As a university graduate myself, I always wonder why my tuition fee was so expensive. Especially when I studied overseas where every dollar I spent was equivalent to 3 dollars back in my home country. Also, there is this saying, “you use only about 5% of what you learn at university” which gets everyone with a right mind thinking, why attend university at all if you don’t apply the things you have learnt?

The mainstream media have got most of us into this fairytale story telling us that if we do not graduate with at least a degree, we do not get a job. Well, that is just one side of the story that appeals to only the employers, not the students.

Here are why our university and college education do not appeal to you students and is definitely not worth your parents’ hard earned money.

University Education is Nothing near Advanced Technologically

If you plan to take engineering and hope to get hands-on experience with high-end manufacturing machines. Think again, you might want to double your tuition fees to take up postgraduate studies instead.

If you plan to take commerce with the hope to graduate with all the skills needed to success in trading and investment, you will fail miserably because in university they teach you nothing about diversifying your portfolio. They teach you to diversify your portfolio in stocks, which makes you a loser every time the market crashes.

If you plan to take IT courses, prepare to meet lecturers who have no idea what they are teaching.

If you plan to take law and medicine, you graduate working your heads off with companies that pays you dirt.

Either way, by the time you graduate, all the things you have learnt is outdated and you will have to re-learn everything when you join a corporation.

It’s All About Business Mate

Very few universities actually promote real, practical, hands-on education. Education is now an industry, your vice-chancellors care not about your welfare as a student. Even if you’re excellent in your studies at postgraduate level, they hire you just to keep you as a tutor and pay you enough (you don’t want to be earning only enough your entire life) so that you can produce more papers to promote the university. Yay free advertisement.

Highest Inflation on Your Tuition Fees

Believe it or not, the inflation in the university and college education sector is one of the most inflated industries in the world. I did a search while I was surfing around the other day and found this.

I then checked this graph with the CPI index of Australia and learnt that the inflation in education even higher than the inflation in healthcare!  So I have come to a conclusion that this graph represents most of the universities and colleges around the world. So much for the importance of tertiary education.

Do you know that the money I spent studying in Australia can be used as a down payment for about 3 houses back in my hometown. Can I buy 3 houses in the next 4 years as a university graduate working for companies that pays me dirt? Very unlikely.

The Ever Growing World Wide Web

Every second, data as big as the Library of Congress is transmitted over the internet. You can imagine the whole library swooshing around the world in the network cable. Almost everything you need to know is available on the internet. In fact, most of the assignment given to you in university or college requires the use of the internet to complete them.

Why would you still need to pay a huge sum of money to the education institutes to tell you things that can be easily searched from the internet for free?

What Can We Do About This?

I guess we could form a union and go on a strike on hopes that the universities will reduce the tuition fees, which sounds extremely impractical and dangerous. On top of that, going on a strike is also something done by a person who has no control over anything; to simply put it, a university graduate who is being kicked around in the society.

So what are our options?

A few months ago, I met up with a friend called Fred at a cafe. Fred was complaining about his expensive tuition fees, he said that he should have taken his friend’s suggestion before he entered college.

His friend’s suggestion was this. Instead of paying a lump sum of your university savings to people who teaches you a lot of impractical crap, spend those money on your first few businesses and professional courses.

US’s average annual tuition fee is about 25,000 USD, a university course is usually 3 to 4 years depending on which degree you are taking. Fred’s friend suggested that you spend 20,000 USD on a new business and spend the rest attending courses that will enhance your professional skills.

Most of the time, your first business will fail. But keep in mind that you have 2 more years of savings to work on and usually you learn a tonne after your first business failure. Pool them together with the knowledge you gain from the professional courses you attend, I am sure your second and third (if not your fourth) business will be a success. That is when you will have control over your life.

Please bear in mind that I am not exactly advocating these kind of ideas. However, I believe it is something worth trying out if the universities and colleges keep on jacking up their education fees.