How many of you followed the WTS direction on education years ago and have been screwed by it?

by Julia Orwell 119 Replies latest jw friends

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  just Ron

  I was not raised in the borg, I was already an adult with a degree and a career when I got sucked in. However, I do have three kids and I saw the pressure other parents were put under to keep their kids from going to university. There was one young sister who did go away to university, and she came home with a worldly husband and step son. The only other family to buck the trend sent their son to uni for an engineering degree, and he's quite successful in that career now, and none of that family attends meetings anymore. So the local elders use that as confirmation that university education is bad and will destroy your spirituality. Also, the COBE never went to university and he owns his own business selling industrial supplies and equipment. He's made good money at it, upper middle class lifestyle - ski trips, cruises, eating out all the time - so he thinks anyone can do just fine without a degree. He didn't let either of his kids go to a regular university - his daughter went to cosmetology school and his son went to a 2 year technical school for graphic design.

  I always told my kids that a good education was important and that they should choose something that they liked and that paid well. I guess in a few more years we would have been the black sheep of the hall when our oldest went away to uni.

  Finally Awake (of the too lazy to switch logins class)
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  Giordano

  I passed up college and pioneered where the need was great. Met and married a great sister. All of that time I was reading anything and everything. The book that helped me a great deal was Eric Hoffer's THE TRUE BELIEVER. I don't think he even knew about JW's he was writing about high control groups, how they tailored their message and how they were able to attract believers. It had the society down pat.

  My wife and I left when I was 23....we never looked back.

  I immediately went to a trade school that taught portrait and commercial photograpy. I could only afford 3 months of school.....we had started a family and it was time to start a career. It took until I was 30 before I felt on par with my peers income wise. By then I was selling Real Estate in South Florida and we were in the middle of a real estate boom. I took the bonus money and invested in myself and my wife and we launched a new career in the arts.

  We loved making art, exhibiting art and seeing our work hanging in galleries and museums. I retired at 60 my wife is still going strong. She had a one person show at the Huntington Museum last year. I in turn put my energy into volunteer work. I became a Trustee and Vice President of an important historic preservation foundation.
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  Giordano

  P.S. We are very pro education and have established college funds for our three grandchildren. My son also went to college.
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  LisaRose

  I came into the lie in 1968, when I was 13. I did not go to college due to the influence of the organization. Being new converts, my parents and I did not even consider that I would go to college, who needs a degree when the world is going to end? Instead I got married at 17, that was quite common then. I was extremely immature and picked poorly, it was not a happy marriage and my husband could my keep a job, so I worked full time from the time my youngest was one year old.

  I worked hard and had a bit of luck and eventually worked my way up to a pretty good career. I worked in manufacturing, and several other jobs, some good, some not. I finally landed in a company that I liked. I started as an admin, then auditor and finally systems analyst. I did well until a meltdown in that industry (telecommunications). I survived many layoffs, but eventually my number was up. So there I was, 50 years old, no job, and with no degree. Any job that was remotely in my career field required a degree and different skills than I had, my experience was too industry specific. And even though I contributed a lot to my 401k, I lost a most of it due to mismanagement and fraud, and all my company stock was now worthless. I decided to start my own business, as that had always been my dream. I have done this for eight years now but I have had to scale back due to health issues, so if I wasn't married, I would likely not even be able to support myself. I am 58 now, too young for social security, but too old to start over, considering my health, but not sick enough for disability, even if I had been paying into it. I consider myself lucky to be in a stable second marriage with a supportive husband, and money isn't a problem, but I still find it hard to not be contributing to the family income, as I was always self sufficient. I will get social security in a few years, and have a small amount of retirement savings.

  I read recently that the path I took, starting with an entry level job and working up, is not even possible now. So many people have degrees that even the most low level job requires a degree now.

  The WTBTS is doing its members a disservice by pretending a degree isn't needed. A 4 year degree is equivalent to what a high school education used to be, it is the minimum requirement.
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  I quit!

  I left the witnesses many years ago so the JWs in my family don't tell me a whole lot of what is going on in their JW world and what I do hear is warped by their JW perspective. The following good example of that.

  Years ago I heard that my wife's cousin's daughter had ran away from home. I believe she was 15 or 16 at the time. Of course at the time they were saying it was because she was evil. I didn't know the reason behind it till recently when we came in contact with each other through facebook. It turns out that what had happened was that she was offered a college scholarship but her parents would allow her to take advantage of it because the end was near and they wanted her to pioneer. She loved school and really wanted to further her education. She was so upset that they wouldn't let her take advantage of the offer that she ran away from home.

  I'm hoping at some point she will join this forum and tell her story.
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  Nice_Dream

  My husband is a draftsman, he took an acceptable 2 year program at college. 4 year programs were looked down upon by the JWs in our area. He could have gone to school for 2 more years and been an engineer. He never applied for entrance scholarships to university, and never considered a student loan because he felt debt was bad. He had some of the top marks in the Province, but tried to make due just to get by "in this system" because "the end was near."

  Now he wishes he had done things a bit differently! Fortunately our children will be encouraged to pursue their dreams and not have to worry if they are pleasing Jehovah or not.
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  NewYork44M

  I never followed the direction. Even as an elder I was taking classes. I never hid what I did, but I never advertised what I did. I sent my children to college.

  None of this made my ex-jw-wife happy, but I guess she is happy now give the fact that the only way I can afford the alimony payments is because I have a solid education and a career.
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  Bungi Bill

  I plead guilty to that.

  In our part of the world, the JWs took the pre-1975 hype even further, and tended to condemn any of their young people who even entered into a trade in during years. I was firstly prevented from going to university (even though a large company had offered to sponsor me), and then 12 months later was made to pull out of the apprenticeship that I had just entered in the telecommunications industry.

  With the assistance of some contacts my father had in the industry, I was later able to complete an apprenticeship in a related field (electrician). At the conclusion of this, my employer wanted to put me through the diploma course at polytech. However, my wife of the time strenuously objected , claiming that the "children now needed a father". She was quite correct about that, of course - a trade apprenticeship while you are an adult is murder on family life. I did, though, manage to complete a paper in Advanced Trade studies. That was enough to at least get me into the branch of the electrical trade (i.e. test work) that I was most interested in. Some in the congregation had the daggers out for me for even doing this. However, by that time I knew enough about what was what to (mentally, at least) give them the good old two-fingered salute!

  These days, I have the good fortune to be working at a site where they are prepared to employ me as an engineer: - regarding my advanced trade qualifications to be adequate, when coupled together with my extensive industry experience. To buttress this further, I am presently in the process of applying for membership of the Institute of Engineers as an Engineering Associate.

  This is not a course, though, that I would recommend to anyone. If I had my time over again, I would have without hesitation undertaken the degree course.

  At 58 years of age, I shudder to think of what my lot would now be if I had not at least managed to get into a trade while still a young adult:

  - the temperatures outside have been up to 48 Degrees Celsius this summer, and dragging a jack hammer around all day for a living in those conditions is definitely work for young men!

  Of course, the real victims in all this tomfoolery were my three children. For that, the WTS should be collectively shot with a ball of their own $h*t!

  Bill.
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  breakfast of champions

  Present. . . and in my 40's studying for a midterm exam this week
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  blondie

  I got a FT job right away out of high school...I had a parent and siblings to support. I lived in a university town. After 1975 more jw children went to college. College though is not a right or a due from your parents. I've seen non-jws get jobs, get scholarships (yes they are available to adult students...not just through high school), some with wives/husbands and children and FT jobs, some who had pissed and partied away there opportunities when they were 19, 20, 21, then came back to start over.

  A man once said, "it is not too late until you are dead."