How educated are the ppl around you IRL? - Page 6

[ParisApril]

I don't ask my friends how much schooling they have had. Some I know because I have known them for a long time but most of the people I know I have never asked.

[flowers]

Originally Posted by ABrez

Most of our friends have at least a masters (including DH). I'm a college drop out and I try to hide it. It's pretty humiliating.

I'm so sorry you feel that way. I have a bachlor's amongst ivy league masters and phd's and I know the feeling. I am trying to get past the idea that you need papers to prove your educated. It's a stretch for me but feels way better than feeling less than. I am very smart and insightful and can keep up with the best of them! (and you can too! )

[p1gg1e]

Originally Posted by lach

Don't do that. My husband does that and it's just silly. He does quite well for himself, thank you, without a degree. Plenty of people without degrees do. And as has been repeated on this thread many a time, education has NOTHING to do with intelligence: not to mention with being a nice, compassionate, interesting, fun-to-know person. And if anyone gives you a hard time (which is unlikely: a 4 year degree or higher is viewed as being so normal where I am, I think people think of it more as a slightly odd personality quirk than any real shortcoming), there's always the Bill Gates card

Exactly!

Ive always gone by the saying that I'm talented but not gifted or gifted but not talented...I don't fit into the way the classical education system is set up...I'm actually quite proud of it. I went to collage and really there wasn't anything they had to offer at the place I was at. Since dropping out and becoming a mom Ive learned even more about myself and what my worth is...and my dreams.

[*Aimee*]

Most of the people I know do not have a college degree. My husbands side is mostly college educated, but my family, I think just a few are.

My husband was homeschooled and finished high school at 15. He went to community college but ended up being too overwhelmed with the sudden lack of supervision and rebelled. He ended up flunking out of all of his classes.

He had a passion for computers, and got an internship at a software company. Now he's 28, been working in the industry for 12 years, and is senior software architect of his company's "programmers" division and co-owner of an Iphone's game development company. He also does a ton of work for people on his own because we were SUPER stupid and dug ourselves into a lot of debt. His company actually last week gave him a pretty large raise because two other companies tried to "steal" him.

He is not, according to this poll, educated but is probably the smartest person I know. Unfortunately, our friends who did go to college are all struggling right now, with degrees that are not particularly useful. But they do have an air of smugness towards those of us that didn't go.

He's been told many times that ONE day he wont be able to be hired because someone with a college degree will beat him out. It just isnt true. Someone will much rather have a programmer with industry experience and shipped products than fresh outta college applicant.

Oh, and our friends that are not "educated"? They're mostly doing well. One owns a landscaping business that pulled in 200k last year. He didn't even finish high school but really knows how to run a business. Our experience has been that college is not that important. And can even be detrimental.

We're teaching our children to do whatever they're passionate about and they'll succeed if they truly enjoy that. If what they love happens to need a college education (like a dr. or vet. or nurse) then that's fine. But I will never EVER teach them they need college to be successful or that people with degrees are "worth" more than those without, because it simply isn't true.