Which is better Community College or University?

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If you have some other option, I would recommend it. The community college system in California is taking massive budget hits that won't be restored for years. The one nearest to me just dropped 20 classes from the next semester's schedule. There are going to be a ton of locals vying for those same spots.

What a stupid government. I see disaster. Poor Californians!! !

It looks that only money solves all issues... including education. Sigh.

Perhaps not all problems, but money can definitely solve a lot of them. And the lack of it can cause some pretty spectacular ones.

It would appear that a large part of the budget problems here, statewide, are caused by the way the state generates income. There is a very minimal personal income tax (a few percent at most). Federal income taxes are really not very high and go off to the feds, who apportion them back as they see fit (or bail out places like Sachs Goldman or other fat-cat businesses). Most of the state's revenue is from sales taxes and taxes on corporate gains. As long as the economy is doing well, the money rolls in. When the economy does poorly, when people stop buying things that can be taxed, then the revenues to the state dry up.

Local property taxes pretty much go to local entities, and the rates for those are based on the purchase price of the property - you buy a home at $200,000 and you have a set rate that can only go up a very small amount each year even if the value of the property triples. If the value goes down, you can argue that and get the tax rate you pay reduced. Local school taxes do not even remotely pay for the schools - the state sends money to the districts.

As long as things were going well.... You know, I wouldn't be so hard on the government officials. There are so many competing interests holding their hands out for a share of the money and they're caught between them all. They've just cut (I believe I heard this on the radio this morning) the children's health program. They get sick now and have no private insurance and they're out of luck. They get critically ill and the state emergency medicaid will step in - as long as their parents have almost no money. (There's no health program for adults who are not already disabled, just children.) If they own a home, the parents sign the title over to the state for sale (I believe) so that it's entirely possible that you lose everything you own and then, perhaps your kid gets better. Or lingers when you are homeless. Or dies and then you have nothing at all, not even a bed. They are cutting funding for carers who go into the homes of the elderly and disabled. They are cutting both student aid and funding to pay for instructors in the state-run colleges and universities. They're cutting our wages/work hours (I work for an organization that runs partially on state money - ouch - like I can now go out and buy even what I would have normally to generate the tax revenue??) and discontinuing a lot of funding for other government-supported programs. We are just entering wildfire season and there has been talk about there being no money to pay extra emergency firefighters. It's insane, but if there's no money, there's no money.

That's all a problem with a state where services funding is primarily based on transaction taxes (tax on sales, etc.). It can all go to hell in a handbasket rather quickly. People yell and complain about it, but they don't want to pay the taxes themselves that would make it possible to keep things as they were. It's a no-win all around. Really - things are getting very not-good here. If you can find someplace else to be, I'd plan to be there until this all turns around in a few years.

Assuming it does. And assuming you are not rich - if you are, none of the above applies, really.

That, and more importantly, PROPER MANAGEMENT of money goes a long way.

Americans keep pouring money into education and getting crappy results. We could cut funding to education and have really smart kids graduating if we were diligent in how money was spent. Government puts so much "fat" into budgets for stuff that isn't needed it's not funny. So much waste.

Usually it goes unnoticed until you have a recession/depression and the source of funding starts drying up and politicians (as true to their nature) protect the fat over the muscle in the budget.

Then what to do with the not-so-smart people who just want opportunities? Surely they will have to accept themselves being not as highly educated as their parents... How cruel this is!

Only if one thinks it's cruel. My mother never went to high school. She didn't see that as a problem. Her mother never got past the 3rd grade (approximately 9 years old). She didn't see it as a problem. Neither of them were particularly well-read, but I had aunts and uncles who were incredibly intelligent and well-read, who never did more than finish high school. I had an uncle who could have given an engineering professor a run for his money, who taught himself. It's not all about jumping through the system's hoops.

I got a BA, a Masters, and was only about 15 hours and a dissertation away from a PhD when I left higher education. While I REALLY enjoyed my studies, fiscally it was quite a mistake to have gone on past the BA. There has been no financial return, and it's run me in the red for years. I could have read all the same books on my own time, for free. But I bought into the "more school = better life" thing and wanted that for my family. Duh.

