Higher Education or Plumbing and Electricity?

There’s a lot of argument of education and higher education. Mike Rowe, the host of Discovery Channel’s show ‘Dirty Jobs’, has an interesting point of view on this subject.

On May 11^th of 2011 Mike Rowe proposed a testimony to the Senate. His main points of his testimony are as follows: “In high schools, the vocational arts have all but vanished. We've elevated the importance of "higher education" to such a lofty perch that all other forms of knowledge are now labeled "alternative." Millions of parents and kids see apprenticeships and on-the-job-training opportunities as "vocational consolation prizes," best suited for those not cut out for a four-year degree. And still, we talk about millions of "shovel ready" jobs for a society that doesn't encourage people to pick up a shovel.” … “Right now, American manufacturing is struggling to fill 200,000 vacant positions. There are 450,000 openings in trades, transportation and utilities. The skills gap is real, and it's getting wider. In Alabama, a third of all skilled tradesmen are over 55. They're retiring fast, and no one is there to replace them.”

Basically he is stating that because we make higher education seem like the only important option, we are losing majority of the people who actually help run this society. The skills gap is widening because people are going to college to go after accounting or business or technology jobs rather than trade schools to learn to be a plumber or electrician. High schools have made it seem like being a plumber should be your ‘plan B’ and that it’s a job you shouldn’t be proud of.

However, high school education has this wrong. Plumbers get paid around $100 an hour. I don’t know about you, but that sounds like pretty great money to me. Sure the job may not be very white-collar but who cares when you’re living well?

I definitely agree with Mike on this concept. High schools focus way too much on everyone getting a degree from college rather than teaching them skills to very highly profitable jobs. I actually wanted to be a car mechanic when I was younger. But society and school has made it seem like that’s a dirty and low-class job. So I am going to go to college for a meteorology degree. I also love meteorology and it’s not a problem to have a different focus but it definitely shows that schools have a huge effect on our after high school career choices.

I think schools need to offer more trade-school kind of classes into the system. Without our plumbers, what would we do? Without our electricians how would we get by? These seem like much more important job than whether or not your computer or Ipod can be fixed. I’d rather have a properly working toilet and heating in my house than a properly working computer and I think most people would agree.

Schools need to add these kind of classes and encourage kids to go after whatever interests them even if that doesn’t involve a college degree.