Another Loopy Anthropologist

[Surferbeetle]

Adam,

I appreciate your assessment:

[*]I have to disagree with you on this. Bachelors degrees used to mean someone was educated (most of the time.) Now most bachelors degrees are only an assurance that they NOW know what they should have known coming out of high school. (Most of the time.) I am not saying that all people are like this, just too many.

'Education creep', by which I mean a high school diploma used to carry far more economic weight than it does today is an issue due to an explosion of knowledge and increased specialization. High School is a broad education. It's my opinion that a degree (in whatever the topic) means one has been exposed to defined body of knowledge and can use analytical tools typical to that discipline to make assessments and decisions. As you rightly point out however quality and motivation of employees varies and the buyer/employer needs to ensure that generalists and specialists are selected and employed appropriately.

....I really question whether it would be better to provide the education in house. It would not be hard to out-do even the most prestigious universities these days.......Is the reason you are mentioning associate degrees that they are a shorter term of study that is less expensive and has fewer credits? If this is so, the military should make arrangements with state schools so that they can simply accumulate credit.

The US Military is to be applauded for providing tuition assistance, block training programs and myriad military training opportunities. However not all of these training events translate into credits at an accredited university and in some cases this is rightly so. The interaction our service members receive at civilian institutions helps them to 'think outside the box'. Our military would benefit from having a program by which all who meet the requirements would get an accredited university education....what an incredible recruiting tool this would be and from a purely management standpoint our ability to fight the 'graduate level' of war would also be increased (we are experiencing mission creep into state department functions but that is for another post). In my opinion associate degrees offer a quick and measurable return on investment as well as building academic confidence in those who undertake the course of study. A university or tech school education, regardless of the level (A.S to PhD), benefits all involved and is a great return on investment for the nation...

I absolutely agree with this. I've been meaning to get around to writing something about this but that never happened. On top of this I would suggest that the DoD create a program where language programs in Arabic, Farsi, Pashto, etc. (the more exotic but useful languages these days) are subsidized in public schools.

In my opinion language skills quantifiably and qualitatively increase ones effectiveness in an area of operations, while helping one to realistically to assess problems and generate solutions appropriate to the locale in which one operates. If a solution falls apart after one leaves it speaks volumes about the effectiveness and sustainability of said solution...I would submit that often times failures such as these are due to a failure to understand the language and thus the culture.

Regards,

Steve