The article by Nemko titled “America’s Most Overrated Product: The Bachelor’s Degree examines the value of college education to students who attend programs which last four years. According to Nemko, such programs have become very expensive. Having been a counselor in the past, he uses his experiences as counselor to support his assertions. Although his claims are valid, the author fails to acknowledge and address certain facts that that are critical to his claims. For instance, Nemko fails to appreciate the fact that the average income that persons holding college degrees is higher than the average income earned by those who do not have college degrees. Hence, it is simply not true that students have become easier to manipulate through the ‘misleading’ opinions about college degrees. Education is never a waste.
Nemko discredits large colleges for their perceived concentration on research work but fail to accord the same interest to students. For this reason, the author opines that such colleges do not equip the students with proper education. He consequently observes that students eventually leave those institutions with excessive debts. Nemko further asserts that a majority of college graduates do not end up in professional jobs. His observations are well-founded but only to the extent that most graduates fail to get into professional employment.
Failure to get professional employment can be explained in many ways such as the availability of limited professional jobs in the market as compared to the high number of students graduating from colleges every year. Limited professional job openings only mean that few graduates get the opportunity to work as professionals. Accordingly, where students enroll in colleges with a clear plan on the future while focusing on finding employment after graduating allows the students to choose a path that is ultimately beneficial.
On his statements regarding average income as regards college graduates vis-à-vis non-graduates, Nemko fails to support his assertions with statistics. He also fails to use statistics on the issue of the number of students who are likely to get employed after graduating from past data. It is imperative for the author to substantiate such assertions using statistics otherwise mere assertions can only be treated as speculation. It is noteworthy that the income of students who graduate from the community colleges which the author seem to support get to earn more than those who do not attend college at all. Nemko acknowledges this fact from his statement that even if one was to lock the “collegebound in a closet for four years, they'd still go on to earn more than the pool of non-collegebound” (Nemko 1).
It is contradictory on the part of the author to encourage students to consider enrolling in community colleges while on the same breath making a general assertion that there is little to learn from colleges. This is proof that despite Nemko’s opinion that college degrees are overrated he acknowledges that college education is important. His contention is therefore not the education itself but the amount of fees that colleges charge.
The bachelor’s degree may be overrated in the sense that more and more students are seeking college degrees in order to get higher salaries when they eventually find employment. Nevertheless, the article does not acknowledge the fact that people who hold mere college degrees are increasingly seeking additional education in a bid to set them above the rest and certainly earn more. In this sense, a college degree is prerequisite to attaining an advanced degree. It is therefore not proper to conclude that a college degree is useless.
The fact that employers are complaining about the supposed low level of preparedness with regard to recent graduates cannot be attributed to the instructions they receive in college. Students at colleges receive the same if not better training patterns from their professors, just like the past students. The more logical explanation for their perceived poor preparations can be attributed to the changes in workplaces. Today there are newer technologies being introduced in places of work. As such, more training is necessary and a bachelor’s degree is definitely a vital stride towards further learning on the ever-changing market.
With regard to the foregoing, Nemko completely ignores a large number of people who are willing to graduate from college, find entry level jobs and work their way up through experience. Entry level employment is not properly paid but there is an added advantage once a person gets a college degree. The degree holder gets higher pay than a non-graduate for the same work notwithstanding the efforts of the latter. A graduate also have a higher possibility of ending up in professional employment than a high-school dropout. Such aspects underscore the importance of a college degree.
Work Cited
Nemko, Marty. “America's Most Overrated Product: The Bachelor's Degree.” Chronicle of
Higher Education 2 May 2008: B17. MasterFILE Premier. Web. 12 Oct. 2013.
