The #1 College Myth, Busted: Not Everyone Should Go to College

Nearly half of all students who start college never finish.

Yikes! Could it be that going to college was never really their best option?

There is a well-oiled track from high school to college in the United States. To be sure, the college experience offers many riches, including the intellectual ones I treasured as a coed. But it's primarily the presumed long-term financial advantages that have channeled our cultural wisdom into the prevailing adage that "everyone should go to college".

Except maybe not everyone. Maybe not even half of those who give it a try. I for one believe that our high-school-to-college track is a tad too slick.

Photo by Marcus Winter from Potsdam, Germany

One of my university counseling clients comes to mind. A young woman who had immigrated to Pennsylvania from Southeast Asia, she had lived in the United States long enough to learn that college was absolutely mandatory. Unfortunately, in course after course she would try and fail, crash and burn. Reading and writing in English, her second language, could not have been easy. To top it off, academics were not really her thing.

My client had good mechanical ability and an interest in cars—but she refused to consider a career as an auto mechanic. Data on the nearly equivalent salaries for employees in her major and in auto repair did not sway her. I never heard her say that she couldn't be a mechanic because she was a woman. No, she was determined to get her college degree because that was the way to succeed in America.

In future posts I'll provide guidance about how to help a student judge beforehand whether college is likely to be her personal best choice. For now, let's focus on the word college. As it is commonly used, college refers to a four-year institution.

Ah. Here's a quick way to change a cultural commandment that could otherwise continue to lead countless students astray.

For many high school students, a two-year associates degree might be much more appropriate. In fact, community college training may pay better than a four-year liberal arts degree. Nursing as well as a variety of technician jobs come to mind, with median annual wages above $50,000 and some above $60,000. Anthony Carnevale, the research professor who directs Georgetown's Center on Education and the Workforce, says that nearly one-third of associate degree jobs actually pay more at entry level than those requiring a college education. Many of these middle skill jobs also offer better benefits and chances for advancement.

What can talent mentors do with this information? I'd like to hear your thoughts. Here are some of mine:

For starters, let's not automatically use the word college or restrict our thinking to a BA or BS. Instead, we can simply tell students they need to get further training after high school.

Secondly, we can help our children consider possibilities that may include but are not limited to a four-year undergraduate institution. For example, they might find training on the job, or begin an apprenticeship, or join the military, or earn an industry certification, or enroll in a vocational program at a community college.

The following action suggestions may help you unearth local alternatives:

· If your child is still in high school, make an appointment to talk with her high school counselor. Ask about Career and Technical Education (CTE) classes and experiential learning opportunities for students who may not be college bound.

· Visit your local community college, online or in person, and survey their program offerings.

· Talk to a member of your community's Workforce Investment Board. Using your zip code, you can find names and contact information online.

I admire an observation made to me by Kathy Hanson, a CTE school district coordinator: As mentors, we can provide an attractive array of educational and employment options from which our students can choose. We can help them gather information and think through the advantages and disadvantages of each option. Then we can support their decisions.

An Example of a Strength: Mentors in IT Help Rob Find His Place

In my previous post, I wrote about one of my weaknesses: I wanted to sing and play an instrument, but I was born with a tin ear. As long as I performed in the musical realm, a mentor couldn't do much except maybe hold my hand, express some sympathy, and push a pair of plugs into his ears.

Everyone has weaknesses, like mine in music; but by the same token, everyone also possesses strengths. With the proper mentoring, your child's strengths can become a path to finding her place in the world. Let me illustrate by telling the story of how mentors helped my son Rob develop his talent with computers.

As a seventh grader, Rob took Mr. Jewett's Introduction to Computing class. Computer skills came easily: Rob learned quickly, had fun adding cool extras to his assignments, and felt magic when he could make something happen on the computer. His friends all wanted to be the teacher's aide for second semester, but Mr. Jewett chose Rob. His technical prowess gave him a positive social identity and helped him overcome the tough luck of being a new kid in a junior high crowd.



In eighth grade, Rob took a Web Design course from Mr. Denise. The class was provided with PCs loaded with the latest Adobe software package and told, "Build a website with three pages. Go!" Rob was able to learn html by doing, always a better method for him than listening to a lecture. Mr. Denise also put Rob to work in the school's computer lab, another form of hands-on learning.

Sadly, by the end of eighth grade Rob had already taken almost every computer course offered through the school district. So his parents stepped in. I arranged for an independent study in simple coding to round out his ninth grade year. Then my husband and I gave him what proved to be the best Christmas present ever: an Apple laptop. Rob "played" with it for hours on end, learning all the while.

