Summary

If you ask someone why they want to go to college and the answer is, “To get a  job.” they intend to treat college as a vocational school. If the answer is something along the lines of learning from the great minds that went before them, to learn about our shared history and to learn how to think, then they are going to college. In either case, partying and other non-academic pursuits will be involved (more in the former case), but that is where the similarity ends.

Individually and as a society, we benefit from both a broad liberal arts education and vocational training. Everyone should have some foundation in history, science, philosophy, languages, the arts and have some command of numbers. That’s a liberal arts education. And we all need specific skills, vocational skills, whether used in the home, professionally or both. You don’t need to go to college to give yourself a good liberal arts education; libraries are everywhere, and you can find/start a book club. You are more likely to need formal training to acquire good vocational skills.

Vocational schools are not at all always blue collar. Examples of vocational training range everywhere from welding school to undergraduate science and engineering schools to medical school. My liberal arts degree was a BA in Philosophy from the University of Colorado; my vocational degree was an MBA from Harvard Business School.

For the next 10 minutes, we will talk about college and vocational training; the differences and how to choose.

Transcript

If you ask someone why they want to go to college and the answer is, “To get a  job.” they intend to treat college as a vocational school. If the answer is something along the lines of learning from the great minds that went before them, to learn about our shared history and to learn how to think, then they are going to college. In either case, partying and other non-academic pursuits will be involved (more in the former case), but that is where the similarity ends.

Individually and as a society, we benefit from both a broad liberal arts education and vocational training. Everyone should have some foundation in history, science, philosophy, languages, the arts and have some command of numbers. That’s a liberal arts education. And we all need specific skills, vocational skills, whether used in the home, professionally or both. You don’t need to go to college to give yourself a good liberal arts education; libraries are everywhere, and you can find/start a book club. You are more likely to need formal training to acquire good vocational skills.

Vocational schools are not at all always blue collar. Examples of vocational training range everywhere from welding school to undergraduate science and engineering schools to medical school. My liberal arts degree was a BA in Philosophy from the University of Colorado; my vocational degree was an MBA from Harvard Business School.

For the next 10 minutes, we will talk about college and vocational training; the differences and how to choose.

Let’s start with something that I hope is becoming increasingly clear: college is not intended to be for everyone. In the main, college has become a cross between something that is expected after high school, a fun time, and fiercely expensive. It is a waste of time and money if the desired result is producing thoughtful citizens who are well equipped in terms of a solid fact base with the ability to apply those facts to whatever issue is at hand.

Today’s Key Point: The best combination is layering vocational training and skills on top of a solid liberal arts foundation. Both pursuits are opportunities for lifelong learning. And while learning is occasionally hard work, remember to jump in feet first. When you learn, just as when you live (learning being a key part of living),