Response Paper
Response Paper: Saying No to College
For many high school students, the obvious choice after graduation is going to college. But why has this become the norm? With many students being conditioned at a young to prepare for college, there might not seem like any other choice. As college tuitions continues to rise and the job market continues to decline, young adults have started to rethink the choice to attend college. After all, there have been many successful people who have not graduated college. This proves that one does not need to attend college to be successful and there are many different options besides a four-year university to gain knowledge that is useful for getting a job. In “Saying No to College”, author Alex Williams proves there are many successful individuals in the world who have not graduated college and gives a plethora of different ways to gain knowledge besides sitting in a classroom. He uses examples like Mark Zuckerburg and Steve Jobs, to name a few, that have been successful without a college degree. He asks why pay money if you can make it? Williams shows how college basketball players attend college long enough to show their skills and meet the length requirement for the Professional Basketball League, then if they are selected for the pros, they drop out of college. Mick Hagen, who dropped out of Princeton and later developed the mobile app Undrip sees dropouts as “freethinkers, risk-takers… not tainted by groupthink”. Williams believes one can learn more from life experiences than a college degree. An example is Natalie Warne, who traveled on a gap-year internship after high school where she acquired experience in public speaking, event coordinating, and film editing. Eventually even appearing on Oprah. Williams acknowledges that not all professions can be attained without a degree like law or medicine. Yet quotes Michael Ellsberg, the author of “The Education of Millionaires: Everything You Won’t Learn in College
For many high school students, the obvious choice after graduation is going to college. But why has this become the norm? With many students being conditioned at a young to prepare for college, there might not seem like any other choice. As college tuitions continues to rise and the job market continues to decline, young adults have started to rethink the choice to attend college. After all, there have been many successful people who have not graduated college. This proves that one does not need to attend college to be successful and there are many different options besides a four-year university to gain knowledge that is useful for getting a job. In “Saying No to College”, author Alex Williams proves there are many successful individuals in the world who have not graduated college and gives a plethora of different ways to gain knowledge besides sitting in a classroom. He uses examples like Mark Zuckerburg and Steve Jobs, to name a few, that have been successful without a college degree. He asks why pay money if you can make it? Williams shows how college basketball players attend college long enough to show their skills and meet the length requirement for the Professional Basketball League, then if they are selected for the pros, they drop out of college. Mick Hagen, who dropped out of Princeton and later developed the mobile app Undrip sees dropouts as “freethinkers, risk-takers… not tainted by groupthink”. Williams believes one can learn more from life experiences than a college degree. An example is Natalie Warne, who traveled on a gap-year internship after high school where she acquired experience in public speaking, event coordinating, and film editing. Eventually even appearing on Oprah. Williams acknowledges that not all professions can be attained without a degree like law or medicine. Yet quotes Michael Ellsberg, the author of “The Education of Millionaires: Everything You Won’t Learn in College