Is Higher Education Worth the Price?

When someone hears the term “higher education”, the first thought that comes to mind tends to be college, of course. College has always been thought of as the one-way ticket to a high salary occupation. The reality of the situation is that while that may be true in some cases, it’s not as easy as it seems to receive that ticket aka the Bachelor’s degree. College tuition is a large amount and it’s even more expensive to attend college only to drop out. This leaves the student with no degree and vast amounts of debt. That debt is averaging 20,000 dollars for four years of schooling. Higher education is beneficial for anyone with the dedication to attending and knowing what they are striving for with while doing so. But the question: Is Higher Education Worth the Price?

One of the biggest reasons students attend college is for the chance to get a better job once us, the students graduate. No student wants to work out of high school as a truck driver or fast food employee for the rest of their lives. People want to pursue a job that they enjoy and won’t get sick of after 5 years. Over the past couple of years, the educational standard for certain job positions has risen and isn’t given out to high school graduates as much as it used to. Nowadays, the standard to receive a job is to carry a bachelor’s degree which you can get by going to college. So, going to college has a huge impact on what job you get and if it will be a good college or university you would be admitted to. 

There are many benefits that a college degree can provide a person, but it is widely known what the most sought after benefit is. Money. The one main thing when thinking about this issue. Money is what makes the world move and almost everyone on this planet spends a huge majority of their lives working hard to make themselves financially secure. However, the amount of money that every individual makes depends on the type of work that they have. Not all occupations make the same salary, and jobs that give a larger payout are only available to those that have the proper skills to handle them. These skills are earned through college degrees and the like. The longer a person spends in college working towards a desired degree, the better the job opportunities that will eventually become available. 

In the article “Are Colleges Worth the Price of Admission?”, authors Andrew Hacker and Claudia Dreifus mentions that whether or not you go to a public or private institution, the cost of attending college has doubled, compared to when our parents and every other generation before us went to college. Hacker and Dreifus made some very good points including when mentioning how schools should engage the students more and use their minds. They should become “caring, and attentive to every corner of their classrooms” and “more thoughtful and interesting people.” (Hacker and Dreifus 180). It’s important to know that what we think of things we see not just in classes but in the real world. Some may think the same, others may think differently but that’s what makes us all creative, unique and different. 

To conclude, for the past half a century, education has always been defined as the key to success. Many parents preach to their children that statement and the world is their oyster and in the documentary “Ivory Tower” directed by filmmaker Andrew Rossi, Rossi puts it into question. The documentary starts on move-in day in the nation’s oldest institution for higher learning and one of the historic universities in the U.S., Harvard University. Hundreds of new students and their parents. After watching the documentary as part of the audience, I learned a lot about the realistic possibilities of becoming debtors for students after college and the costs of post-secondary institutions. The takeaways from it are the cause that led to exploding tuition costs and the massive total student loan debt of over one trillion and also, ways to alter it and how it comes back to the need of lower tuition.

Hacker, Andrew. Dreifus, Claudia. “Are Colleges Worth the Price of Admission?” They Say/I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing. Ed. Gerald Graff. 2nd ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2012. 179-188. Print. 

Rossi, Andrew. “Ivory Tower”. Samuel Goldwyn Films. 2014.