Michelle Schultz
Essay #2 Final Draft
November 6, 2013
Words 1154
A Successful Life Without College
Many people in life tend to think less of you and your abilities if you did not go to college. I would argue that people can be successful even without a college education. Some high schools do not think about bringing topics into education that would attract all students. Students may be more interested in school if they are able to learn about something that interests them. I think that people who do not go to college can be very successful because they may have the opportunity to get a job that they could excel in that does not require a college education. But if teachers want all of their students to go to college then maybe they should try to teach and use examples that “street smart” students may understand, not just “book smart” students.
In Mike Rose’s essay “Blue-Collar Brilliance,” he acknowledges that blue-collar jobs can give you much more of an education than most people realize. He speaks of his mother, Rose Meraglio Rose (Rosie), and the knowledge she gained while working as a waitress. His mother Rosie learned things that college may not teach you, such as intuition, memory, reading social cues, how to deal with people and many other things. He also mentions his mother’s brother, Joe Mareglio, who left school in the ninth grade to work as a foreman. Joe also learned many things through work experience, some skills that college could not even teach him. The knowledge Joe gained from just working helped him manage and train his co-workers. Rose claims that there is a generalization that those who do not go to school are thought of as “a bunch of dummies” (247). However, he makes the point that you can learn a lot from just work experience and that you do not have to go to college to be successful. He adds that every job requires you to have skills, routine, and experience.
In the essay “Hidden Intellectual”, Gerald Graff states his opinion that what high schools and colleges fail to do, is take into consideration one’s “street smarts” and passions. He gives his personal experience about how he was more interested in sports, and if the school had given him (and other students) the option to write about something that they were passionate about, they would have been inspired to learn more. Graff says that schools don’t take into account certain learning experiences that sports can provide. Graff comments that sports magazines offer many headlines that can be used as topics for debate in class or spark discussions in day-to-day life. He does not think that schools emphasize what sports (or other passions that students may have) can offer to the world. Some people with “street smarts” may be more receptive to learning in a classroom setting if the subject matter was presented with a perspective that they could understand and relate to.
In both essays, “Blue-Collar Brilliance” and “Hidden Intellectual” Mike Rose and Gerald Graff both offer alternatives to success by way of college. Rose argues that people can have a successful life without going to school and instead, learning by work experience. Graff’s opinion is that some students may have a hard time in school but are very intelligent in ways that some people may not believe are as useful. Graff asserts that if schools gave students the option to read or write about something that interested them, they might try harder. Graph mentions a good point that a college professor argues that it is a challenge and “’ is not simply to exploit student’s nonacademic interests, but to get them to see those interests through academic eyes’”(Graff 385).
Rose argues the point that people can learn things through work that school would never be able to teach them. In blue-collar jobs, you need many skills that people do not know are required. In making this argument Rose states, “I’ve since studied the working habits of blue-collar workers and have come to understand how much my mother’s kind of work demands both body and brain. A waitress acquires knowledge and intuition about the ways and the rhythms of restaurants” (Rose 245). Similarly, Graff points out how sports can help you in the real world because they offer learning opportunities that school cannot, like learning how to evolve a good argument and how to state your point. You learn differently because you are interested in how sports teach. Graff believes that sports taught him “how to make an argument, weigh different kinds of evidence, move between particulars and generalizations, summarize the views of others, and enter a conversation about ideas” (Graff 383).
Rose and Graff both feel that people can learn very important things outside of school. They introduce topics that could help our educational system improve for people who have “street smarts” or other nonacademic talents and interests. Rose points out that for his Uncle Joe, “the shop floors provided what school did not; it was like schooling, he said, a place where you are constantly learning” (Rose 248).
My brother, Trevor Schultz, never attended college. All of his high school teachers tried to convince him to go. They told him that he likely wouldn’t be successful if he did not go to college. At age 18, Trevor graduated high school and right away began to work for my grandparents’ business; Liberty Rock Inc. Trevor drove dump truck and hauled rock. While Trevor’s classmates were going to college and accruing debt with student loans, he was making money.
Trevor is now 28 and he has recently quit his job to become a partial business owner with Bodi Isreal and his company, A & B Excavation. Trevor has maintained a blue-collar job throughout his adult life and he is making more money than many of his friends with college degrees. He has gained experience such as operating machinery, social skills, managing people, and working with family (which is very hard to do in my family!). Trevor feels he has quite a successful work life even though he did not go to college. He did not feel that college could offer him the education that would be the most beneficial for him at the time, but is in a position to finish his education without taking on debt if he chooses to in the future.
I agree that college may be important for some, but not necessary for everyone. You can have a successful life without going to college. I do believe college is important because it does help many people, but for others it is not so helpful. You need to do what is best for you in your life and what will help you become most successful, and not care if people think less of you because you did or did not go to college.
Work Cited
Graff, Gerald. “Hidden Intellectual.” They Say I Say 2nd Edition. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company 2012. 380-387. Print.
Rose, Mike. “Blue- Collar Brilliance.” They Say I Say 2nd Edition. New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company 2012. 243-255. Print.
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