Education Roads Less Traveled: Solving America's Fixation on Four-Year Degrees
Every year, large numbers of American young people who are not terribly interested in attending a four-year college reluctantly enroll anyway, effectively pressured by combinations of parents, peers, teachers, guidance counselors, and the normative air they breathe. More than occasionally, they wind up confirming that collegiate life is not for them and, sooner or later, drop out. From there, again more than occasionally, they find themselves unemployed or underemployed, in big-time student debt, and quite possibly feeling like a failure.

Cratered paths like these routinely stunt entries to middle-class jobs and careers. These are often needless delays and losses, because other education and career routes are primed to better serve millions of young men and women, especially those who enjoy working with their hands. Taking advantage of these routes also simultaneously enriches our economy.

Digging deeply into issues like these is the book’s main aim. Helping teenagers think through what they want to do with their lives occupationally is its main educational mission. Recognizing the economic and other dangers posed by severe skill gaps, made worse by the retirement of skilled baby boomers, adds urgency to the mix.
1129392484
Education Roads Less Traveled: Solving America's Fixation on Four-Year Degrees
Every year, large numbers of American young people who are not terribly interested in attending a four-year college reluctantly enroll anyway, effectively pressured by combinations of parents, peers, teachers, guidance counselors, and the normative air they breathe. More than occasionally, they wind up confirming that collegiate life is not for them and, sooner or later, drop out. From there, again more than occasionally, they find themselves unemployed or underemployed, in big-time student debt, and quite possibly feeling like a failure.

Cratered paths like these routinely stunt entries to middle-class jobs and careers. These are often needless delays and losses, because other education and career routes are primed to better serve millions of young men and women, especially those who enjoy working with their hands. Taking advantage of these routes also simultaneously enriches our economy.

Digging deeply into issues like these is the book’s main aim. Helping teenagers think through what they want to do with their lives occupationally is its main educational mission. Recognizing the economic and other dangers posed by severe skill gaps, made worse by the retirement of skilled baby boomers, adds urgency to the mix.
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Education Roads Less Traveled: Solving America's Fixation on Four-Year Degrees

Education Roads Less Traveled: Solving America's Fixation on Four-Year Degrees

by Mitch Pearlstein
Education Roads Less Traveled: Solving America's Fixation on Four-Year Degrees

Education Roads Less Traveled: Solving America's Fixation on Four-Year Degrees

by Mitch Pearlstein

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Overview

Every year, large numbers of American young people who are not terribly interested in attending a four-year college reluctantly enroll anyway, effectively pressured by combinations of parents, peers, teachers, guidance counselors, and the normative air they breathe. More than occasionally, they wind up confirming that collegiate life is not for them and, sooner or later, drop out. From there, again more than occasionally, they find themselves unemployed or underemployed, in big-time student debt, and quite possibly feeling like a failure.

Cratered paths like these routinely stunt entries to middle-class jobs and careers. These are often needless delays and losses, because other education and career routes are primed to better serve millions of young men and women, especially those who enjoy working with their hands. Taking advantage of these routes also simultaneously enriches our economy.

Digging deeply into issues like these is the book’s main aim. Helping teenagers think through what they want to do with their lives occupationally is its main educational mission. Recognizing the economic and other dangers posed by severe skill gaps, made worse by the retirement of skilled baby boomers, adds urgency to the mix.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9781475847550
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date: 02/15/2019
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 144
File size: 2 MB

About the Author

Mitch Pearlstein is a Senior Fellow with Center of the American Experiment, a think tank he founded in Minnesota in 1990, and for which he served as president for nearly 25 years. His previous books include Riding into the Sunrise: Al Quie and a Life of Faith, Service, and Civility; From Family Collapse to America’s Decline: The Educational, Economic, and Social Costs of Family Fragmentation; and Broken Bonds: What Family Fragmentation Means for America’s Future.
Mitch Pearlstein, PhD, is founder emeritus of the Center of the American Experiment, a think tank for which he served as president for nearly twenty-five years. His previous books include From Family Collapse to America's Decline: The Educational, Economic, and Social Costs of Family Fragmentation (Rowman&Littlefield, 2011) and Broken Bonds: What Family Fragmentation Means for America's Future (Rowman&Littlefield, 2014). He lives in Eden Prairie, Minnesota.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Chapter 1: The Four-Year College Bias

Chapter 2: Underemployed Paths to Great Jobs

Chapter 3: The Growing Power of Debt

Chapter 4: Potential Economic Detours

Chapter 5: Potential Social Detours

Chapter 6: The Art of Craft

Chapter 7: Conclusion

Index

About the Author
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