be in-person during COVID based on machinery contracts the school needed to fulfill, and not on the skills students needed to learn in person.
Elon Musk: Hey fellow kids I just finished a massive blunt, you know you don't need a degree just buy my stocks!
Muskrats: gleeful screeching
(Why do these people who went to college and benefited so much from them say we don't need them? Interesting)
Why don't we see elon musks in the millions who went to these same colleges lol
It seems to be a thing of social engineering that some people dont want everyone educated.
Musk is the perfect archetype of capitalism ready to draw in incels to support it
@@agstinacueva1673 you aren’t even using incel right.
@@sevehrsevehr6001 You do though. Bezos has an engineering degree, Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, Jack Ma, all went to university. Many did end up dropping out after receiving opportunities, bit you can't say that their knowledge and experience in University wasn't a factor in opening door's for them. Additionally, Jeff Simmons has a PhD in Mathematics and made billions in the stock market. If you look at the list of the richest people in the world you will find they all went to expensive private schools or universities. Even the ones that dropped out already had found a job that would eventually be making them a lot of money.
Where are all the billionaires who came from underprivileged homes that dropped out of HS??
I'm thankful to the algorithm (for once) to see this. My experience with high education is much more grim than this.
I come from Serbia, maybe it's because we're an ex-socialist country, but even within academia "It matters what you discover" is overshadowed by "Michel Foucault isn't a real philosopher" (if you study philosophy) or "There's nothing we can learn from Marx" (if you study economics) etc. And these statements come from professors. The academia is still akin to a religious sect when it comes to the open-mindedness.
I think the way subjects are taught has a big impact on how we view them. Everyone knows that with maths in particular, it seems very arbitrary and pointless for those who are forced to take it past basics, and for most, extremely difficult. And yet, we’re always told that we’ll use maths everyday, and we need it for problem solving and analytical ability, whilst the magical formulas on the sheet we barely recognise say otherwise. If they just taught us the actual _maths_ behind stuff and applied it to realer examples in life, people may understand it better, and enjoy it better and persevere with it more. I know myself that my grade went from a C to an A when I taught myself the actual maths behind what we were learning, instead of just having to memorise a formula and hazard a guess at the problem solving questions.
I understand (and kinda idealize) the concept of universities as places where people were exposed to different knowledge that basically helped our minds flourish.
Sadly, at least in Latin America, public institutions have been turned into merely skilled worker factories.
even though I’m someone that won’t be attending university, I completely agree with you. Honestly, I’m constantly appalled by the anti-intellectualism and disregard of data of my peers, even those that attend/attended university.
I can say that college definitely sharpened my critical thinking skills. I majored in history and it forced me to be far more rigorous in my analysis and argumentation. I also took some philosophy courses and they were very valuable as they required you to really think deeply about issues, and poorly constructed arguments lacking logic and rigor just didn't cut it. It's all about critical thinking.
In Argentina education is free and I'm so proud of that. I went to a private school because that was my mom's decision but I chose public university for me. I don't see myself paying to get education ever again and I LOVE THAT ❤️
Edit: I feel like I've had the same thoughts for a few years but never quite managed to put them into words. You said it perfectly! 🙌🏼
I'd say it's either or.....after highschool i automatically just went into the workforce for experience through connections(not rich ones I'm the furthest from it) . If anyone skips college....you better know how to network well....if not I recommend college.
College felt like an enormous waste of time for me.
I last two semesters.
How did it feel for you?
Yeah, me too. For me, it WAS a complete waste of time. Didn't even finish my 1st year.
I am from India and will finish high school in the spring of next year. These days I have been looking into colleges and stuff, and boy oh boy, what disappointments every step of the way.
Since childhood, my parents (both from middle class backgrounds) have told me that higher education is the only way people from our background can better their lives. We don't have a lot of money or connections, so study very very hard because education is the only thing we have. So I always thought of college as this romantic place, where you can study whatever you like, spend hours in the library and have interesting discussions with other intellectuals all the time and come up with new ideas blah blah blah. At least these were the stories my parents told me.
But over the past few months I have discovered, it's only if your degree reap a profit does all of that matter. I want to study economic history but expect my mum and dad, literally every one else has told me in no uncertain terms that I will never be able to be 'successful' or 'settle well' with that degree.
And I don't really blame the people for thinking that way too. I get it. Going to college is a huge investment. Studying in any of the more prestigious colleges in the country is hella expensive. Government higher education infrastructure is crumbling all around us and private institutions will leave you with a huge debt by the time you graduate. Admission is becoming more and more selective day by day- the cut off marks in good colleges hover around 98% - 99% each year. Then there are issues of accommodation- most colleges only offer hostel facilities to the students with highest marks.
Seeing all of this is disheartening but it hasn't convinced me to change my plans- yet. I feel that I am gonna do whatever I want, everything else can go to hell, but I know it's going to be extremely difficult. I am prepared for it I think. I can still afford to dream but I know many who can't.
Sometimes I wonder, what is the point of our higher education Institutions? To give education to whoever wants it or to give it only to the best of the best and the most affluent?
Higher education and knowledge in general was never free. It was only ever meant to be in the hands of a few, its because of this that so many people view college as a waste of time. No matter how smart you are or what degree you have, you can not change your circumstances. The poor will stay poor and the rich will stay rich. So instead of learning in the hopes of making it to that dream home you have pinned up to your wall, might I suggest you live your life to the fullest and learn what you enjoy. Make yourself happy because no one else ever will.
In europe, universities focus more on education and research is mostly done by research institutions. This separation will improve the quality of education in the US.