A Foreword by Niagara At Large publisher Doug Draper
In a media release, posted below, from the office of Ontario’s Conservative Party opposition leader Tim Hudak, we are told , in so many words, that young people today are graduating from college and university palaces with hundreds of millions of our tax dollars in brick and mortar alone, and are coming out with huge debts and little to nothing in the way of real, decent-paying jobs.
Ontario Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak wants more jobs for students graduating from the province’s colleges and universities. Good luck funding that.
Ontario Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak wants more jobs for students graduating from the province’s colleges and universities. Good luck funding that.
If you look at Statistics Canada and other data, that is fairly well true. Earning a graduate degree at a college or university in almost anything these days might get you a job stocking shelves at a Wal-Mart Store ahead of getting one in your field.
So while I post the piece from the office of Ontario PC leader Tim Hudak below, I do so with a reluctant message to young people my daughter’s age to say to hell with college and university altogether, and use your intelligence to create new opportunities for yourselves in this changing economy that, quite frankly, our colleges and universities have not shown a very good track record of training people for.
Hudak may call Ontario’s colleges and universities “great equalizers” for giving students from any background a path for a good job. But they seem more like great heartbreakers that leave young people tens-of thousands of dollars in debt for a job market that is not there – except for maybe a minimum wage job at a box store. (You know, one of those stores. The ones you shop in for a discount deal for a cheap piece of plastic crap made in China while our governments continue to tolerate outsourcing, and our manufacturing base and decent paying jobs continue to melt down here.)
So why not cut the B.S. with younger generations and admit that the baby boomer generation and others have left them looking down the shitty end of the stick on the job front? Why come on like colleges and universities still meet job market needs? A college or university degree, earned by a Canadian or American on this continent, is now worth bullshit because corporations would rather higher people from underdeveloped countries who think that working for ten and a half bucks an hour is like hitting a gold mine.
If there was any real interest in hiring young Canadians graduating from colleges and universities here, the Stephen Harper federal government of Canada would not have recently announced plans to greet people from other countries that have skills that are not meeting the country’s employment needs. The Harper government’s plans to find workers from outside Canada were announced because companies in this country would rather exploit young people from third-world countries with low-wage expectations, rather than young people from Canada or the United States who expect to do at least as well as there parents or grandparents in fulfilling a dream of a decent living and life.
We may be far better off – young people and many of us older ones who have college and university degrees that don’t mean a shit in today’s job world – to say screw going to college or university. There is enough out there, through the internet, etc., to assist us in finding our own way.
Having said that, Niagara At Large is posting the latest media release below on Ontario Conservative Leader’s answer to the college and university degree mess around building up huge debts, then trying to find a decent paying job in a country where governments think it is all to fine to outsource those jobs to regions of the world where people will do the same work with all but chains and shackles on.
By the way, if anyone is wondering if I have any university experience to back up what I am talking ab out, I have an Honour’s B.A. in Psychology from Brock University and a Master of Art’s degree from the University of Western Ontario – neither one of which are worth a what my cats leave in the litter box in today’s job world.
Now here is Tim Hudak’s post.
COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES MUST MEET JOB MARKET NEEDS
QUEEN’S PARK, February 12 – Ontario has too many students who graduate with degrees – and deep debts – and then can’t find a job, PC Leader Tim Hudak and Training, Colleges and Universities Critic Dr. Rob Leone said today.
“Our colleges and universities must meet the needs of a twenty-first century job market,” Hudak said. “If we can help them achieve that goal, our investments in post-secondary education will grow our economy too.”
Hudak and Leone – himself a former Wilfrid Laurier professor – made the comments to launch Paths to Prosperity: Higher Learning for Better Jobs.
“Ontario has strong colleges and universities,” Hudak said. “But too many graduates can’t find work in the areas for which they’ve prepared. At the same time, we face a shortage of skilled workers in the coming decades,” he added, noting a 2012 Auditor General’s finding that only 65 per cent had found jobs related to what they studied in university.
Leone said we must ensure we have better schools producing graduates with the skills to meet the needs of our economy: “So along with ideas to improve quality for students at universities, we propose a ‘College First’ strategy for more applied learning.”
Higher Learning for Better Jobs calls for:
- Allowing colleges to offer three year applied degrees, such as a Bachelor of Applied Technology Degree, designed to teach leadership roles in the construction industry
- Expanding the “dual credit” program, so more high school students consider college, in which students can earn credit toward their high school diploma and their college education, and
- Encouraging regional relationships between colleges and universities and linking future growth in universities to creating paths for transferring college students
Hudak called our colleges and universities “the great equalizers” for giving students from any background a path to a good job. “Our strategy will ease the pressure on universities, and ensure students who choose university are properly prepared and receive the best quality education.”
(Niagara At Large invites you to share your views below, remembering that we only post views by individuals who also share their first and last name with their comments.)