In high school, Rob built a gaming computer as a capstone project. Two new mentors—a high school computer teacher and a HP volunteer—generously extended themselves to support his project. The task was fulfilling in its own right and also offered something pleasant to focus on following the death of a friend.

At the University of Colorado in Boulder, Rob worked part-time at the IT Help Desk for the School of Business, assisting his professors with their computer problems. In addition to making spending money and continuing to learn about IT, he found community on the job, a form of social support that eased the stresses of college with its endless round of breakups, conflicts, due dates, exams, and head colds.

Rob is now employed as an IT consultant for Big Compass, using computer skills that mentors have helped him hone for the last fourteen years. To the C++ he learned in college, he's added programming languages like Java and Ruby on Rails—and it still feels magical when he makes something happen on the computer.

I don't know my son's salary, but for me, that's not the point. He's been self-supporting since graduation and even manages to travel abroad and save some of his income. His boss has become a role model; he feels valued at work; and he's given freedom to solve real-world problems in his own way. As he looks to the future, IT remains a keystone.

Please note: Although the work world is competitive, Rob attained both revenue and resilience without getting straight As. He never had to win an award as The Most Magnificent McGillicuddy. It was not imperative that he attend an Ivy League institution (although he works with Ivy League teammates at client organizations, teasing them about how much they can accomplish when only one of them went to Yale).

Of course, in our tech-driven world, Rob has been fortunate to find great opportunity in his area of talent. But any strength has the potential to provide identity, community, and a positive life direction while also increasing employment opportunities, if your student has received some mentoring along the way.

Among my son's exemplary mentors, I feel the most gratitude to his junior high teachers. Mr. Jewett and Mr. Denise noticed Rob's early enthusiasm for information technology. They nurtured his budding interest and ability. Exceptional educators with high standards who continually modeled their own sophisticated use of computers, they set tasks at Rob's growing edge and gave him increasing responsibilities. Their early talent mentoring launched him in one of the most daunting challenges of modern life: finding one's place.

An Example of a Weakness: In Music, Carol Cannot Be Anything She Wants to Be

My mother stands at the sink, her back to me, and says, "You can't be in the band."

"What?" Somehow I've made it to her side. "But Susan Weber is going to play the clarinet."

My mother scrubs a pot, her eyes fixed on the gray dishwater, her forearms slick with spent suds. I can see the constriction in her throat and hear the resulting harshness in her voice. "You got a low score on a musical aptitude test."

I remember that test. Our class had listened to a short series of tones and then been asked to choose which one had changed the second time around: A, B, C, or D? Not even understanding what the word tone meant, I had guessed at every answer. "So?"

"Only one kid got a lower score than you did, Carol, out of both fifth grade classes. So they don't want you in band."

"You mean I can't get a clarinet?"

Mom shakes her head, pressing her lips together.

Trying to take it in, I leave the kitchen, picturing a line of forty-some fifth graders placed in order of musical ability. Because I'm standing next to last in that line, I won't be beside my best friend when she starts band next month?

I don't remember Susan proudly carrying her shiny new instrument into our classroom. I don't remember being left behind, one of the few souls remaining after the mass exodus to the band room. But I do remember this: Mr. Wagner, my first man teacher, contacted my mother and suggested that she provide me with an alternative activity, something that not all fifth graders could do. And thus it was that for the next couple of years my mother took me to Mt Solo Stables on Saturday morning for horseback riding lessons, where Cathy McRae became my buddy in the arena.

No, I never became an Olympic equestrian. And whenever I tell musical people that I was banned from learning an instrument in elementary school, they are appalled. To be sure, no one should be prohibited from making music. And yet, now that I'm familiar with aptitude assessments and not only approve of them but even advocate their use, I don't want to ignore the information they provide.

In my case, I believe my fifth grade test yielded an accurate prediction of my ability. I received an equally low score two decades later on a Tonal Memory aptitude test at Johnson O'Connor. I've also done poorly in any number of informal "tests." Nearly everyone who has ever heard me sing has asked me to stop. Even sweet little Rusty, a severely disabled boy I once babysat, didn't want me to sing "Rubber Ducky" when he took his bath. Shortly after I'd start to croon, his palms would hit the surface of the water, drenching me with spray as he yelled "Pops!" (his version of "Stop!")

Five decades after receiving a rude lesson about one of my weaknesses, here are my thoughts on the matter:

1) Although I myself had been unaware that my musical ability was in the low range, my weakness was obvious to others. If I had been allowed to play the clarinet, I'm confident that my performance would have earned scowls and scorn from my fellow students, which would have been even more excruciating to me than being excluded from band.

