Education, etc.

I swore if I ever became a parent that I would not lie to my children. I would not use fear or manipulation to try to guide them while they grow up. I stayed away from the typical silliness of telling them if they swallowed a watermelon seed that it would sprout in their stomach or if they swallowed their bubble gum it would stay in their stomach for 7 years, undigested. Most parents have some tall tale they tell their children, but my mother and my friend’s mothers could win awards for the lies they told us.

I had bad acne as a child so as a teenager, I took a medication that can be very difficult on your liver. To keep me from drinking alcohol while in high school, my mother famously said, “Because you took [medication], if you drink alcohol before you are 21, your liver will turn black and fall out of your butthole, right in the middle of the hallway at school.” Keep in mind, I was a science minded child, but I never knew if my southern mama had connections to some kind of magic, considering she always seemed to know just what I had done, often before I did it. As adults, I sat down and talked to a friend from high school about this very story, and her response summed it up perfectly: “We knew she was lying, but on that one off chance that she could make it happen, we knew better than to chance it.”

As I said before, my mother did not have a monopoly on telling lies to her children to make them behave. My best friend is a twin. Both have a diagnosis that impacts their eyes. For my best friend, one of her eyes will turn in. She cannot feel it and does not know when it is happening. As a child, her mother told her that it “only happens when you tell a lie.” Since she could not feel it, she never knew if it was crossing, and was afraid to be less than honest with her mother.

There are other lies, more damaging lies, that we tell our children.

• You must go to college and earn a degree to be successful.
• You must have the money to pay for college, because you don’t want to leave college with a mass of student loan debt.
• If you work hard enough, your grades will help you get a good job.
• Trade schools and technical education are not as important as a degree from a 4-year institution.
• White collar jobs are better than blue collar jobs.
• Loyalty to the same company for 30+ years shows more character than job hopping.
• Tattoos, piercings, and certain hairstyles are not professional and have no place in the office.

When I was graduating high school, going to college was the expectation for success. You had 2 pathways in high school: college prep and technical. Occasionally, you had a child who would get a dual seal, but generally students were tracked along these two paths. For the college prep student, it was not a matter of if you went to college, it was a matter of where. Bragging rights were based on the prestige of the university and how quickly you were accepted. You started touring colleges and universities in the second semester of your sophomore year or the first semester of your junior year and often you had choices of where to go to school. That piece of paper you earned when you completed your 4 years, and you were expected to get through in 4, was the key that opened doors to a good career, healthcare benefits, and a 401K. But that was 20+ years ago and times have changed. College acceptance is dropping, and has been dropping, for many reasons (Levine, 2023). It is just not as simple as apply and get in like it was when I was heading off to college and had the pick of more than once school.

A coworker and I were recently discussing how both of our parents are of the same school of thought when it comes to our children going off to the college of their choice, and us, as teachers, and their parents, fitting the bill, because they, our parents, had done just that when we went off to the college of our choice. She pointed out that the out of state tuition from her college years to her soon-to-be college freshman is more than 5x more expensive. And because it is out of state, there is no in-state scholarship program to assist with tuition, housing, or books, even though he was an honor graduate with an A+ average in rigorous classes. This means either the parents write a check, or the student must use student loans to pay for college, which can be anywhere from $10K to $50K a year. A 2023 study by Best Colleges showed the cost of college has more than tripled in almost 60 years, with the cost of 4-year institutions rising by 78% (Bryant, 2023).

Maybe some parents can write a check, but most cannot. Scholarships, grants, loan forgiveness, and other programs make a dent, but it is still an expense for the average student to take on. And if they are going to have massive amounts of student loan debt, it all will be worth it, because a degree earned with a high GPA means a good job, right? It is true that more education helps with employability and increases in pay (Nietzel, 2022) but it is not a 100% guarantee. Employability and pay are controlled my many factors, not the least of which are the college degree, soft skills, and the organization which is hiring.

