Meet the Parents Who Won't Let Their Children Study Literature

Parents Forum
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As an aside, the large loan debt issue isn’t necessarily due to undergrads from low-income families taking out massive loans to attend private elite/respectable colleges.

For starters, if they managed to earn admission to such institutions, they’re likely fully covered or close to it.

Secondly, attending one’s local public college even as an in-state student doesn’t guarantee one will not end up with large amounts of education loan debt.

I’ve lost count of how many friends I know who accumulated massive debts from attending public colleges or sometimes even community colleges due to factors such as having to drop out for a semester to make up the next term’s tuition/living expenses, budget shortfalls on the public college system’s side which meant less/no FA for students who needed it, and more.

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@sevmo - I know many parents who want their kids to be engineers and I think since they’ve been pushing it since birth, the kids actually think so too. Then when the kid gets to college and can’t get past the first year classes in math, chemistry, etc. they feel like a failure. I know we need to guide our kids gently, they are, indeed, only 17 or 18 years old. But unless the parent is going to sit in the class, do the work, take the tests, go to the study groups and do the all nighters, then there should be some other major that fits the parent’s bill of being marketable and yet the child can enjoy.

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A talented senior corporate speechwriter can make $300k a year. (the job will have a fancy title like “Director of Executive Communications”). How do you get those jobs? By starting as a speechwriter- in DC or a state capitol, writing talking points for a state senator, or crafting the opening remarks for a Congressman who is sticking a shovel in the dirt to mark the opening of a new bridge or tunnel project. Nobody rolls out of bed and gets paid $300K - you start at the beginning and work your way from there.

If someone wants to be a nurse or a CPA then fantastic. I don’t think anyone on this thread is arguing that point.

The discussion is what to do with a kid who DOESN’T like nursing or accounting- and how to best shove (one point of view) or guide (another point of view) or cajole (yet a third point of view) that kid into something that he or she IS interested in. Which also pays a living wage (at however you want to define that). And has career advancement potential (however you want to define that). And is stimulating if you care about that.

I am trying to point out that there are lots of interesting ways to earn a living which don’t involve nursing or accounting. Even for a kid from a modest background who doesn’t have the bank of mom and dad bankrolling him/her. Believe it or not- there are kids working at museums and foundations and think tanks and at NGO’s who do not come from affluent families. They earn what they earn- get raises every year- probably have a roommate or two depending on the city they live in, and somehow, they manage to advance.

If you don’t know anyone like this- I get that you think this is another variation of “would you like fries with that”. But I don’t think there’s any shame in a new college grad making 30K or whatnot, having roommates, renting an occasional zipcar to make a Walmart run to buy paper towels but otherwise using public transportation, and having enough money to pay their loans. Especially since the first job leads to the second job which leads to the next job. etc.

You want your kid to study something practical? Great. Kid happens to be good at that thing? Even better. But why inflict a terrible nurse on the world if your kid could have been a fantastic something else?

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@middleburyDad2 - Why the jump on @scout59 ? There were several pages with posters bashing the mediocrity and “easiness” of accounting.

@cobrat - please stop comparing the CPA exam back “in the day” with today’s pass rates. They are different for several reasons - a big one being we had to sit for all 4 sections at once, 2.5 days of straight testing, only given 2 times during the year. The CPA exam was (and is) uniform nationally, but states varied in the past on how the exam could be passed. In my state, 2 parts had to be passed at the same sitting (with a score >75%), and no score could be lower than 50%. This means a candidate could have 99% on 3 parts and 49% on one part, and nothing counted. There were 3 years to pass any remaining parts–that is why you keep referencing 6 testings. There was extremely poor reciprocity between states, so one had better sit where one wanted to practice.

@JHS - Sorry if I took your post wrong. I inferred you felt you could pass the exam. “They (and I) had no doubt that they could teach me and I could learn everything I would need to know to take the CPA exam in due course.” I’m curious about Big 8 giving out so many offers to non-accounting grads, as the pressure to pass the exam for new hires in public accounting was/is intense…very intense, and most of these non-majors wouldn’t have qualified to sit for the exam.

From the AICPA
" Passing rates from the computer-based CPA Examination should NOT be compared to the paper-and-pencil examination passing rates. In April 2004, when the computer-based examination was launched, the content and format of the examination changed as did the testing environment and the rules governing testing. Unlike candidates taking the examination in the paper-and-pencil format, candidates taking the computer-based examination have much more flexibility - they are permitted to take one section at a time and may schedule testing appointments during eight months of the year." ONE section at a time! 8 times a year! People my age are still salivating at how great this would have been.

