Regarding the whole college/no college discussion, I can only relate my own personal 40+ years ago experience forward vs. present times...
The HS I went to was the only HS in the district at the time and also had the only area vocational school...meaning other districts students were bussed (or drove) to our HS for vocational classes.
I’ve posted about much of this before, including my art teacher (“Mad Miller”
) losing it when I announced to her that I wouldn’t be taking art again my junior year, and would be enrolling in vocational drafting class instead, as I wanted to be an architect.
There were 2 3-hour classes each day, and I was in the morning class my junior and senior years.
It was set up to be a learning environment, but, also a kinda’ job environment...we were allowed to have soft drinks, coffee, music, and someone went to get Round Rock Donuts every morning...!!!!!
Drafting and design was the only thing our teacher taught. He also did drafting and design on the side. So many schools back then had a drafting class, but, it was usually only an hour long, and taught by maybe an assistant football coach with limited knowledge, to fill out his teaching schedule.
As a result, we used to go to district, area, and state competitions and just clean house. Not bragging, just the way our system worked at the time, and an awesome teacher who was dedicated to his craft and us in every way.
From the middle of my junior year, many of our projects were actually drafting construction documents for a local builder to earn money to pay for those competition trips. And, we were payed fairly...no slave labor, plus we were getting serious real-world experience.
I liked to render my projects in ink instead of pencil, as most did. 3 months before I graduated from HS ( I was 17), my drafting teacher got a phone call from a local architect that wanted to know if he had a student he could recommend to ink brochures after school in the evenings. He recommended me, told me I had an interview if I wanted it, I interviewed the next evening, and was hired on the spot.
When summer rolled around and I graduated from HS, they offered me a full-time drafting position, and I jumped on it. Most of my friends were either off to college, or still working fast food, retail, etc. jobs.
I did interview at the UT school of architecture, and things looked promising, but, ultimately, I decided full-blown college wasn’t for me, and what my goals were. Even the partners at that first firm told me I had skills they were just learning in their 4th year of architecture school in college, and there would be no point in me bothering with it...and they payed me accordingly, in a good way.
I’ve gone through 2 layoffs and 5 firms over the last 39+ years, but, have been with my present firm for a combined 26+ years.
Bottom line is, as a result of the particular path I was able to take, I have continued to keep up with the times in my career, and am still very skilled in old school methods.
Whether a partner needs it designed, CAD’d up, 3-D modeled, old school rough sketched, old school presentation sketched, old school drafted, etc., they know I can do it. None of the younger folks, as awesome as they are (and I truly mean they are awesome and truly enjoy working with them, as we all learn from each other) have any of the old school skills. My multiple creative and technical skills are what make me valuable to them, and that is a result of me never, ever, refusing to learn new tech and skills.
26+ years of employment by the firm is testament to that.
Half of the employees in our firm are from our kiddos generation, and are extremely intelligent and very hard workers...the partners definitely wouldn’t keep them around if they weren’t, as they demand excellence. But, as y’all have also all seen before, the partners are still a great-fun group of guys to work for.
Finally...
It is, unfortunately, very rare that anyone can do it the way I started off 40+ years ago, these days.
Get the sheep skin.
Seeking a higher education is a noble thing, but (yes, a big but), some of it seems to have devolved into a business...milk as many people as you can, for as much money as you can, for as many years as you can.
And, too many times, people are in debt up to their necks, and never achieved anywhere near what they dreamed of.
Again, people are responsible for their own dreams and achievement of those dreams, but, others are led down the primrose promise path wearing rose-colored glasses.
People really just need to use their minds instead of emotions when making decisions and pursuing such important life decisions.