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Hudak just wants worker bees, as George Carlin said…”educated enough to do the dirty work but not enough to realize they’re being used.”
Not everyone is cut out for university and the debt that ensues is mind boggling. Trades are often more in demand and even more lucrative.
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I agree with Linda McKellar that we desperately need trades people to keep the economy moving. There are too many U. and C. grads working at much underpaid, and undervalued jobs. I was of the lucky cohort that was able to get reasonable jobs upon graduation, but have seen so many changes and so many losses over the years with my children’s working life. Students today have little to look forwrd to. No wonder our high school students are so stressed, as a recent survey indicates.
Sometimes lower learning might lead to better jobs.
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Some years ago — more than I care to count — I wrote a piece called “Suggestions for an Alternative Philosophy of Education.” Another was titled, “To What End Education.” They were evidences of my earliest thinking about what genuine education should be. After more than 40 years of teaching — from gr. 1 through university and college — I am still thinking about that. I have drawn one conclusion, however, that has remained virtually unchanged. I believe we “educate” to create the “ideal citizen” of our culture. In Canada that means raiding “the corporate child”: a cog in the corporate wheel. I believe doing so is wrong!
To raise truly free citizens, we must educate so as to grow them to be thinkers. Thinkers, however, may reject our culture’s guiding principles, e.g. that “growth” should be the measure of economic health and hence corporate success. Indeed, thinkers may well come to conclude that the “growth” of the bottom line is nothing more than a social cancer killing our environment and ultimately the human race.
I have never ceased to be amazed at what thinking young people can accomplish without the help of the education system. What they accomplish, however, is often in direct opposition to corporate interests, e.g, the work of Craig Kielburger and Malala Yousafzai, to name but two. Both challenged the power structures of their own cultures. Both are changing the world. How many grads can claim that distinction? Indeed, how many “educated” adults of any age can do so?
My own son appeared on Canada AM when he was only 9 having started his own business, in the first hour of which he earned $38 when college/university students were earning less than $7 per hour!
While on the Principals’ Course at Queen’s some years ago, I overheard two university students standing out the student “employment office” bemoaning the inability of the staff there to find them summer jobs. Meanwhile, down the way at the opposite end of the campus, two boys were selling coffee, snacks, newspapers, and whatever other “special requests” they could fulfill to earn money from those on the Principals’ Course. The boys had not finished high school. I guarantee they did not learn in school to do what they were doing. I also guarantee they are doing very well even in today’s economy! While in North York, I was teaching primary kids (grades 1-3) to run businesses—an undertaking not on the course of study per se. One pair of students created an insurance business, two others discovered what we know as “inflation” and another was creative enough to cause a “run” on the class bank. Yet another student, from the Ontario Housing project nearby, earned the most money in the class! Yet another student made a short animated film. Many adults do not have their acumen.
We need to rethink whether education is for the benefit of those seeking education, or whether it is for the good of the society as a whole, or at least a better balance of both. But, surely, education is not for the benefit of corporate Canada. True freedom means getting the education that best meets one’s own needs without hindering the opportunity of others to do the same. The best education nurtures the development of responsibly independent members of society.
Perhaps it is time to see if there is a better way to educate, especially with the technology that we have available now. Why should the best education I ever earned have come outside of formal schooling? How much better to have had that help from within the system? Perhaps my observation — in grade 5 — that the continents of Africa and South America seemed to have been connected at some time, would not have been met with, “Surely you don’t think continents move!” might have been better answered with, “How might we find out if that’s true?”
I know I have been a thorn in the side of some teachers, administrators, and colleagues, and I’m sure some students, too. Others have appreciated, even commended, stands I have taken. Some others discussed my ideas with me. They helped me the most! In any case I think for myself and take responsibility for what I think. I didn’t learn that in the public system. I learned it largely in the “school of hard knocks.” I certainly appreciate and owe a great deal to teachers like my grade seven/eight teacher, Jack McGregor, for encouraging me to think for myself and not to simply regurgitate the thinking of others. He was rare! He was also a life-long learner: learning his best teaching outside of teachers’ college.
Interestingly, the very best primary teacher I know doesn’t even have a degree. Yet, she has managed to get her principal’s papers and heads up a special needs department in a private school of some note.
Love those who encourage students to think for themselves, and to think outside the box – the school box, that is! Save us from people who claim to know what is good for us!
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You may have opened up a hornets’ nest here Doug!
I agree with your comments that Universities and Colleges are not cutting it these days. I only lightly skimmed over what Hudak had to say. He isn’t worth commenting on.
As for the problem facing young people today: North American society puts far too much emphasis on pushing students to go to university. I retired about two years ago after a working career that started in 1964.
Back when I was in high school, we were offered a choice of courses – those that put emphasis on continuing on to university, or those that put emphasis on becoming a skilled tradesperson.
Very few schools today offer any courses that would lead students to enter the skilled trades – carpenters, welders, mechanics, heavy equipment operators etc.
