JorenWater.CMC2018

Mr. Kipling’s Advice for College Applicants

Prior to the senior year of high school or transfer admissions, students simply matriculate in a pack, taking the same classes, striving for the same grades, clustering in similar out-of-school enrichment activities. Yet, at the moment of applying to college, students need to make their own decision—relate the process, to what Mr. Kipling shares the benefits, yet complexity of walking…

Continue Reading

Quote: Steve Jobs

Freedom Comes From Within, Not By Attending College

Often, teens seek freedom, as a primary reason for attending college. To which, their parents nod knowingly, smiling slyly, complicit in their teen’s seeming act of rebellion, believing that a college education is a coming of age into the freedom of adulthood. However students and parents should reflect on what it means to be free, and free of or from…

Continue Reading

College: In Loco Parentis? Not.

Congratulations on being accepted to college!  But, now the work begins. During college, each student still needs to seek understanding of their aptitude, collaborating with mentors, to unleash joy and thus more likely realize a lasting economic vitality.  However, many students expect colleges and universities to act in loco parentis, in the place of a parent, guiding them into adulthood…

Continue Reading

Quote: Ferris Bueller

Choosing a Career is Just That, A Choice

In response to Art’s recent post, To Choose or Have Others Choose for You, a Reed College student who’s finishing her first year, shared the following in a recent text conversation. Since many other students are likely in a similar predicament, I’m passing her message forward:  I’m so glad other students have the opportunity to read this article. I definitely…

Continue Reading

Chart of Labor Market Outcomes of College Graduates by Major (May 21, 2021)

Too Many People with The Same Good Idea

New college grads, those aged 22-27, who studied computer science, are just as likely to be unemployed as those who studied the fine arts, according to the latest New York Federal Reserve analysis.  The irony.  Most families expect that any studies remotely related to technology translates to unequivocal and continuous employment throughout one’s lifetime. Conversely, both parents and students often…

Continue Reading

The Struggle to Realize Genius and the Cost of Failing to Do So

Everyone has genius. Yet, few discover their genius.  Every parent intends to unleash their child’s genius. Yet, the endeavor to help one’s child discover genius requires the intricate, on-going, at times, herculean effort to challenge expectations—one’s own, one’s extended family’s, as well as one’s culture’s and community’s—not to mention reconciling any gaps in a parent’s own undiscovered genius, a separate…

Continue Reading

The Top 100 Colleges in the U.S. Ranked by Tuition

How to assess the value of a college education in order to avoid malinvestment

Comparing the published price of tuition along with the size of the student population can be one metric to value a university education. However, “shopping” colleges on price alone is shortsighted, thus families may overlook valuable educational opportunities.  Instead families should determine the value of any college education by discussing answers to reflective questions, starting with, “Why is a student…

Continue Reading

JorenWater.CMC2018

Post-Pandemic Innovation in Education a Real Possibility

During the last fifteen months of living a pandemic disrupted experience, kids experienced unstructured days amidst distance learning and suspension of regularly scheduled activities. Simply seeking to stave off boredom, many (re)discovered talents.   Perhaps a break from running on the hamster wheel of modern family life, chasing prosperity was just what we needed. Pandemics throughout history have disrupted, short-circuiting the status…

Continue Reading

Tests assess but don’t always determine aptitude

And, as Bart Simpson exemplifies once again, a test without context can create conflicting results far removed from reality. Answering standardized multiple choice questions, at a single moment in the time-space continuum, subject to emotional reactions and human temperament, then interpreted in a formulaic analysis, identifying aptitude without ever seeking the view of the kid whose future has now been…

Continue Reading