AEE Episode 5: Is College in the US Worth the Price?

This is an all-ears English podcast. Episode five is college in the U.S. worth the price? Welcome to the all-ears English podcast where you'll finally get real, native English conversation and fluency for business and life. We believe in connection, not perfection when it comes to learning English. Now, here are your hosts, Lindsay McMan, the English adventurer and Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl coming to you from Boston and New York City, USA. The price of college in the United States just keeps going up. Is it worth it? Today, Lindsay and Michelle share their opinions so that you can make the best decision for yourself if you are thinking about studying abroad? Fluency is not about speaking perfectly. It's about communicating comfortably, being able to share your ideas without stress, react naturally in conversations, and express your personality in English. If English still feels like something you have to manage carefully, you're probably very close to the next level of fluency, but progress becomes much faster once you know exactly where you stand. Take our free two-minute fluency quiz and discover your English level today. Go to all-ears English dot com slash fluency score. That's all ears English dot com slash F-L-U-E-N-C-Y-S-C-O-R-E. Hey, Michelle, how's it going? What's going on? Hey, Lindsay, good! How are you? Oh my god, I'm excited to be back on the mic recording with you. We always have fun on this show. That's what it's all about, right? Definitely, definitely. It's a fun time. I know, so we were just talking about, you know, a few years ago we were both, we were in school, I went to graduate school, I went to college, you did two. Here's the question for today, real quick, do you think that at this point, college in the US is worth the price? The college is really expensive. I think there is a social pressure, and I think it's worth it in the sense of like people see it as a very important on a resume. Do I actually think dollar for dollar? It's always worth the price. I'm not sure. What do you think? Good point, Michelle, you're right. So there's this societal thing that says you have to have a bachelor's degree on your resume. No, dollar for dollar, I really don't think so. I think a lot of what we're paying for in the US right now for college is the experience. It's like this whole leave the home at 18 and break out as an adult, but you're not really an adult on a college campus, right? You're eating in a dining hall, you're living in a dorm. It's kind of an in-between step. So I think we're paying for that in-between step between childhood and adulthood, and we think it's a right of passage. But the education itself, Michelle, what do you think about it? It's just the education, like what you learned in college. This is just talking about undergraduate. We can talk another day about graduate school. Yeah, I agree with you. I think it's a lot just learning about like how to be a person. Like when I think about my classes and I studied theater and you know, I enjoyed it and everything, but I don't know. I feel like grad school was more useful. Okay, interesting. So more applicable to what you're doing now. Yeah, I mean, and I also did like a bit of a career change. So like, obviously, like to my, but in the same sense, like I am a theatrical co-person in those skills apply to what I am doing on the podcast. They apply to teaching. They apply to a lot. So I can't, I can't say that it was like, I mean, it's definitely like worth it, like the classes that I had. But as far as like, you know, theater or major, like it's not like known for like making a lot of money. Yeah, no, for sure. So it all is who you become. I mean, I agree. You have a great voice on the show. And some of that came from your education. Your undergraduate degree. But I just want to make sure our listeners know what we're talking about, right? You know, right now, right now the average cost for the school year at a private college in the US was, can you guess it, Michelle? Can you guess how much it costs the average cost for a private universal private? Is it around 40,000? Yeah, it's 41,411 and for a state college for in state residents, it's a lot cheaper. It's 11,000. But if you're going to a state school and you're coming from out of state, it's 26,000. So these are big numbers, right? Yeah, they're huge. I mean, I do think that overall, I think if you're asking me and I can only give a yes or no answer, is it worth it or not? I would say yes. Yeah, what would you say? There's a big difference between understanding English and participating in English. Understanding means you follow the conversation. You participate by adding your ideas, reacting naturally and keeping the conversation moving. Many English learners are strong listeners but hesitant speakers. Once you know your current fluency level, it becomes much easier to close that gap. Take our free two-minute quiz to discover your level and what to focus on next. Go to allersanglish.com/fluencyscore. That's allersanglish.com/FLU-EN-CY-SC-O-R-E. Yeah, I think it's still worth it. It's still just a baseline you expected. I mean, when we hire at allers English to build our team, we look for that at least that undergraduate degree. It's a baseline. You just need it just to get by and make one of those things. Yeah, but I also think my advice for our listeners would be it's good, but it's not enough. All right, get it. Get your bachelors, but then get trained in something of high value. If you can go into computer software, software engineer, something that's very like high value of become a specialist in something as quickly as you can. That's what I would say. I think our education system says become a generalist. Get all these skills. Yeah. But very soon after become a specialist in a highly valued skill, that's not easy to acquire. But then you hear these stories of a lot of people who have dropped out. I mean, didn't Mark Zuckerberg drop out of home? Oh, for sure. But I think, yeah, so that's like what we that's our what we worship, what we we recognize. And we say, oh man, that's the dream. I think that's the exception though. Bill Gates of Uber, right? These guys, they were like geniuses, they invented a company, they are lucky, right time, right? Innovation. So I don't think that's the rule. Yeah, no, I agree with you. But then there are also certain like trades that you can be in without a college degree that can make you a lot of money. So I think it also like we like people should recognize that like college may not always be like the right thing. Like I think, you know, we have to be honest about that. Like if you if you you could make more money doing something else and you like it like, yeah, it is kind of the baseline like. But I think that we do need to recognize that not everything is right for every person. And I and it's kind of I'm kind of sorry that it's the baseline actually because I don't think that it's like right. If like other people are like, you know, looked at like, oh, you like, you know, you didn't get a college degree. And it's like, well, they could be making more money than you. Yeah. I mean, I think that might be true right now that you need that degree. But I think you're right, Michelle. I think things are going to start to move in the direction that this general college degree, the bad, the what do you call it, liberal arts degree is going to become a little obsolete. It's just going to become unaffordable. Yeah. Yeah. You know, so then it's going to be about specializing in new skills for the future, learning online. Right. There's so much cool stuff that's going to happen in the next 10 or 15 years. I can't wait to see it. Yeah. Good stuff. Yeah. Good stuff. And I want to make sure our listeners know guys, hit subscribe, hit follow on this podcast because if you've just found us, you don't want to miss our next episode. We've got tons of we're going to have tons of episodes here. So join us on this journey to connection not perfection. Right. Michelle, what does that mean? Connection not perfection. Guys, well, I mean, wow, it means so much. But basically is you want to, you know, there's so many times I know it's tempting to stare at that vocabulary list, stare at that book, at textbook. And, you know, to really focus on those things and get really nervous about it and get really nervous and upset if you make a mistake. Yeah. But that's not what all our English is here for. We are, we have a different mindset. We have this mindset of we're focusing first on the connection. And you don't have to be perfect to make those connections. And isn't that what it's all about to make the connections? You don't have to be perfect. Obviously, we want to be good. We're going to, you know, we're along this journey. We will be helping you giving you lots of tools, but the main idea is to connect. Exactly. It's human connection. Michelle so well said. I think we can finish that off today for this one. Thanks for hanging out. All right. Let's see. Bye. Take care, bye. (upbeat music) Thanks for listening to all ears English. And if you believe in connection, not perfection, follow our show wherever you listen to podcasts to make sure you don't miss anything. See you next time. (upbeat music) Fall never arrives all at once. Verse the air, then the light, and slowly the things you love begin to find each other. 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