Current pass rates of the CPA exam are 45-56%, depending on which of the 4 sections. In contrast, the pharmacy Board pass rate of ACPE accredited programs average 95.35% The first time national average medical board pass rates are 81-96%, depending on specialty. Pharmacy and medical schools control their professional numbers at entrance; the accounting profession does it after the education.

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I know plenty of new doctors and lawyers who are drowning in debt and are living just to pay off their loans. The bigger picture is that the cost of college has gotten so high that the vast middle 50% who are neither rich nor destitute leave school with tens of thousands of debt unless they are lucky enough to be accepted to a needs blind, loan free institution - which of course is not an option for most. So many of these kids who are being pushed into engineering by their parents would be so much happier doing HVAC, being an electrician or plumber. And one thing is for sure, they will always have a well paying job without the massive debt. But I know, vocational training is a bad concept here on CC where all parents think that their children need to get a 4 year college education.

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How is it so strange to think that a kid actually might want to be a nurse or an accountant? “inflict a terrible nurse” “third rate accountant”( Post 7) sounds pretty dramatic .I’ll bet there are plenty of third rate people in any profession, even yours. There is nothing inherently better about any profession or path to a profession.

@Tperry1982 ,Both of my kids are engineers. So is my husband, so was his dad. In no way, did we “push it.” My oldest had to write something in high school about his goals. He said astronaut. I told him he was too tall so needed to think about something else. He said physicist or engineer. When it came time to tour college, we toured the physics department and the engineering department. HE picked engineering. I could have cared less what he wanted to study as it is not my life. Younger kid had fine SAT’s but was not the best student in high school. He said he wanted to study engineering. I was actually shocked- did not see it coming. He did very well in college in engineering, exceeded any of my expectations. Some kids, even at a young age, really do have an idea of what they want to do-whether that is engineering, nursing, accounting, pharmacy, marine science, geology, medicine, theater, scientific research. What would be the reason to have them not pursue that as an undergraduate? Would it be just for the sake of getting a liberal arts education? (not just directing that question to you). Any major also has room to explore other things.

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“@middleburyDad2 - Why the jump on @scout59 ? There were several pages with posters bashing the mediocrity and “easiness” of accounting.”

@sryrstress , nobody was “bashing” anything. like @scout59, you would benefit from folding in some context and laying off the drama. there is a difference between “accessible” and “easy”. My exact words were, “A kid who has taken through Algebra III can cut through accounting coursework and pass the CPA with little difficulty if they are at all intelligent.” And I stand by that because I actually know what I’m talking about. Accounting does not offer the same degree of rigor or barrier to entry that, say, Physics or Engineering does. Most people CAN become accountants if they want to. Many people cannot get through Physics or Engineering because they can’t handle the quants.

And it was @itsgettingreal17 who, again, introduced the rhetoric and hyperbole to which you refer. unless I missed it, the only person who used “mediocrity” and “accounting” in the same sentence was @itsgettingreal17 in yet another attempt to make a point by ascribing to others an argument that they are in fact not making. and now you’re helping him/her out.
To understand the context of the counter-push here, I offer you @tucsonmom 's post (in relevant part):

“… I will totally admit that you could probably lump my spouse & I in the category of “those parents who don’t let their children study literature.” I’m not going to spend tens of thousands of $$ on an english degree. If our kids want to pursue that, they can figure out a way to pay for it themselves. Blast away at me with cannon fodder. That’s pretty much how we feel. At the end of your college experience, you need to find gainful employment…not work as a Starbucks barista and live at home until you’re 30 years old.”

Again, it’s the idea that English Degree = Starbucks barista, absent law school or something. And it’s coupled with the equally stupid and uninformed idea that Technical Degree = Job Security and Promising Career.

They are both incorrect and ridiculously misleading generalizations.

It is against that backdrop, and within that context, that this discussion is taking place.

And I, along with others, have conceded that, for an unlucky group who absolutely must land on their feet making a good starting salary and must have that certainty and predictability right after college, a more career-specific major may make the most sense. But it does not follow from that, at least for clear thinking people, that you’re doing yourself a disservice by not pursuing such an education.

I also offered my take on the virtues of a good and well rounded liberal education, but I’m not going to repeat it now.

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I googled “Director of Executive Communications” and immediately found an opening at Microsoft.
https://careers.microsoft.com/jobdetails.aspx?jid=261615
For some reason they are asking for Undergraduate Degree (minimum) in Communications, Business, Journalism, or equivalent. I am wondering if degree in Comparative Literature will be an equivalent.

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The Big 4 hire people from lots of different majors. But they are not necessarily being hired as an accountant.

