College was even better than I thought it would be. I made great, lifelong friends; I played on the football team, and the baseball team. I met girls. I laughed like I never laughed before. And those – sports, friends, and girls - were the main reasons that I went to college.
We registered for our next semester’s courses each mid-term. If it was called for, the dean that assisted in the process scolded us for a lack of scholarship. In my case it was called for, but I had my answer ready.
“I’m getting more out of college than just grades,” I said. I doubt if my words had stumped him. He’d been around. He’d heard it before and likely knew that I was adamant and there was no sense wasting his breath. Getting a lot out of college – that was me. Wrong.
I was in college for ten years. I got three degrees – sadly the wrong ones. I wasted much of my time there. Well not completely. I deduced that if I didn’t know what I wanted, then the best thing was to keep going to school. Get more degrees. It was better than nothing, but only barely. I got a Doctorate in Education to go with my Master’s in Teaching (Math) and undergraduate BA, (Education major, Math minor).
So what did I do wrong? For starters, Math minor should have been a clue. If you’re studying to be a teacher then find a field that you want to major in, and do that. Don’t major in Education - a minor there is sufficient for certification. Plus, if you don't want to major in the field you'll be teaching (me) then that's the wrong field.
Here’s another problem. I ended up teaching for 27 years, and over the years I talked with countless 18, 19 year olds about their course of study. My first question was always, “What is it that you want to do?”
By far the most prevalent answer was, “I don’t know what I want to do.” I expected that, so my next question was, “What do you enjoy? What are your hobbies? What do you read? If you have a part-time job, what do you like best about the job?”
The objective here is to find an interest and to study that. For young adults one may have to dig deep for this. There’s another objective and that is to develop a “skill,” one of some value. A major in Education, communications, even sociology and psychology are not good job skills. As long as you’re in college for four years come out with a skill that will contribute to your support.
So you say, “Hey, I seriously don’t know what I want to do so I’ll major in math and be a math teacher. I need a job. It’s better than nothing.” I would sit with you and respond, “OK, that’s OK, but don’t give up your research project. You have four years of college with a wealth of opportunities at your disposal. Trust me, if you don’t turn over every stone you will one day say to yourself – Gee, four years. Why didn’t I do something? Learn a language, learn how to write better, play music, learn an actual skill etc.
Andy Rooney said that he loved football, but didn’t want to “let the game dominate my life and become a culturally deprived jock, so I decided to take piano lessons.” That we should all have such maturity at age twenty. As for me, I was well aware of life’s priorities – there was football, sports, girls, beer, laughing with friends and sleep in that order. Cultural deprivation, whatever that was, I’d make up for it later, if necessary, which I doubted. But seriously, I would have thought that the hour on the piano stool was cultural deprivation. How dumb!
