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Originally Posted by katiesue
Employers aren't helping either. Do you really need a four year degree to be a receptionist? No but at least in LA all the ads required one. I'm an Executive Assistant, all the job listings will say four year degree required and some even want graduate work. Umm for what? Unless college will teach you to make coffee, travel arrangements, be polite on the phone, put up with unreasonable bosses and so on experience is really the key.
It seems to me here in the US the attitude is if you don't go to college (and you should go to an well known college as well) you're a complete looser.
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I would suspect that "college degree required" in LA is code for "No Mexicans need apply."
I think the only people who think that the working class are losers are people who go to college with a "liberal arts ideal" and come out unable to earn a living--as I did. I remember having a work study job at the career services office at Berkely and watching all the kids line up to interview with, e.g., Big 8 (at the time) accounting firms. Resumes? How did they get those? However, college was a "track," and even after four years of temping and collecting short story rejection slips, I was still able to get into a top 20 (at the time) law school.
I would be very leery if a kid of mine didn't want to go to college unless he had garnered some significant work experience in a trade during high school. Even then, I would probably insist because education is valuable, and you can always decide to do what you want to do later. In high school, there were definitely the smoking area and auto shop types that we felt inhabited a different world from us, but I was never convinced that it was because they were not cut out for academics, college, etc. or simply were not encouraged to try.