If you have a Bachelor’s Degree, chances are, almost everyone you know has a Bachelor’s Degree, so you may not think you have anything to be proud of. However, according to this website, Percentage of persons 25 to 29 years old with selected levels of educational attainment, by race/ethnicity and sex: Selected years, 1920 through 2013, only 33.6% of people between the ages of 25 and 29 had a Bachelor’s Degree as of 2013. Now, I know some of you might be thinking, “this only applies to people between the ages of 25 and 29”, but here’s the thing. The vast majority of people who do get Bachelor’s Degrees do so at 22 or younger. So if someone older than 22 doesn’t have a Bachelor’s Degree, it’s safe to assume they’ll never have one. Even among white people, the percentage of those with a Bachelor’s Degree is only 40.4.
Now like I said before, it’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking that you have nothing to be proud of if you have a Bachelor’s Degree. After all, the 64.4% of people who don’t have a Bachelor’s Degree are people you’re likely never going to meet. Education levels tend to be similar within families. For instance, if your parents have college degrees, you probably have one too. Spouses are also likely to have the same level of education. Also, people in the neighborhood have similar levels of education as do people in the same schools. So if you have a Bachelor’s Degree, chances are good that your relatives, friends, and neighbors also have one, but it’s important to remember that y’all have accomplished that majority of the country hasn’t and should therefore, be feeling very proud of yourself.
Go try to get a job in your field with that bachelor’s degree. It ain’t easy. I’m beginning to develop a sneaking suspicion that resume fraud is now endemic, where the only people who get jobs are those who lie and claim to have the exact qualifications a posting is looking for. (that is, I think most postings these days are asking for a set of skills and experience that no one actually has, or at least, the 10 people in the country who actually do are all working already.
I don’t know about the resume fraud being widespread, but I know that in my various job searches over my lifetime, not once was I asked to show my college diploma (although that makes me wonder, is there a way for employer to check with the university whether such and such graduated with the degree he claims?).
Yes. There’s third party services that they can simply send your information (SSN, university, etc) and that service will have a way to check with the university.
Since employers these days don’t generally confirm anything, that’s why a college degree has value. It’s the only thing on a resume that can’t be easily faked! At least, that’s becoming my theory. Maybe I exaggerate a little, but let’s suppose you claim to have done certain tasks for 5 years (making you experienced) during your tenure at a previous employer. People with good connections, their former boss will confirm it over the phone. Whether true or not.
An educational institution has a lot more prestige and credibility than some random guy you call up on the phone to check someone’s credentials.
A college classmate (small school only 47 graduated that year) of mine was recently promoted to a really big job (executive board of one of the largest companies of its type in the world). A huge feather in the cap of our little school, eh? Imagine the reaction when the company website published his capsule bio, and alumni social media exploded when we realized much of it was fake. He blamed “an HR mix-up” and soon the capsule bio was down to two lines.
This is a guy pulling down mid seven figures (USD), not some guy who needed a correspondence course bachelors degree to be able to sit the sergeant’s exam. Making up degrees from top schools and inventing certifications he never had over a couple of decades in resumes/CVs/applications submitted to some of the world’s most prestigious companies and NGOs. And none of them checked.
My friends in HR tell me that LinkedIn is making things awkward for many people. When they hear that an applicant does not have a complete LinkedIn profile for “privacy reasons” they are really starting to wonder. Does “privacy” mean they don’t want Mom’s friends asking why Junior’s undergrad degree on linked is just says “University of Pennsylvania” rather than the more complete “Kutztown University of Pennsylvania” where he went to night school all those years.
On the other hand, I have known many people who got their bachelor’s degrees over many years while spending the majority of the time lounging on mom’s couch or worse. And many other people who couldn’t go to school because they were already working multiple jobs to help out their family. I’d say who should be proud of themselves includes the starting point and the route taken as well as the end result.
I don’t know how it is now, but when I was hired by the Dept of the Navy in '85, I had to have a certified copy of my college transcript sent to them by the university. They wouldn’t accept my copy or my diploma.
I don’t know if this is changing, but many people of my generation (I’m 41) were strongly pressured to go to college, and threatened with all kinds of terrible consequences if they didn’t. The people you hear claiming that a bachelor’s degree is “nothing to be proud of” are probably degree holders who feel that college was a waste of time for them. It’s a backlash against the misguided twentieth-century mindset that you should go to college just for the sake of going to college.
