A degree? Are you there yet? Welcome to the 21st Century.
Have you heard of Gary V? You can find him HERE! I was chatting to my son Ryan the other day when he said there’s this guy on you tube and he was talking about what to do after school….I was ‘hold up’ I actually know Gary V!! Gary V is such an interesting person (although he throws the F word out too much in my opinion) and in one of his posts he was saying ‘kids of today go live life; go earn money and if you don’t want to spend years educating yourself that is all good’ (in a nutshell).
And okay on one level it does makes sense especially if you don’t want to study after school and go to college. Plus – some kids don’t know what they want to study but they follow their parents suggestions and hate it…and then they quit!
And hello us parents we do put pressure on the kids to go to University/ college and get a degree – because our understanding is that a degree is the GOLD STANDARD. But is that understanding from the 20th Century? Have we arrived yet? Here, we are in the 21st Century with loads of kids not knowing what they want to do OR in SA we do currently have a big unemployment problem so….is Gary V right?
Money does Make a Difference
In a situation where money isn’t a problem then by all means go to college or take a gap year. This is not something I agree with because money should not make you irresponsible. When I was growing up (okay it might have been the dark ages to some of you) my father insisted that all his children got 3 years of Uni tuition. I chose a B.Sc and majored in Biochemistry and Microbiology – after that I went on to study for my Hons and then my PhD. My father refused to help me further and I received bank loans and also some really great bursaries (thank goodness). And I worked every weekend and during the holidays at Woolworths as a student.
It helps if you know what you want to do.
And this I think is the pivotal moment – knowing who you are and what you see yourself doing for the rest of your life! Does your school provide one with that these days? Are there too many choices? Why are the kids of the 21st Century feeling so overwhelmed that they don’t have a sense of direction? To get more answers keep reading.
Some background information
When researching this dream topic I became familiar with the Gen classification system (felt like Bio actually). So the MILLENNIAL’S (Gen Y) are children born from 1980 to 2000 (and reach adulthood in early 21st Century). Compared with Gen Z who are born after 2000 therefore after the Gen Y. The main difference between these two groups is that Gen Z are born into a society that is already technically proficient. I broke it all down for us so we could see them better…..hope you find your classification!
So now I think we have a much better handle of what we are dealing with right? Our world has changed and our kids have changed and are changing. I think that the BIGGEST problem is that we don’t know how to handle the changes. I look forward to seeing how Gen Alpha turns out….haha G-d help us.
Dealing with the changes
- Obesity problems
- Cyber bullying
- More stress and less sleep
- Therapy (anxiety & depression)
- Debts
- Non-traditional families
- Poverty compared to senior citizens
- Both parents working full time what will the impact be?
- Internet will be used solely for education (might even do away with schools)
- Gaming will affect social development & education
writing is what we did at school
school today
Friends/ family life today
I just want to go back and ask myself (having a degree) whether I would do it again – and I would say YES! I feel that even though I am not using it right now in this job – it gave me the framework for what I am doing in my business. To find out more about my degree you can read one of my other blog posts. It was a very personal post to write.
Admittedly over the past 3 years I have had to constantly challenge myself so that as the world and people change I also change (so that I can keep up). But my degree gave me tenacity, perseverance and yes a certain type of training that one can only get going through 9 years of life at a University.
Honestly I don’t have any answers I do think that even if you don’t have a degree per se you need A BACKUP PLAN. And most importantly you really do need to be happy. I would love to hear your thoughts.
Chat soon
Gxxx
