Another of Those Really Great Exitential Questions.

Do you know the difference between a "college," and a "university?"

Guess what?  I didn't either.  And many of my family members did either.  Including some teachers.  So I did some research.

First of all, somebody with some heavy horsepower somewhere, a long time ago, was responsible for deciding our children should all face a fork in the road: we should either send them off somewhere for higher learning, once they'd reached the 10th grade or so, or sentence them to a life of drudgery.  

Like driving a truck, or digging ditches, or building houses.  That decision could have been made based upon their observed intellect (NOTE: dumb kids don't get the big education), or more likely, the social or financial status of their parents (NOTE:  Well-to-do kids almost always go to college).  If their parents could afford college for their kids, off they'd go.  If not, too bad, so sad.  The life of a tradesman for them.

As if that's a bad idea.  (Spoiler alert:  It isn't)

And whether they'd go to a local 2 or 4-year colleges, or a more prestigious university, almost always depended upon daddy's finances.  And it still does.  I attended both colleges and universities (thrown out of several of the best of each), and never knew the difference.  Except for the cost, that is.  And the size of the parking lot.

In fact, most folks use the terms interchangably.  To denote institutions of post-secondary education.  After high school.  Usually the 12th grade.  But they're different.  So I looked it up.  I spent a couple of hours doing some intensive research.  As only I can.  Oh, I knew that the root words are "college" and "university."  They are latin, meaning "collegium" a partnership, guild, or body of colleagues, and "universitas," meaning the whole, or whole body, or a community.  

Like that's important somehow.  Humor me. 

The first is a group of like-minded folks joined together to engage in a common enterprise.  It could be a bunch of nuns at a convent somewhere.  Or a group of sheriffs' deputies who like to bowl every Thursday night.  Or it could be a 2 or 4 year institution offering degrees in various subjects.  They're typically smaller than a university.  They can be either public or private, and offering certificates, associate degrees or bachelor degrees.  

Universities, on the other hand, are uniformly 4-year institutions, offering both undergraduate and graduate degrees.  They can be either public or private, like colleges.  Universities have more students, often in the tens of thousands.  And gigondo football teams.  They usually represent the states they're in.  You know them when you see them because they have enormous parking lots, and their students must have a hanger on their rearview mirrors denoting they've paid their exhorbitant parking fees.  Otherwise, their cars will be towed.  And they sell $50 hoodies with the football team logos on the back.  And they charge an arm and a leg to go there.  Or at least a leg.  

Many universities are known for their research and development, often paid for by the Federal Gubmint or a friendly corporation.  Which found that the university did the research cheaper than they could.  Most research is paid for by the Federal Gubmint.  They also offer advanced degrees such as PhD's in inane subjects, plus law and dental and archeological studies.  You can also discover some have colleges within their universities, denoting more specilized study.  Like meterology.  Or Medieval Lesbian Poetry.  Or gender studies (spoiler alert; there are only two genders!).  

That's true for both colleges and universities, BTW.

Smart folks go there because their daddy pays for it, likely to keep them away from  home, and so they can become "Professors."  So they can profess.  Which means to preach to their students their particular slant on weird, arcane stuff.  They can get their start as an "Associate Professor," meaning they grade the papers of their professors.  Sort of like a "Farm Club."  Or an "Assistant Professor," meaning they get to order around the Assistants.  Or "Full Professor."  Meaning they know virtually everything there is to know about almost nothing, and have the Associates get their coffee and the Assistants teach their classes.  While they hang out in the Professors Lounge, along with the other self-important slubs.   

And you're gonna' pay through the nose to find out just how much they (think they) know.

The colleges and universities have sucked up all the available teachers so they can now espouse their knowledge.  And opinions.  To the world.  To those who will pay.  Dearly.  And their students are supposed to pay attention to them.  And be judged on their level of inculcation of that knowledge.  Because their Professors have spent years and $Tens of Thousands of Dollars, probably borrowed, learning that stuff.  Stuff that nobody else usually wants to know.  Or even understand. 

And their students will surely get an "A" in each class, so daddy won't  be pissed at their grades.  As an example, a recent review of Harvard grades indicated that everybody, in every subject, got an "A."  Did you expect anything else?  

And the colleges and universities are nothing but a collection of those "Professors."  Like a plumbing company hires supposedly qualified, licenced plumbers to fix your toilets when they break, which is their guarantee they know how to fix toilets, the colleges and universities are supposed to do the same.  Except their "Professors" have no licenses.  Or little white vans with advertising and catchy phone numbers on the side panel to drive around.  They just have sheepskins hanging on their walls.  

But do they actually know stuff?   Do they need sheepskins to teach "Equine Reproduction," as an example?  Or "Black Studies?"  How often do you need to study that, BTW? And do their students need to be knowledgeable in that subject?  Or will their graduates be asking, "Would you like fries with that?"  The purpose of this little blog today is to ask that question.  And to try and provide you with an answer.

Do the "professors" at U.C. Berkeley, one of America's most prestigious universities, we're told, or Stanford, as an example, actually know the stuff you're supposed to know if you go there for an advanced degree?  Or do they just pass along their Uber-Liberal predilections on one subject or another?  Or are they chosen by voice vote of the other Professors, like a fraternity.  Enabling them to join the "club."  

Like the Mafia chooses its "made men."  And God help you if you get blackballed!