And, in my opinion, these people have great justification for this. A generic bachelor’s degree can qualify you for a certain kind of job, which tends to pay more than a job a high school diploma alone can get you. I don’t dispute this. But you can be just as miserable in a “degree-exclusive” job as in a G.E.D.-requiring job. Or just as happy, for that matter.
So, you have a lot of people whose college education has prepared them for awful jobs that they hate, and others who are happy doing jobs they could have done just as easily without a college degree. These people, especially those in the first group, are likely to regard their college years as a fun ride at best, and a complete waste of time and money at worst. In neither case are they likely to report a whole lot of “pride” for their bachelor’s degree.
But I’m certainly not mad at people who are proud of their educational achievements. There’s nothing wrong with that at all.
I didn’t get get my Bachelors degree until I was a bit over 30 because I was working and going to college and raising three kids. I’d also dropped out of high school (got my GED soon thereafter), neither one of my parents went to college (matter of fact, I had no one close to me that could answer questions about college because no one had gone to college), and my (now ex) husband hadn’t even finished high school, let alone gone to college.
So you bet your last dollar I’m proud of my degree.
And my current employer asked for a copy of my college diploma, but in my experience, they’re the first to have ever done so.
Last year I decided to try online dating again. A guy that seemed nice enough knew my first name and what I did for a living. We were supposed to meet on a Saturday. The Thursday before he texts me, “Do you like surprises?” Me," sure, I guess".
Imagine my huge surprise when he walks in 5 minutes later. To my office. That I didn’t tell him about. Turns out that my first name plus city plus job popped me up instantly on LinkedIn. Turns out, I learned a thing or two and deleted my LinkedIn. I have never used it professionally and don’t know if anyone that does in my field.
It’s very easy to verify you went to the schools you say you graduated from and worked at the companies you say you worked at.
Other than that, whatever “skills” or “experience” you have is really up to the interviewer to try and verify. Resume padding is pretty rampant because unless it’s specific industry or technical knowledge and you are being interviewed by someone appropriately qualified, it’s pretty much impossible for them to determine if you are full of shit.
But FYI, no one looks at resumes and checks them off against some list of qualifications. Unless maybe you are looking for a government job. In the business world you see pretty much the same phenomenon you see with Trump filling his cabinet. Hiring managers look for people who have suitably “impressive” backgrounds. Certain schools. Certain work experience and certain companies.
This OP is weird. The OP joined today and has made one post (this one) and the OP reads like an excuse to say Bachelor’s Degree as many times as possible. Plus the thread seems strange. Join up just to say “hey, a bachelor’s degree is something to be proud of”. Everything points to the OP being a spammer, but there’s no spam link. Weird.
This isn’t true, at least not anymore. Recent studies have shown that the majority of students take more than four years to earn their bachelor’s degree: only 19% manage it in 4 years. Apparently it’s now considered “normal” to need six years, so that would make a typical college graduate, who began first grade in the US at age six and graduated from high school at eighteen, twenty-four when they earned their BA or BS, not twenty-two.
That’s funny. Almost everyone I know did it in 4 years(or less). At any rate, 24 is still younger than 25, so we can still safely assume that the majority of people in the study will never get Bachelor’s Degrees.
I’m the only one in my immediate and near extended family (grandparents/uncles & aunts/cousins) who went to university (father, high school; mother 8th grade; siblings a mix of high school and high school drop outs). Spouse doesn’t have a degree past A levels.
But they’ll always be exceptions to the rule really.
Do I feel proud about it? Sure, finishing school was an accomplishment, but I wouldn’t say I was ‘proud’ of it.
People have a right to be proud of whatever they want to be.
But personally, I don’t think having a bachelor’s degree is that impressive of a feat for people from supportive, middle/upper middle class families, barring any physical or mental challenges. It’s an achievement worthy of a party and a high-five, to be sure. But I don’t really see why someone from a well-heeled background should necessarily feel proud of themselves for simply being able to acquire something that most people can’t afford. I mean, they are also more likely to create their own successful businesses and make six-figure salaries, too. Most people can’t even dream of having these things. But I don’t think they are that big of a deal for someone who has bee set up by their families to enjoy this level of success.
