Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

Most people in America still see college as fun first and education second. At least education is in the top two.

Here is an article about the slow pace of adoption of online learning in colleges. The technology is here and has been here for years. Still, most colleges don’t go online.

And, most college students in America don’t go online.

Instead, they attend the brick and mortar schools. That is what they want. They could stay at home in their bedrooms and learn online.

And, most college students in America could earn a college degree in three years.

They instead take four, five, or six years to do so. Logical and practical thinkers like myself have to ask,

Why?

Kids want to have fun. Wow! That is a radical thought (not).

Face it folks, college is fun. A few thousand kids your own age, lots of recreational facilities, weekends, no working hours. Why would you want to shorten this or learn at home?

There are exceptions. There are kids who need a degree to find a job and they don’t have the luxury of delaying that job one day. They simply need the money. They scramble, take every online course they can, educate themselves 12 months a year instead of eight or nine, and finish sooner.

There are kids who work full-time jobs and graduate in four years. How is it that someone can work 40 hours and still take the same course load with the same grades as someone who works zero hours? Oh well, I guess motivation and determination and discipline and those dirty words have a role.

The majority of American kids are rich (sorry for that one as I know it disagrees with government figures that say that there are only few rich people). These rich kids can afford to stretch their college years by  a 33% or 66% (those are the numbers for when a three-year college experience becomes four and five years). To me, that is the definition of rich.

Rich kids like the fun of college. College is fun with some education. At least education is in the mix.