Indoctrination from the public school system is real. And it has characteristics that might be a mightier foe than I anticipated.
Yesterday, after driving with my son home from soccer practice, I asked how being in Jr. High has been going now that he’s been at it for a few days. He said he liked it, talked about a few classes, and then mentioned CCA class, College and Career Awareness. Then immediately followed up with the comment, “You have to go to college if you want to get any job that pays well.”
🚨 ‼️ 🚩
I asked him, “Can we talk about that?”
“Yeah, Dad.”
Told him that is flat-out not true. If he wanted a career that required a degree, then there’s nothing wrong with college. But college is not mandatory in any sense and not required for most careers…
Keyword, “careers.”
*cough* College and CAREERS Awareness class *cough*
I asked him who the most successful person is that he personally knows.
“You, Dad.”
I asked him, more importantly, who could drop everything, step away from work, take them to school, run him and his brother and sister after to soccer, dance, and all the other things that day while mom was sick?
Who has that freedom of time and a happy family?
“You, Dad.”
And… I dropped out of college to pursue entrepreneurship.
If we keep score only by financial incentive and not actual happiness, a doctor can’t walk away from work and do that. Neither can a lawyer. All the highest paid, college degree-required careers that schools use for the highlight reel, little-to-no freedom.
Respectfully, I make more than a doctor and a lawyer combined. Annnnd, I dropped out of college to pursue entrepreneurship.
More important than financial stability (unfortunately, the only incentive schools promote about college, while still ignorantly not discussing the cons)…
I have freedom of time.
I see my kids when they wake up, have breakfast with them, visit them regularly at their school for lunch, am at the door when they get home from school, and off at 5 pm on weekdays and entirely on weekends to be full-time dad the rest of the day, at every school event, sports game, and dance recital.
He’s talked about starting his own sticker business or t-shirt business. I asked who his boss would be if he was successful with his business.
”Me, Dad.”
Do you think your boss would care if you didn’t have a degree?”
”No.”
My kids also see the amazing people I surround myself with that do equally amazing things. And this indoctrination still got in their head enough for him to consider it as fact.
I have no problem with explaining college and sharing its potential advantages, if you also share the potential disadvantages. My problem is the siloed, tunnel-visioned narrative that it is a zero-sum game, don’t think out of the box, don’t bet on yourself, and unless you are rank and file, you’ve already lost.
Give me creativity.
Give me happiness.
Give me individuality.
Give me options without guaranteed debt.
Give me options without shackles.
Give me options, period.
I realize I’m fortunate, my situation is not normal, and it might not possible for everyone.
But maybe part of the reason it’s not possible is because kids are taught only “normal,” and aren’t taught what IS possible.