The construction industry today is crying for skilled workers all across this country. At the same time, we have people who spent four or five years to obtain a BA or similar degree who have to take jobs serving burgers.
Basically, society has listened to the educational elite far too much. We need workers today who can do the jobs that need to be done. The emphasis is on the “can do.”
Oh, by the way – I was able to go through my entire career as a journalist and Public Relations practitioner without ever graduating from high school.
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With tenure at college and university, there isn’t much incentive to introduce new courses that meet students’ interests and needs if one is intent on protecting the teaching jobs in these higher institutions. One teaches what one knows; but what happens when one doesn’t know much about what is needed or wanted? What if it is no longer relevant? Does anyone want a course on alchemy: turning lead into gold? I wouldn’t be surprised if somewhere there is still a “professor” teaching it because he/she has tenure. On the other hand some of the “Mickey Mouse” courses offered in college and university pander to the dull at heart. What is needed is a more dynamic interplay between skills and knowledge offered and skills and knowledge sought to meet real interests and real needs. The shotgun approach to elementary and secondary school does not have to be.
On the other hand, should the market drive the product? Who should decide what is offered and for what purpose? There are many questions that need to be addressed. In the end, however, the system will need a major overall, one that is long overdue.
Some of the most successful people I have known (at least in their rise to positions of influence and power, well paid to boot) never went to college or university. Some never finished high school yet each was recognized for their outstanding contributions.
Formal schooling is but one way to get an education. We sure can, if we wish to do so, find other ways to learn and qualify for jobs. I think of Dave Ramsey, entrepreneur, author, financial “wise man,” and founder of Financial Peace University. When hiring staff he isn’t as interested in whether one has an undergraduate degree, a master’s, or a doctorate. He is more interested in what a prospect can do and can prove that he/she can do. What a novel litmus test for an employee!
It’s easy to ask for a piece of paper. However, in the end it is what one can do that counts. Ah, but colleges and universities are all about the paper! Skills outweigh paper every time! Sometimes the tortoise does beat the hare. Perhaps more than we realize. I believe it was the founder of FedEx whose proposal to a professor was rejected as basically unsound. Duh!
Consider, too, how much Einstein must have learned outside the classroom. Thinking great thoughts when he was a boy, some of his teachers thought he was dull. I wonder how many of their names and contributions the world knows.
Monopoly® was created by an unemployed worker. He thought “outside the box” and his schooling isn’t what got him thinking; he adapted to his situation and learned what he needed as he needed it.
Have you ever considered just how much time you spent in school learning things you have never used, and may never use, and how much time you spent outside learning what you wanted most to learn?
Is there a place for formal education? Yes! However, it will make more sense and be of greater value if given its much needed major overhaul. And, here is a novel thought. Why not include in the very group that works on the changes some students. There are some excellent thinkers out there. Some of them, unfortunately, have already dropped out.
Perhaps I should have listened to my high school Guidance Head, “Why not quit; you’re wasting your time?” She was right to a great extent. I have learned far more outside the system than within it. I’ve seen too many creative, bright, able students turn off and drop out. Formal schooling is great for some, but certainly not all. There has to be a better way to grow a knowledgeable, responsibly independent citizenry.
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I do agree with much of what you wrote Doug and oh Lord, just love the language used! 😉 You had me laughing Doug, and I needed that.
However, I think we are getting too far ahead of ourselves when we think only about jobs, not careers. Our labour market is not generating anything that one can even write home about, let alone to pay one enough to have a home to write to … there are some good paying jobs in different parts of the region and province, but these jobs do not go to the most qualified applicants. In this region and probably everywhere, it has more to do with who you know, as opposed to WHAT you know. For example, WHO made the decision where to place the hospital in St. Catharines? Was there not a multi million dollar traffic study done before this was located there, and the decision was made to locate there prior to this study. Then later it is announced how many millions more the taxpayers will have to pay to accommodate this location? What was the education of this person? I bet you they did not have proper credentials, same as others that make other politically driven or motivated decisions that in actuality cost us more in the long run. Yet many people that could have made more rational, financially sound decisions based on their education credentials are currently flipping burgers at some fast food restaurant.
Further, how about people with disabilities? I don’t see any in executive suites, yet they are supposed to be satisfied in low wage, repetitive, meaningless work to subsidize or top up their inflation bitten meagre pensions. I think the responsibility here lies squarely on the shoulders of employers to ensure qualified personnel are hired in jobs they offer. In the public sector, or publicly supported sectors, such as hospitals, non profit agencies, and so forth, I don’t see too many people with disabilities there either in senior positions. Yet I can reliably identify many people in this region that have disabilities that can and want to work that have excellent credentials and if any of them were given the opportunities to make certain decisions in this region, my bet would be that the location of our hospital would not be where it is today, among some other crazy decisions that seem to be repeatedly made by the same people all the time.
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