Question: The notion that one will actually make use of one’s major without > : > graduate study is a very second-tier thing. > : > > : > Josh > : BTW what does exactly a “second- tier: thing” mean? > : Are you saying that expecting to be educated enough to enter the workforce > : with “only” a B A., indicates your class?

Answer: If we’re talking about English literature, then perhaps the difference between a top-rated school and a less prestigious school is that the former hopes or expects to send a higher percentage of its BAs to graduate school, so as to become professors in the field, while the latter may send a higher percentage of its graduates on to careers in high school teaching or in unrelated fields, at jobs that range (in relatively rare cases) from very prestigious to (too often) not prestigious at all. I recently met a newly minted polisci BA, for example, who was surprised that he was the only guy in the room with a college degree, at one of those recruitment meetings for a company that sent people out on door-to-door sales expeditions.

I should clarify the foregoing parenthetical comment regarding the scarcity of prestigious jobs available to some graduates. The study of liberal arts at a good university may yield surprising long-term results. Here’s a quote from http://www.indiana.edu/~econweb/ug_index.html: “AT&T studied the college backgrounds of employees who, after twenty years, had advanced to senior management positions. They found that 43% of the liberal arts graduates advanced to senior management, compared to 34% of the business school graduates and 28% of the engineering graduates. The president of AT&T, Charles Brown, offered an explanation: ‘The humanities and social science majors were most suitable to change — the leading feature of this kind of high-speed, high pressure, high-tech world we now occupy.’” I’m not sure that quote is entirely coherent, but you get the idea.

As you get into the more employable fields (e.g., engineering), it may still be true that the more prestigious schools send a higher percentage to grad school, but I haven’t gotten the impression that going directly to work at a good salary strikes such graduating seniors as a low-class alternative. Some people, regardless of class or ability, get tired of going to school and amassing student loan debt; they want to enjoy a bit of the good life.

Most universities feel they have somewhat of a mandate to provide relevant > or practical skills to their undergraduates. Think of business and > engineering courses as opposed to economics and pure science courses.

It goes without saying that a person seeking, say, a degree in economics will be encouraged to take “relevant” courses. But “practical”? Do I understand this to mean that the general requirements for B.A. and B.S. degrees at most universities, or the departmental requirements for all econ majors (or whatever), include courses that will help a person get a job?

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