2) The school should never have asked my mother to do its dirty work. Instead, an educator should have talked with me privately and explained that even though there were plenty of things I could do well, remembering tones was not one of them. It certainly wasn't my fault, but my low tonal memory would make it painfully slow and laborious for me to learn to play music.

3) My lack of ability limited my options. Although I'd still love to be a singer, it would have been kamikaze crazy for me to pursue a career in music. Of course I could learn and improve, work hard and persevere, but it would take an unrealistic level of outside support for me to succeed. At an early age, I had discovered that no, I could not do whatever I wanted to do.

4) I later learned to play the recorder but lacked the motivation to continue making music with that or any other instrument. Eventually, I came to appreciate that not being musical was a blessing in disguise, in that it gave me more time for a preferred endeavor, one for which I possessed significantly greater talent and passion: reading.

Breaking Away from the Competition: A Footrace Illustrates Strengths and Weaknesses

I was unhappy with my life, so I went shopping. Surely I could justify buying a new pair of sensible shoes. Instead, the salesman held up something that looked like it belonged on a Barbie doll, with a high heel and stylish strap over the instep. He slipped the sandals on my feet and leaned back, admiration in his eyes. I couldn't afford the shoes but bought them anyway, because the salesman had made my shopping experience a pleasure. As it turned out, those sandals brought me joy every time I wore them.

A year I later bought running shoes from a different salesman. Knowledgeable but surly, he insulted my intelligence for choosing a pair that later proved to be comfortable and long-lasting. I still wish I'd pulled him aside to hiss in his ear: "You sold me these shoes despite your poor performance. You should do yourself and your customers a big favor by getting out of sales!"

In all my years of buying footwear, those two salesmen remain in my memory because one of them was just as awesome as the other was awful. They anchor opposite ends of a continuum. That same continuum exists for most human behavior, with strong performance at one end and weak at the other.

Let's switch now from a verbal explanation of strengths and weaknesses to a visual and numerical description, using the metaphor of a footrace. A footrace measures running skill. Like other skills, running can fall in the strong, average, or weak ranges. The image above shows the distance 100 runners have covered after ten seconds. (It also illustrates what statisticians call the normal curve.)

You'll notice that there is quite a bit of spread between the racers, with most of them bunched up in the middle of the pack. Those sixty-eight folks are running in the average range where it's hard to distinguish one from another. In contrast, the first sixteen racers—the strong runners—have broken away from the pack, while the last sixteen—the weak runners—have fallen behind.

In the high and low ranges, strengths and weaknesses are extreme enough to become "visible to the naked eye." In other words, observers are more likely to notice that you're fast, if you're one of the first sixteen runners, or slow, if you're among the last sixteen to cross the finish line. Arrows below the footrace image mark the point where the average range begins and ends (these two points are also known as one standard deviation below and above the mean).

Running is only one skill, but this general concept of performing in the high, average, or low range applies across the world of work. Every occupation has its own unique pattern of required skills, such as those necessary for selling shoes. When your student can use her greatest strengths on the job, she will become an effective and perhaps even phenomenal employee, like the guy who sold me the snazzy sandals.

Strengths are characteristics that help the worker adapt in a specific environment. In the sales environment, for example, strengths could include positive characteristics like being outgoing, developing rapport with strangers, and generating many alternatives. An employer seeks and compensates employee strengths that contribute to meeting his customer's needs. If you were the owner of the shoe store, of course you'd want to hire the most effective salesman you could, because he would help keep you in business.

Your child is best served by looking for work that is enhanced by her strengths and not affected by her weaknesses, so that she can break away from the competition throughout her career. If a particular job requires important skills that she can only perform in the low range, then she's better off looking elsewhere.

Do you suspect this point is too obscure to matter? Consider this little known fact: Many job seekers must submit to pre-employment testing. Employers seldom share the test results with their candidates; instead, they simply hire the applicants whose strengths provide the best match for their position.

And the unfortunate job applicant who has already spent her time and her parents' money to earn her bachelor's degree? She may not even be aware that she's running in the middle of the pack. She will not be hired. And most likely, she will never know why.

Mentoring Tips: Five First-Rate Ways to Support Others in Conversation

Your student wants to talk with you. You're flattered to be consulted and eager to help.

Now what do you do?

Here are five mentoring tips, gleaned from my experience as a counselor (as well as a supervisor of various kinds of psychotherapists):

Tip #1: Begin with what you hear and see and feel in your child's presence

There's something amiss in the phrase "just listening." To put yourself aside while you truly listen to others is to give them a precious gift.

