College Degree Required

by respectful_observer 14 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  respectful_observer

  I don't anticipate seeing this article, or its supporting data, referenced in any WT publications anytime soon...

  ......................................

  http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/20/business/college-degree-required-by-increasing-number-of-companies.html?hpw&_r=0

  A few excerpts:

  The college degree is becoming the new high school diploma: the new minimum requirement, albeit an expensive one, for getting even the lowest-level job.

  Like other employers across the country, the firm hires only people with a bachelor’s degree, even for jobs that do not require college-level skills.

  This prerequisite applies to everyone, including the receptionist, paralegals, administrative assistants and file clerks. Even the office “runner” — the in-house courier who, for $10 an hour, ferries documents back and forth between the courthouse and the office — went to a four-year school.

  This up-credentialing is pushing the less educated even further down the food chain, and it helps explain why the unemployment rate for workers with no more than a high school diploma is more than twice that for workers with a bachelor’s degree: 8.1 percent versus 3.7 percent.

  Some jobs, like those in supply chain management and logistics, have become more technical, and so require more advanced skills today than they did in the past. But more broadly, because so many people are going to college now, those who do not graduate are often assumed to be unambitious or less capable.

  In 2012, 39 percent of job postings for secretaries and administrative assistants in the Atlanta metro area requested a bachelor’s degree, up from 28 percent in 2007, according to Burning Glass.
• 

  Splash

  I don't need a college degree.

  I have a WT Masters from reading Awake! magazine for 20 years.

  Splash.
• 

  hamsterbait

  There was a request many years ago for bethel Vounteers with expertise in electronics. One Brother had worked for over 20 years in this area, so volunteered.

  They rejected his application as they said"you only have a DIPLOMA not a degree."

  HMMMM

  HB
• 

  DATA-DOG

  HB, that's awesome! I know I girl who got a very good job with a Data-storage/server facility because she knew someone and had a good work ethic. It is a major company so I am happy for her. She was a JW janitor and now she is in administration. Sadly, it is an exception, not the rule. I know from searching that the majority of employers want some kind of degree. They want to know that you know what you are doing. I can understand that. The older I get, the less I want to physically kill myself every day with labor. I do not know what I am going to do...
• 

  LongHairGal

  respectful_observer:

  This has been the case, unfortunately, for quite some time. It started long before the economy and job situation got bad.

  The reason for this is because education has become so dumbed-down that many graduates of high schools in certain areas were hardly literate and unable to fill out a job application or do basic arithmetic!

  Years ago, a child would be left-back and made to repeat the year if they failed. No more.

  Schools don't want to deal with it or all the social problems we have in society today. So, what you have in some cases are students handed a h.s. diploma who do not even have basic skills that people generations earlier acquired by the eighth grade!

  What is an employer to do in a job market where applicants are so numerous the line stretches around the block and more?? The employer picks the person with the most education.

  Unless an applicant is recommended by word of mouth, this is the way it is nowadays.
• 

  out4good3

  Finishing my MS degree this summer.

  I saw this trend coming 20 years ago and tried to talk to my JW wife about it to get her serious about working towards an employable future. She would have none of it and sided with the JW elders who sat in my living room and berated me for not putting kingdom interests first by spending the time I was spending in school pursuing an AA degree in the door to door service.

  If it weren't for that decision I made all those years ago, we'd both be pounding the pavement in minimun wage jobs and struggling to live paycheck to paycheck now instead of her not having to work at all for the past 15 years and us living in a house that could fit inside it both houses of the elders who were telling me that I was wasting my time.
• 

  gingerbread

  Specialized training, certifications and degrees have become the dividing line between to hire or not to hire in many companies. There is also a direct, statistical relationship between levels of education and earnings. And between levels of education and unemployment numbers.

  Some JW's think that the Society has put itself in a bad economic position by not encouraging higher education. I disagree. Persons of lower income brackets (and in most third world countries) historically give all of their surplus income to "the church." The Society also knows that knowledge is power and they want to control the education level of the faithful. The JW's (myself included) that decided to go against the "direction" of the WT and earn degrees find a sense of freedom. We make more money than we need to live on, enjoy vacations and hobbies, plan for retirement & stay out of debt.
• 

  Apognophos

  Some JW's think that the Society has put itself in a bad economic position by not encouraging higher education. I disagree. Persons of lower income brackets (and in most third world countries) historically give all of their surplus income to "the church."

  Interesting thought, gingerbread. I suppose that if all the friends were successfully saving up for retirement and medical bills, they wouldn't be so desperately looking forward to Armageddon to come soon....
• 

  gingerbread

  Apognophos - If you still attend meetings (or choose to remember them), really listen to the comments made during a meeting. Folks in their 50's and up emotionally bemoan the conditions that we have to contend with in "this wicked world." They did things the "right way" and now find themselves without a pot to p#ss in. Because of choosing to do labor intensive work with low pay they find themselves with no savings or emergency fund, no retirement, bills they can barely pay, fighting depression and anxiety.... Sure they want things to come to an end as quickly as possible - to relieve their own pain. Sadly many have become "old people" before their time (look around at a convention). They have sacrificed their happiness and health for a religious organization.

  These well meaning people are our grandparents, parents and siblings. The cycle has to stop!
• 

  sir82

  Folks in their 50's and up emotionally bemoan the conditions that we have to contend with in "this wicked world."

  Very insightful.

  There is a strong, direct correlation between age, and the intensity of statements such as "this system just CAN'T go on much longer..."

  Such statements are made to reinforce, in the speaker's mind, that all that effort hasn't been for nought.