Skilled labor, technical education, and blue-collar jobs were once considered second tier careers held by those who could not get a college degree or a white-collar job. I would not think of someone who can do a job that I cannot do as being less than me because I have a university education. I think of myself as being handy around the house. My father, an architect, was always working around the house and I was always at his knee, learning how to do things that needed to be done. I have changed out light fixtures, a thermostat or two, helped to hang tongue in groove board on the wall, worked with sheetrock, concrete, and even changed out a toilet all by myself, including sealing it at the floor with silicone. All that and my extensive years of university education have taught me a very valuable lesson: my handy work around the house has major limits and someone with a technical school education is able to do a lot more than I can and are worth every penny I can pay them! If you do not believe that, then I encourage you to call someone with a university education when you air conditioning quits in the middle of July in southern Georgia, when humidity is 100% and Hell begins to look like a more temperate climate. You will quickly value that trade school education for someone, anyone, that can fix your air conditioning, plumbing or electrical work.

My grandparents’ generation often worked the same job for 30 years and in return, they were gifted a gold watch or something else, as a thank you for their loyalty, and a pension as retirement. One of the many jobs I had right out of college was working for a foreign import company and when I made a job change, many comments were made about how I had questionable honor of leaving the job as career moves were not common in their culture. That is just not the case anymore. At a recent leadership training, attendees were tasked with composing their resume. One public safety officer listed his 20+ years in public service, indicating his 1 job during that time frame. The instructor for this training informed him, if she were reviewing his resume as a potential employee, she would dismiss him because only 1 job on the resume showed a lack of ambition and an adversity to risk. Granted, in his career field, moving agencies means starting over at the bottom. In the corporate world, a resume with diverse job experience shows a willingness to learn new skills and improve on what you bring to the table as an employee.

As for the ever-changing workplace, what is considered professional is always shifting, and the remote working environment brought about by COVID19 added overdrive to the speed of change. Gone are the days when women worked in a tea-length dress with heels and a simple strand of pearls. My mentor explained when she first started her teaching career, more than 50 years ago, pantihose were part of the required professional dress code. Many jobs in the corporate world still require a dress shirt and tie, but not all. Tattoos are no longer as taboo as they once were. Creativity is needed more and more in a job force that is now largely digital, and creative personalities are less likely to conform to the professional standards of dress that ruled the corporate world 10 years ago. Hynes (2023) provides several suggestions for the need to relax the professional dress code, not the least of which to attract creative talent, but also for diversity and inclusivity. The brilliant minds who write code, publish websites, and create digital graphics are less likely to follow the rules about hair being a natural color, having facial hair, or not having piercings and visible tattoos. Companies are becoming more concerned with the talent of the employee than their conservative appearance. As with all things, this is not true for every company, but there is a trend toward a more relaxed corporate environment where creativity and productivity are most important. This includes flexible working hours and moving away from desks and cubicles for some companies that push collaboration and innovation.

“The Times They Are a Changin’”, according to writer Bob Dylan (1964), reflected the allied connection of the Civil Rights Movement and the Folk Music Movement, yet the lyrics are relevant today. The world is changing. It is not like it was when you were embarking on your life fresh out of high school. When you find yourself wanting to advise the next generation, do a little research instead of relying on the way things used to be, even as recently as 2 or 3 years ago. You want to be able to advise them with the most up-to-date information. After all, you want them to be successful so they can pay taxes and fuel your retirement one day.

Bryant, J. (2023, January 12). Cost of college over time: BestColleges. BestColleges.com. https://www.bestcolleges.com/research/college-costs-over-time/#:~:text=The%20average%20cost%20of%20college,1963%20to%20%2413%2C777%20in%202020.&text=That’s%20accounting%20for%20inflation.

Dylan, B. (1964). Bob Dylan – the times they are A-changin’. Genius. https://genius.com/Bob-dylan-the-times-they-are-a-changin-lyrics

Hynes, J. (2023, February 17). Why your professional dress code might want to loosen its tie. Red Clover. https://redcloverhr.com/why-your-professional-dress-code-may-want-to-loosen-its-tie/

Levine, A. (2023, May 1). Why does it seem so hard to get into college? – premium prep: College counseling. Premium Prep | College Counseling. https://premiumprep.com/2023/01/01/why-does-it-seem-so-hard-to-get-into-college/#:~:text=The%20first%20thing%20to%20acknowledge,letting%20up%20any%20time%20soon.

 Nietzel, M. T. (2022, October 12). New report shows college degree continues to provide better employment prospects and higher income. Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2022/06/01/new-report-shows-college-degree-continues-to-provide-better-employment-prospects-and-higher-income/