Maggie's Farm

When this nation was founded, certain jobs were thought to require a higher education - church ministers, for one. Higher levels of education were also required to teach higher levels of education - a teacher of the privileged had to be at least smarter than his or her charges.

Army and Navy officers needed advanced training in engineering as well as military tactics. Those designing multi level buildings and bridges also needed to be instructed in the higher mathemetics and physics to avoid disaster.

But somewhere along the way, the subjects that people used to just read and write about became fixed organized courses of study, courses that could only be taught by someone who had achieved the completion of that course.

So instead of the local shopkeeper also dabbling in writing fiction, or the self taught keeper of a public journal (journalist) you had a group of people claiming to be able to develop a better person through the completion of a prescribed course of study.

Most kids in college today are making friends who may or may not influence their future career. While I sometimes use the marketing part of my broadcast degree, I run own and run a computer business, write church music, and coordinate PR for several sports leagues - things for which I never attended college.