THE BEGINNING of the spring semester is marked by a few memorable events. Rushing and pledging are two that are very common. Proponents will point to brotherhood and sisterhood. Critics find it hard to understand why anyone would pay for a group of friends. Yet hardly anyone questions the purpose of college itself, which fails to serve as much more than a paid social network. The main purpose of college is education, but this is rarely realized.
Students have been fed a theory that they have come from an assembly line high school which cranks out robotic students who have succeeded based on rote memorization and repetition of what their teachers wanted to hear. Stepping foot onto a college campus frees them from their intellectual prisons. Along with this liberation comes a new arena of learning. Inside the college classroom, students are made to believe that they are being challenged to think outside the box, to think for themselves, to "learn how to learn." Outside, their learning is through real world applications of classroom lessons.
These are all convenient catchphrases that mask the lack of useful education provided by collegiate institutions. The epiphany comes when future graduates realize the worth of their degrees. Especially for students in the College, degrees mean little when searching for jobs. What many will find is that experience and skills matter more than majors and minors. Additionally, majors are more or less interchangeable in applying for entry-level jobs. For the basic occupation, a chemistry major with an interest in poetry can land the same position as a sociology major who worked for a pet store since it does not take much to make photocopies or to jot down the minutes to a meeting. From there, raises and advancements are based more on performance than college education.
More importantly, these entry-level skills do not require a formal education. But students are pressured from an early stage - middle school for most - to perform well academically to get into the best colleges. The struggle to get into college is phased out by performing well in college in the hopes of achieving a competitive grade point average. Much like how a high school GPA only helps determine where we attend college, a college GPA only helps determine where we get an entry-level job. However, moving from job to job is easier than transferring from college to college, thus decreasing the impact of a college GPA.
In ten years, not many individuals will remember what they learned in their second writing requirement course, or how to take the derivative of an integral, or the difference between a ketone and an aldehyde. We still find ourselves following the path set up for us since elementary school: going to class, studying for tests and getting good grades. Along the way we learn few job-related skills and theoretical ideas that will stay with us after graduating.
Lastly, we are not going through the motions for our own good or for our own maturation. A day working on a farm will probably build more work ethic than a semester behind a desk. The reason for coming to college is to show future employers that we have a higher or better education than the next candidate.
College is still an institution, and institutions are tough to change. But without an effective education, college is no different than a very large co-ed fraternity without the hazing. Being a brother or sister confers the same bond as sharing an alma mater. Membership in certain fraternities and sororities supposedly shows social status while membership in certain colleges supposedly shows intellectual status. Fraternities and sororities build their unity around some Greek letters while colleges build resumes with numbers on a four-point scale.
Still, part of the beauty of college is the social experience. While parties and drunken stupors are not unique to college, some experiences are. Gaining culture through Shakespearean plays or putting on Sunday's best for Saturday gamedays prepares us for future Jeopardy game nights and cocktail parties. Is knowing who Jane Eyre is and how to dress for a dinner event worth the price of admission?
Hung Vu's column appears Tuesdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at h.vu@cavalierdaily.com.
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