My grandmother worked as a cook for a wealthy family and, later, as "the lunch lady" in a high school. She was not wealthy, but she had enough money to live on without having to scrape. My mother only worked outside the home while my father was away at "the war." As in THE war. She had no skills training so she did menial assembly line work until my father came home and then she was a housewife for the rest of her life. We didn't starve. I have done everything from working on a similar assembly line (prior to going for my degrees) to working in high tech (again, before degrees). Now I'm basically a secretary, because the degrees were definitely educational but had NOTHING to do with the workforce, and so, except from looking good on paper, are worthless in the job market.

I actually, to get my first job here in California, had to leave everything by my BA degree information off of my resume to even get an interview. I've found that the advanced degrees pretty much got me in the door working in higher ed (at the clerical/administrative assistant level), but were useless elsewhere. This would be different, of course, for someone with a degree in, say, accountancy or a hard science (one of the biologies, nursing, pre-med, engineering, etc.). There are some fields where you absolutely must have that training - so if you're interested in one of them, go for it. Just be sure you know what you're paying for.

My own daughter finished high school and went to community college, getting a 2-year degree in a foreign language. We don't see her having only a 2-year degree as a problem - the job market she's in (clerical/administrative/secretarial) pretty much wants either two years' experience and 50 words per minute typing speed or a 2 year degree and 50 words per minute typing speed. Once she's been working for 5 or 10 years and has a proven record, she should be able to move into management if that's what she wants to do. She's probably more highly educated and well-read than a lot of people who have 4 year degrees - she did it on her own - and she's competing for the same kind and level of jobs that liberal arts BAs are as well, but without the student loan debt on her back.

Really, looking back and from having talked to a lot of HR people, (and generally speaking) once you have a couple of years' experience, the degrees really just don't count for much (liberal arts) if they ever counted at all. Unless you're working at a socio-economic level well above where I function (your degree from Harvard is definitely going to get you farther than a degree from Cal State - the alumni network/placement network thing does that), etc.

It was different 40 or 50 years ago - college degrees were a rarity and, thus, indicated the cream of the intellectual crop. But it's not 40 years ago and they're as common as high school diplomas used to be (and some argue that they designate functional ability at that same level!). As they used to say in my classes, the paradigm has shifted. It's really all in one's perception of things. Higher ed has become an industry, and they do market it well. Use it if it's useful, but don't buy into that "you're a failure if you can't" thing they try to sell.

I personally think they should put vocational education back in the high schools. It was there when I was young - people could go learn a trade that would allow them to apprentice in and, eventually, make a good living. Machine repair, machine operation, tech jobs like phlebotomist, nurse assistant, bookkeeper, plumbing, builder, electrician, welding.... there are always jobs there but there's no real training system in the public schools anymore. They keep giving the kids a sort of generic watered-down college prep that leaves them unemployable at graduation. It's not really the way to go, I don't think.

Looking back over the last 40 years, I think my initial feeling was correct. I wanted to go into small engine repair. That was where I should have gone, but although the school had a class, girls were not allowed to take it so I was shunted off into "crafts" where I made ash trays and beaded belts two hours a day. I would have been a great small engine/washing machine/fridge repairman. And I certainly wouldn't have had to pay the guy I just had in to fix a switch on my washing machine $175 for 20 minutes' work!! !! !

I would recommend either a community college or a small university (preferably with 10,000 or fewer students).

These are unavailable in my hometown though... Sigh.

Oh, only a dissertation away from a Ph.D.? That's like saying you're only $100,000 away from owning a house.

Anyway, your attitude is fine if your end goal was to become a secretary anyway. Then sure, bypass the higher education. But not many children, when they muse on their future careers, will say, "I want to grow up to be a secretary!" The entire point of higher education is to open up new opportunities that were not available previously. Even if you end up with a seemingly useless liberal arts degree, it can be a very enlightening and maturing experience. Although, even I would argue that you should attend college for no reason - your degree should be chosen with an end career goal in mind.

If your end goal is to simply end up as another cog in the grinding gears of the workforce, then perhaps it is best to take the shortest, cheapest route and learn the skills that directly apply to that job and forget about higher education. But don't discount the many people that have ended up with profitable and fulfilling careers that had their basis in their college or university education. Many people start college with no idea what they want to do in life - and experimenting with different classes and subject areas is one way you can figure that out. These institutions exist so we, both as individuals and as a society, can better ourselves, because not everyone wants to end up as a repairman or a plumber or a secretary.

