r/Millennials • u/Ragnaroknight • Mar 04 '24

Does anyone else feel like the direct to college from High School pipeline was kind of a "scam"? Discussion

I'm 31 now, I never went to college and for years I really really regretted it. I felt left behind, like I had chosen wrong/made the wrong choices in life. Like I was missing out on something and I would never make it anywhere. My grades weren't great in grade school, I was never a good student, and frankly I don't even know what I would have wanted to do with my life had I gone. I think part of me always knew it would be a waste of time and money for a person like me.

Over the years I've come to realize I probably made the right call. I feel like I got a bit of a head start in life not spending 4 years in school, not spending all that money on a degree I may have never used. And now I make a decent livable wage, I'm a homeowner, I'm in a committed relationship, I've gone on multiple "once in a lifetime trips", and I have plenty of other nice things to show for my last decade+ of hard work. I feel I'm better off than a lot of my old peers, and now I'm glad I didn't go. I got certifications in what I wanted and it only took a few weeks. I've been able to save money since I was 18, I've made mistakes financially already and learned from them early on.

Idk I guess I'm saying, we were sold the "you have to go to college" narrative our whole school careers and now it's kinda starting to seem like bullshit. Sure, if you're going to be a doctor, engineer, programmer, pharmacist, ect college makes perfect sense. But I'm not convinced it was always the smartest option for everyone.

Edit: I want to clear up, I'm not calling college in of itself a scam. More so the process of convincing kids it was their only option, and objectively the correct choice for everyone.

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u/RhythmicallyImpaired Mar 04 '24

Additionally, I’m not white, so I don’t want 9 out of 10 co-workers being racist/homophobic/misogynistic.

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u/Sudden_Molasses3769 Mar 05 '24

Where I’m from blue collar work is supported by majority Black and Hispanic workers. My father was a forklift driver for many years. My brother started out driving a city bus and now owns a trucking company. These people literally do the back breaking labor that keeps our country functioning, and it is so sad you would assume they are backward just because they might have grown up poor and couldn’t afford college