Are they better and smarter than, say, those at U.C. Riverside?  A veritable joke among Berkeley elites?*  Or the University of Arkansas?  Or the U. of Missouri?  Or Nebraska?  Which are more than likely going to pass along a more Conservative view?  Because their "Professors" are likely more Conservative?  Else they wouldn't have attended there.  Or stayed there to profess.  In short, is a degree in Psychology, as an example, from Berkeley, more valuable to you and me than a degree in the same subject from say, the U. of Arkansas?  Or given that, although there is no hard-and-fast answer to any question you might ask, is a degree in that subject from either institution worth the paper it's printed upon?  Or the skin of a sheep?

Up to you to decide.  And choose to pay for.

My double major is in Psychology and Economics.  From a small college in Missouri.  Neither of those subjects have the "2+2 equal 4" answers to any question likely to be asked.  By anyone, anywhere.  They're just opinions.  But both are considered sciences.  Which, BTW, is why I chose them.  I knew even at the time that the degree I pursued what worth only how much money it could make me.  

As a Liberal arts institution, they made me take English, taught by a woman who had three Phi Beta Kappa keys.  One in English, one it Math, and one in Music.  Her voice was like a bunch of pebbles jangling in a beer can.  Nobody slept in her class.  And she was known especially for having only two dresses.  Worn a week at a time each.  Did reading "Moby Dick," which she required, make me smarter?  No.  Did it make me more hirable?  No.  Or only more Liberally educated?  Yes.  As if that was a goal I was pursuing!  

It was not.  My only goal was to to graduate and get the Hell out.

In all fairness, it might be for some.  Just not for me.  And not now at $90,000 a year at some major universities.  Is it for you and your kids?  That's for you and your banker to decide...  

Yet, when I first visited a recruiter post-graduation, while the ink on the skin of my sheep was still drying, I was hired on the spot by a large New York-based corporation.  At nice money, with a car, an expense account and stock options.  They only cared that I'd had the "sticktoitiveness" to attend, and graduate from, a 4-year institution of higher learning.  The subject did not matter.  The school did not matter.  Never was I ever asked, post-hiring, about anything I was supposed to have learned in my subjects of study.  Or even the name of my alma mater.  They were just interested in how much money I could make them.  Sort of like they do with the Mafia.  How about that?

And I was only interested in how much money I could make from them.  Funny how our expectations coincided.  Something tells me it's still that way.

As a quick recommendation, if your kid is motivated to attend an institution of higher learning, send them to a school that will send them home with a license.  To practice something.  Law, medicine, physical therapy, dentistry, etc.  Anything less is a waste of time and money.  Unless your goal is for your kid to amass information "professed" by a bunch of folks who went to school for the same exact reason.  And are now paid to tell you what they think.  For waaaaay to much money.

You can watch "The View," for free, if that's your goal.   

So here's the bottom line, Fellow Patriots.  Most institutions of higher learning are not worth the powder it would take to blow them to Hell.  They're just collections of overblown stuffed shirt "Professors," who are overly proud of their supposed knowedge.  Which you can learn for yourself by visiting Google should you be so inclined.  And who are riding their degrees to a comfy life of "Professing" stuff to snot-nosed kids who are there because they don't want to drive a truck.  Or fix my broken toilet.  And their daddies have enough scratch to fund it.

The Bottom Line:  College or university is a four-year sentence you serve between high school and life.

Exceppppt, as a Nation we're now short of plumbers.  And electricians.  And carpenters.  And dry wall hangers.  So Capitalism forces us to pay more for those of us in short supply.  (Supply and Demand is the hard and fast rule.  Google it.  Ain't life grand?)  New long-haul Amazon truck drivers are now starting at $175,000 a year.  Electricians at data centers are making $250,000 a year.  To start.  Mike Rowe's company will offer free education in the trades to anyone interested in learning them.  With paychecks offered from Day One.  No paying back student loans.  Farriers (horse shoers) are making $250k a year while enjoying the Great Outdoors.  Daily.  So don't ever tell me your kids are going to school to make money.  They're just trying to avoid becoming Starbucks baristas.  And fixing my toilet.  Okay?  

As far as I'm concerned, your best bet is to send your kids off to the military.  They'll come home older, wiser, smarter and more worldly, and far better educated than they'd be if they went to the University of Wherever.  Then let the Army, or Navy, Marine Corp., or Coast Guard send them off to a higher education, and pay for it.  You won't have to cough up $100,000 or $200,000 for their education.  And they won't be stuck paying it back for decades.  So when they get taught a bunch of useless crap, from a bunch of self-important "Professors," who get paid for passing along their overblown opinions, whether they know anything or not, at least it won't cost an arm and a leg. 

It will be worth exactly what you paid for it:  zero!

(NOTE:  When I used to travel the Country selling stuff to hospitals and doctors, wearing a suit, flying everywhere every single day, while making Major Bank, the person seated next to me would occasionally ask what I did for a living.  I'd respond with, "I majored in animal husbandry, until they caught me at it.")  

Funny how that shuts down all further discussion.  And you can go back to reading your book...

*   The first time I visited Berkeley I was early for my appointment with a doctor.  So I stopped at a coffee shop on the corner just outside the campus.  A guy rolled up on a bicycle, wearing absolutely nothing but a Tam-O-Shanter cap and some tennis shoes.  He got off the bike, parked it, and sat down at a table next to mine.   Completely unbothered by his nakedness, nor concerned that anyone else might be, either.  And guess what?  They weren't!  The waitress took his order and delivered it.  I learned all I needed to know about Berkeley that day.  Both the University and the city.  That was about 50 years ago.  And nothing has changed my opinion about them in the intervening decades.  Except that spending a lot of money on your wardrobe, should you attend the U. of Berkeley, is totally optional...