Psychologist Leona Tyler wrote: "Counseling is basically a perceptual task. It is not possible to learn to say the right thing at the right time without learning to listen and watch and understand." It is the same for mentoring. Look. Listen. Let curiosity gently move you along.

Despite my desire to serve a helping of wisdom along with my counseling, I can't recall a single instance of praise for my profundity. On the other hand, clients thanked me over and over and over again for listening. 

Tip #2: Model patience with the process

Offer a contrast to our frenetic culture. Slow down. Conduct your conversation so that your student can hear herself think and begin to heed that small voice inside.

My clients would often tell me that they didn't know what they wanted when they actually did, deep down. Perhaps they were slightly scared to express it out loud, but eventually, because I waited and listened and probed instead of rushing in to offer advice, they would get around to declaring their heart's desire.

Of all the quotes about creativity, my favorite is from Epictetus: "No great thing is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer you that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen." Developing talent is an equally slow process.

Tip #3: Respect your student's desires

Personal values bring emotion (note the root word motion) into play, and that kind of energy can move entire mountain ranges. So let your daughter know that you respect her values.

One young woman admitted during a counseling session that she wanted to be a good nurse and mother and live in the country where she could raise a big vegetable garden. Then she trembled and hung her head in shame. Her goals didn't fit her parents' values, so she felt as though she had just confessed to something sinful. Hearing my respect for her goals helped her move forward.

Well-meaning friends and family, full of "shoulds," often plaster their own priorities on a young person who already feels vulnerable because her values are at odds with the mainstream (or perhaps simply at odds with her parents). When in dialogue, honor her desires—not your own.

Tip #4: Express confidence in his or her ability

If you believe that your son is capable of doing whatever it is he says he wants to do, then tell him so.

Lawrence Hatterer, a psychotherapist for fine artists in New York City, believed that his single most important contribution was a belief in his client's ability to create. Creative people of all sorts have told me that they were helped by such confirmation. Just one other person who believed in them was enough to strengthen their self-confidence.

I experienced this myself, when I told my sister that I wanted to write fiction for children. She read some of my early efforts and said, "I think you can do it." Sounds simple, but what a boost!

Tip #5: Contain your own anxiety

When your student wants to discuss something important, chances are that she will be uncertain and a bit worried. Anxiety is contagious—but don't let her scare you too.

One of my clients had been fired from a prominent position. Already embarrassed by his public demotion, he became panicked by his subsequent lack of success at the job hunt. Fear wafted off of him like bug repellent, which undoubtedly hurt his chances with potential employers. I helped by not becoming scared myself. Once he calmed down, he got the job he wanted and became one of my most grateful clients.

Try to focus on the person instead of her anxiety. In other words, let her feelings be her feelings and attend to her as a whole person. Attending does not mean rushing in to save her from feeling bad. Nor does it mean taking upon yourself the task of making her choices. It means going back to basics, to the starting point of what you hear and see and feel in her presence (see Tip #1).

Rest assured: You can provide information and opinions and emotional support, but you do not need to make decisions. That task belongs to your student. After all, she's the one who must live with the consequences.

How to Observe Talent in Children: Use Winner's Three Behavioral Markers

I began speculating about my son's strengths when he was still in utero. From the moment he was born, I kept an eagle eye on what he did well, and within a week of his sixteenth birthday, I whisked him off to Chicago for a formal aptitude assessment.

Fortunately, you don't have to be quite such a fanatic. You don't have to spend money, either. One free method for identifying strengths is to observe your child's behavior. In other words, pay attention to what she does better than most kids her age.

Ellen Winner, PhD, a psychology professor and researcher at Boston College, has developed three markers you can use to identify talent via observation. No testing required. Dr. Winner's research has been based on gifted children, but I believe her markers can also be used for the noticeable-if-you-look-for-it kind of talent that places a child or student in the high range of a specific ability. And high ability is plenty 'good enough' for learning quickly, getting a job, and advancing in a career.

Here are Winner's three behavioral markers:

1) Precocity (which means advanced in a specific area)

Let's begin with an extreme example. Carl Gauss, the eminent German mathematician, was a child prodigy. At age 3, he corrected, in his head, a mistake his father made in financial calculations. In grade school, his teacher asked him to add numbers from 1 to 100 in arithmetic progression—a feat he accomplished in mere seconds! At only 21, he wrote his magnum opus on number theory. Two centuries later, his brilliance continues to light the mathematical heavens.

