Posted by yellowbird01 on April 7, 2009, at 17:35:31
In reply to Why do people in the U.S opt to NOT go to college?, posted by Garnet71 on April 7, 2009, at 12:39:25
I'm in the mood that is telling me I have nothing useful or intelligent to say, so if this sounds as useless as it feels, I apologize. I'll give the question a shot though. :)
I think one of the biggest factors that influence people to go to college (or more often, not go) is the community you live in. Socioeconomic status and expectations within any individuals community in particular. Community can be as large as the city you live in or as small as the people in your home I think.. and it varies by person. I grew up right outside a major city in an upper middle class family. It was expected that I went to college, and I did. I believe 98% or so of my high school class of 400-some students went to college. It was just assumed. But a person who lives in a relatively low SES area, or in a rural area or factory area where kids typically go from high school directly into working in a local factory as all their adult family members do... the expectation is different. It's actually outside the norm for someone to go to college so the social pressure I felt to attend doesnt exist. Even for a student who might want to go to college, the knowledge of how to go about doing so, and finding the money or scholarships to do so, can be very limited and the student ends up not going, even though they had interest, because making it happen would be so difficult. Breaking the mold is hard and I'd imagine some kids probably even get a backlash from families who have a pattern of not attending college... upset about leaving the family and not doing xyz that was expected of them. I'm rambling, but I hope I'm making sense.
As I said, I did go to college and then straight into graduate school. I did fairly well in college. I'd suffered from pretty severe depression in late high school, but it mostly was gone during college. My first year of grad school, it hit again just as hard. I was literally going to class one day, in the psych ward the next, and back to classes the day I got out, a couple times over. I ended up dropping out of my masters program with a semester and a half (and a thesis) left to go. it was the best decision for me. But my point was that at least for me, it just became impossible for me to do anything in school. I remember lots of things I learned in college, but barely anything I learned in grad school. Not sure what my point is with that, but just my personal experience.
poster:yellowbird01
thread:889219
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20090328/msgs/889276.html