The Education Edge

On the one hand, you have the argument that an education is required if a young person is to have any kind of future. Good jobs are hard to come by and the fierce competition faced at every application is fierce.On the other hand, some would argue that there is no better school than on the job training. Active participation in OJT will never be matched by classroom simulation and weeks of placement at the end of the journey of study cannot compete with actual job experience.

Let’s try to dissect the issue and look at the inner components logically:

Pursuing post secondary education requires that you know what you want to do. There is significant time and financial commitment attached to higher education and no guarantees of employment. You will be wasting a significant amount of time and money if you decide in four years that you have made the wrong career choice. The flipside of this debate would encourage you get a job in a chosen field and take advantage of the opportunity to observe and absorb to determine your compatibility. In the four years that a peer spends in college, you can try out several career avenues and quite possibly find your true calling.

Following the study years, a graduate typically has to start in an entry level position, so are they really any farther ahead than the uneducated contender?  Some would say no, the educated counterpart is already four years behind and carrying a massive student debt.However, in a competitive job market an education regularly edges out the applicant who didn’t study, especially in the early career stages. With equal experience levels, the applicant who cared enough to invest in his future and wanted to enter his chosen field armed and prepared is often viewed as a safer choice than the drifter who wasn’t stable enough to set goals and see them through. Employers can be very unforgiving when looking for point by which to narrow applicants.

In the end, getting an education is not something that one would ever look back on with regret, but not getting an education might be.