In other words, the talented person often begins to learn about his special subject at a younger age than average. He learns faster and performs better than typical peers. As a result, his skills in his talent area are advanced, even when he's not a genius. For example, the one-year-old who speaks in full sentences, a feat not normally accomplished until the age of two (indicating talent in the area of language). Or the child who can successfully compete on sports teams with children a year or two older (indicating talent in athletics).

2) Rage to Master

Michelangelo, the great Italian artist, possessed an astounding visual-spatial talent that contributed to his success in painting, sculpture, and architecture. But on top of that he focused intensely and labored mightily with his visual gift, so dedicated to mastering his craft that he was willing to spend four years in awkward positions as paint from the Sistine Chapel dripped onto his face.

A rage to master refers to strong intrinsic motivation. The talented individual wants to learn, on his own, about how to win a chess game or play the harmonica. Without prodding, without an adult having to coax him with a carrot or strike him with a stick, the child strives to master the skills of his chosen domain. When adults spot such stellar achievement, they may assume there's a pushy parent behind the scenes, but the child with a rage to master actually pushes himself to study maps so he can learn geography.

3) March to their own Drummer

Living in isolation in northern England, in a world without MFA writing programs, the young Bronte sisters taught themselves to write poetry and fiction. Charlotte, Emily, and Anne Bronte created and acted out dramas as children, inventing and sharing personal worlds of fantasy. Later in their lives, when women were actively discouraged from writing books, each of the Bronte sisters adopted a male pen name and wrote one or more novels of unusual passion and lasting artistic merit (including the classics Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall).

The talented person does not sit idly by with the mass of her fellows nor rush with them like lemmings into the sea. Rather than follow someone else's set curriculum, she instead takes initiative with her own pet projects, maybe building a Lego construction from her imagination or studying all the different kinds of spider webs she can find in nature. She pursues her own goals in her own idiosyncratic ways.

To mentor talent, keep an eye out for these three markers. Be sure to ask others what they notice in your child. For example, at parent-teacher conferences, ask her teacher:

· "What are my daughter's strengths?"

· "What is she good at?"

· "Have you noticed any areas where she is ahead of other kids her age?"

· "Have you noticed any areas where she shows unusual motivation?

· "In what kind of activities does she march to her own drummer?"

Afterward, tell your child where he or she excels. Remember to remind them of their talents from time to time. Students who know their strengths possess an inner security that's both portable and permanent.

Careers Tend to Snowball, Parents: That's Why Starting Off Right Is Crucial

In my office at the University Counseling Center, a lanky underclassman sprawls in the chair across from me, absorbing the results of his Strong Interest Inventory. He looks up and says, "Interior designer is one of my highest scores." He tells me how the design field fits well with other parts of his life and adds, excitement warming his voice, "You know, I'd like to manage my own showroom someday." Then he hops up and hurries out of my office to declare a major in interior design.

I never saw that client again, but I bet he did in fact become an interior designer. I wouldn't be surprised if he later managed his own showroom. Because he was a freshman or sophomore in college when he made his career choice—the perfect moment to pack his occupational snowball and set it rolling.

John Holland, an eminent vocational psychologist, wrote that "careers tend to snowball over the life course." He meant, in part, that people tend to stick with their first career choice. Sadly, that seems to be true even when it's a lousy fit.

For that reason, it was more gratifying for me to help college students choose their first careers than to work with adults who wanted to change their professions. Many of my older clients could identify a more desirable occupation fairly quickly—but then they slowed to a standstill. Change was simply too difficult, when they had children and spouses, car payments and mortgages. Not to mention that prevailing plague of our present day: never enough time.

Research in decision making confirms that people tend to stick with the status quo unless they are forced to change. Even if they are fired or laid off—a calamity with a silver lining—their options may appear limited. She lacks the time and money to retool, so she'll stay the course and find a job similar to the one she loathed before she lost it. At least that way she can cash in on her work experience to buy groceries for her kids.

I myself had a tough time changing my career, and I was a young 26 with no dependents. Sure, there was some delight in discovering my calling. But I also suffered, taking the silver spoon from my mouth to scoop up beans and rice and mix in chunks of food bank cheese. In the process of exploring new directions, I encountered an astonishing number of people who said that the only thing I could do was teach English—when I'd only taught freshman composition on a part-time, temporary basis for one measly year of my life!

Here's my point: It is appropriate to feel some urgency. Your child does not have all the time in the world to make a good career choice, particularly not if she's a specialist by nature. In posts to come, I'll show you how to help your student pack a firm snowball and start it rolling in the right general direction, so she doesn't later find herself hurtling down the wrong hill, gathering girth until she's smashed into a snow bank, her self-esteem, her happiness, and her earning potential all buried in the cold.