Should We Pressure High School Students to go to College?

High school students are bombarded with college decisions by their junior year. You need to decide what college you want to go to and what degree you want to get before you ever know what the real world is like.

So why do high school counselors hound their students to know what they're going to do as soon as they graduate? Are these unreal expectations? Do they hope this pressure will prevent tens from leading blue collar lives? Do these counselors not understand there are a lot of factors that need to be considered? For example, a lot of people cannot afford a college education. Families who earn just enough to live decent lives can't afford to pay for their child's college education, but also make too much money for financial aid. There's loans you say? Of course, but what if these people are already deeply in debt. My boyfriend's parents had to sell their property and belongings just to put him through his first year! This is nuts. That's also with him taking out loans himself. I got lucky, for a lack of a better term, being dirt poor. I got just enough financial aid and scholarships to pay my tuition and with special circumstances. I didn't have to live on campus and pay for room and board. I did have to take a loan out to pay for my health insurance, because you're required to have it—another reason high school grads may hesitate to go to college.

Money aside, forcing 17 and 18-year-olds to know what they want to do with their lives is ridiculous. Who cares if they are undecided? I left high school thinking I wanted to be a nurse. That changed pretty quickly when my biology lab said we'd start working on cadavers (dead bodies). Then I thought okay, I'll do psychology. Ha! Now I'm an interior design major and I hate that my classes are not applicable to my current degree. Now I am behind and will now how to pay more money to the business that is education.

There are so many options for careers and most high school students only know the big, very general careers such as being a doctor, teacher, lawyer, etc... There's so much more than that and you don't have to get a PhD to make a decent living.

Young people who don't desire a college education are judged because a blue collar job is not desirable, but we need blue collar workers. Don't shame people who want to do the jobs that need to get done. Sure, maybe don't encourage kids to get blue collar jobs. Encourage them to go to college if they'd like, but don't pressure them. Don't judge them. If they want blue collar jobs because they're hard workers and it's all they've ever known, then know it's their decision. It doesn't mean they are throwing their lives away.