Exactly, on the PhD. Except that out here $100,000 won't even buy the garage of the house. ABD can get you some lecturing jobs, but that's about it. ; )

But you know, looking back to my own situation, my BA was pretty much a farce - the presentations in all but a few classes were such that I could stay home and read the book on my own, go take the tests, and pass with a decent GPA. I had read enough through the years that, quite frankly, there wasn't a lot (except in the hard sciences) that I hadn't already read about when I started my degree program. There were some truly extraordinary courses - I had a writing course taught by a moonlighting psychiatric nurse that was just stellar! In some cases, I caught professors/TAs (I couldn't tell which they were from the back of the auditorium) spouting inaccurate information. Often. They regurgitated the party line, the middle-of-the-road expectations. There were no discussions. The professors were required to have two office hours per week. That doesn't go very far when their classes have a couple of hundred kids in each of them. Tests were by scantron because there's no way they'd grade that many essays - half the kids couldn't really write anything coherent, anyway. That's the fate of an undergrad at a lot of the large, factory schools (the ones who crank out 8,000 to 10,000 shiny new diplomas a year). Very sadly. And expensively. (By the way, Cal State just announced a 20% fees hike today.)

I have had too much Sudafed and am digressing badly, and you're missing the main point I was trying to get across in my earlier post - obviously I didn't make it clear. My apologies. Very broadly speaking, it should have been "You're not going anywhere with a liberal arts degree that someone without one is going if that person without one was seriously planning to go there." {or something like that }

The liberal arts degree programs have become, for all intents, a sort of "middle class finishing school" credential. I've been around and working in academia for decades. The 150-300 seater classes where a TA paraphrases a book that you could have read on your own hits me as a serious waste of money. Especially when they then tell you how to interpret it (i.e., what the "correct" interpretation is) - God forbid you submit a written interpretation that isn't one they care to agree with or you're going to find out that academic freedom really doesn't apply to undergrads. Speaking of cogs-in-the-machine.... And inbred ones, at that!

Quite frankly, and with much sadness, I do see thousands of little drones being shoved through the machine (university) and coming out all homogenized in their thinking than is healthy for any society every year. I offer that there's a lot more standardization and homogenization going on than there is true intellectual emancipation (at least at the undergrad level). And the letdown so many of them seem to have when they're finished, when they realized "they did all that work for nothing"... well, I do think that there are people who should go into higher education at all costs. But I don't think there are many of them. Then again, given the quality of the education that the kids have at high school leaving (again, very broadly speaking here), going to uni brings them up to what a high school diploma pretty much took for granted 50 years ago so it might not be a bad thing for them to be shuffled through. Just an expensive thing.

It would be nice if it were a perfect world, but it's not. And the benefit/cost of a "higher education" diploma just isn't either feasible or desirable for everyone. I would strongly suggest to anyone reading that they realize their situation. If they're financially well off and can nip off and become "polished" - great! If they can handle the cost and not have to worry about paying it back, and need to learn in a rigid structure, go for it. (At least it gets you away from mommy and daddy for a bit!) But don't just by into that "I have to go to college because I'm a failure if I don't."

Distilled: You do not have to sit in a classroom to learn how to think and the library is free.

But definitely, parents, keep sending your kids to university if it's that much of a cultural milestone to you and if they were not inquisitive enough to have read widely before hitting 18 years old - it keeps me in a job! Whether or not it has any intrinsic value, well, that's always a debate. It does give them somewhere to go, in a world that no longer has a "place" for overage children.

PS - I have known many people who aspire to be "Administrative Assistants" (which is politically-correct-speak for "Secretary") as a career goal. There's nothing wrong with it (other than it's boring as hell). Just as I've known people who wanted to be shop owners, or parents, or gardeners or farmers. Firemen. Police. Yeah, it's a bigger world. Quite frankly, I get paid the same as an assistant professor at a lot of state schools. I'd get paid a lot more as a washing machine repair man, and have much more free time to do more reading, if I so chose. Oh well, water down the drain.

Yep... I think... We just need to do our own, not others' best...

i think the decision of university vs. community college depends on one's finances, circumstances, and personal preference. i will be attending a fine arts college in downtown chicago. i have been up to visit with my dad a few times and just fell in love with the place. my dad's only concern was the crime rate in chicago. but we talked it over and he believes i can handle the city life and i never had an IEP or special concerns as far as my education went. but this is just my own experience. i say to each their own and best of luck.