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"googled “Director of Executive Communications” and immediately found an opening at Microsoft.
https://careers.microsoft.com/jobdetails.aspx?jid=261615
For some reason they are asking for Undergraduate Degree (minimum) in Communications, Business, Journalism, or equivalent. I am wondering if degree in Comparative Literature will be an equivalent. "

@CCDD14 is that a rhetorical question? yeah, I’m guessing it would. I know I’d hire a comp lit kid for a communications job over a business major any day of the week.

and even if not in that single instance, this demonstrates nothing. “communications” and “journalism” degrees don’t really fall into the super-charged career major category. I think most people on this thread would limit that to things like accounting, finance, computer science, engineering, bio-[fill in the blank], etc. Not communications.

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This is not news, folks. http://www.forbes.com/sites/georgeanders/2015/07/29/liberal-arts-degree-tech/#45061be85a75

http://www.businessinsider.com/tech-companies-need-english-majors-2014-2

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Just strange that these dumb people at Microsoft would consider somebody with a narrow pre-professional major for a Director position. We all know such people do not have critical thinking skills.

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“Just strange that these dumb people at Microsoft would consider somebody with a narrow pre-professional major for a Director position. We all know such people do not have critical thinking skills.”

@CCDD14 - Do you really consider journalism and communications “pre-professional”? And do you REALLY not understand that the corporate world is crawling, absolutely crawling, with English degrees operating in Corporate Affairs and Comms? Finally, do you not know there is no overlap between what is taught in a communications or journalism curriculum and a business curriculum? Here’s the hint you so desperately need: Communications and Journalism people spend a lot more time in the English department than the biz kids do.

You need to keep looking for an example to make your point. The one you picked almost makes mine. Congratulations. You’re the guy who shoots himself during your own robbery.

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“The Big 4 hire people from lots of different majors.” Correct. Thank you.

“But they are not necessarily being hired as an accountant.” Correct again. You need the accounting curriculum (not necessarily the BA or BS) before they’ll hire you to be … an accountant.

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@CCDD14 This is somewhat of a red herring in this discussion since the job is not for out-of-college applicants.

Qualifications:
•Undergraduate Degree (minimum) in Communications, Business, Journalism, or equivalent.
•7 years+ years of tech PR, marketing, or speech management experience.
•Excellent writing and overall communications skills.
•A love for storytelling.

•Previous experience working with senior executives in fast paced, high pressure environments

How many pre-professional degrees allow you to demonstrate a lifelong love for storytelling? Comparative literature certainly does.

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@LadyMeowMeow , it isn’t somewhat of a red herring. It is entirely a red herring. In fact, it’s worse. The example he uses almost argues against what he’s trying to establish.

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When I was first hired in business as a marketing research consultant, my highest degree was a BA in economics and an MA in sociology. My boss had a PhD in philosophy. My co-worker had a PhD in English. When it was my turn I hired an anthropologist. (Hint: A lot of people in the position to make hiring decisions have exactly the kind of liberal arts background that @MiddleburyDad2 has been talking about. And what does that suggest about who they will feel an affinity with?)

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@EllieMom ,

So true. Your experience jibes with mine. That’s why I often write when this debate comes up that all of these parents who think they’ve got this all figured out will crap their pants when they realize that their technically educated kid is four management levels removed from a guy with a math or government degree who is running the company.

I think the issue is that a lot of people just don’t know this. It would be comical if not for the implications of men or women running around out there poisoning young minds with stupidity like “English Major = Starbucks Barista”.

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Of course, any business , even technical ones, need marketers, business people, communications people. That is common sense. But technical companies also need people like engineers and CS people. The company my older kid works for competes for top engineering and CS, talent. He has been asked to accompany recruiters to a couple top colleges recently to represent the technical side of the job . At the last school, he said kids were lined up the entire day waiting to talk to people from his company. Most colleges provide opportunities for their students to meet with employers, across most majors. It’s all good. If a kid plays to their strengths, they should do fine. For some , that will be things like engineering or medicine, for others it will be things that come out of a good liberal arts background.

@MiddleburyDad2 ,Who here has said that being a “technically educated kid” is the only kind of kid that might have good options? There are lots of people who have risen to higher levels with liberal arts degrees. There are also lots of people who have risen to higher levels with engineering and technical degrees.

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Communications, Business, Journalism are all pre-professional degrees. Microsoft does not limit this position to people with a Liberal Arts major. Obviously for this position skills and prior accomplishments will matter much more than the undergraduate degree.

Most regular parents just want their kids be self-supporting right after college. They do not have maniacal ideas about how to better position their kid to get into CEO suite. Technical skills definitely help to achieve this goal. If the kid has leadership and people skills he may become a CEO no matter what major he had in college. A lot of tech people are absolutely not interested in running the companies. Many do not even want to become a manager.