It’s also possible that colleges signal other things besides IQ and work ethic. At least some employers (in the sciences, maybe) are looking for traits like curiosity and the ability to think clearly. In which case, spending a month doing repetitive tasks would be a negative signal. Creative or intellectually curious people would be less likely than average to be psychologically able to “spend a huge amount of time doing extremely boring tasks with high accuracy.”
Of course, for many jobs IQ and work ethic are by far the most important things. This program probaby would be a good signal for those jobs if it was well established enough not to trip employers’ absurdity heuristic.
Why does getting admitted to a college signal creativity? If anything being admitted to an elite college means you got all As in high school by doing exactly what your teachers wanted.
As Edison wrote “Genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.” My graduates would show that they could do the 99% part so perhaps have signaled their high capacity for creativity?
If colleges teach you how to think clearly than the signaling view of college is false and my proposed program is worthless. Your IQ is your ability to process complex information so if colleges don’t raise IQs knowing someone graduated from college should tell you nothing about their ability to think clearly if you already know their IQ.
A creative person with a long-term orientation might love the program because it would allow him to quickly start his life and avoid all the not-necessarily interesting work he would normally have to do in college.
I think your proposed program would not be valuable because colleges do, for the most part, make available the skills for thinking and communicating more clearly. And getting a degree does, for the most part, mean that the person is capable of sustained, organized work on challenging tasks that require creative application of a large skill set. In other words, they can be successful at a profession.
All colleges are going to have some bad students, and some of those students will be able to cheat their way through without learning much. But most professors want to see both creativity and diligence in their students’ work, and they grade accordingly. (I should note that my university experiences are mostly large state universities. I don’t have much exposure to elite schools or the students that attended them.)
In my experience, smart people who try college and don’t finish (for reasons other than financial or the like) are not very good at working for others. They sometimes make great entrepreneurs, but I wouldn’t want them working for me until they’d built up a lot of real world experience and demonstrated they can succeed. Smart people who never go to college I don’t have much experience with
The signaling model of education is surely neither 100% false nor 100% true, therefore it seems likely that your program would serve its function (getting certain kinds of people employed) better than no college and worse than completing college.
(Maybe this belongs in a separate comment, but I would add the further remark that your program works only if prospective employers are comfortable with and self-aware about the fact that they consider education to serve a purely signaling function. Since I think very few employers are really comfortable openly saying that they think college is not by and large a value-added proposition, I don’t think your plan would work on a very large scale.)
I agree with grouchy. I want to make the additional point that just because an activity or article of clothing or whatever has signaling value, that doesn’t mean it can’t have any intrinsic value. A Gucci purse still holds your car keys.
I think it is possible that the signaling model of higher education is more in play for the elite schools, as I have certainly read writers who had first-hand experience and claim as much. The signaling model would explain the much higher price tag for an Ivy League education.
Still, any college with anywhere decent facilities and at least a few good professors has enough for a determined and healthy person to get an education that will make them a more effective, interesting, productive, sociable, and thoughtful person. Those are all traits employers want, but are not easy to identify in applications or interviews. So, a college degree is pretty good evidence of progress in that direction.
It’s also possible that colleges signal other things besides IQ and work ethic. At least some employers (in the sciences, maybe) are looking for traits like curiosity and the ability to think clearly. In which case, spending a month doing repetitive tasks would be a negative signal. Creative or intellectually curious people would be less likely than average to be psychologically able to “spend a huge amount of time doing extremely boring tasks with high accuracy.”
Of course, for many jobs IQ and work ethic are by far the most important things. This program probaby would be a good signal for those jobs if it was well established enough not to trip employers’ absurdity heuristic.
The main thing it is used for is to show that you can sit down to do a task that takes three or four years and actually finish it.
The other thing it is used for is as a handy way to cull that gigantic pile of resumes. Hence job requirements inflation.
Why does getting admitted to a college signal creativity? If anything being admitted to an elite college means you got all As in high school by doing exactly what your teachers wanted.
As Edison wrote “Genius is one percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration.” My graduates would show that they could do the 99% part so perhaps have signaled their high capacity for creativity?
If colleges teach you how to think clearly than the signaling view of college is false and my proposed program is worthless. Your IQ is your ability to process complex information so if colleges don’t raise IQs knowing someone graduated from college should tell you nothing about their ability to think clearly if you already know their IQ.
A creative person would be driven nigh to insanity by such a program, the reasoning goes. So only uncreative types would apply.
If applying is strong evidence for being uncreative, then by Bayes, not-applying* is weak evidence for being creative.
* Such as by applying instead to a college.
A creative person with a long-term orientation might love the program because it would allow him to quickly start his life and avoid all the not-necessarily interesting work he would normally have to do in college.
I think your proposed program would not be valuable because colleges do, for the most part, make available the skills for thinking and communicating more clearly. And getting a degree does, for the most part, mean that the person is capable of sustained, organized work on challenging tasks that require creative application of a large skill set. In other words, they can be successful at a profession.
All colleges are going to have some bad students, and some of those students will be able to cheat their way through without learning much. But most professors want to see both creativity and diligence in their students’ work, and they grade accordingly. (I should note that my university experiences are mostly large state universities. I don’t have much exposure to elite schools or the students that attended them.)
In my experience, smart people who try college and don’t finish (for reasons other than financial or the like) are not very good at working for others. They sometimes make great entrepreneurs, but I wouldn’t want them working for me until they’d built up a lot of real world experience and demonstrated they can succeed. Smart people who never go to college I don’t have much experience with
If your first paragraph is correct then the signaling model of education is false and my program wouldn’t/shouldn’t succeed.
The signaling model of education is surely neither 100% false nor 100% true, therefore it seems likely that your program would serve its function (getting certain kinds of people employed) better than no college and worse than completing college.
(Maybe this belongs in a separate comment, but I would add the further remark that your program works only if prospective employers are comfortable with and self-aware about the fact that they consider education to serve a purely signaling function. Since I think very few employers are really comfortable openly saying that they think college is not by and large a value-added proposition, I don’t think your plan would work on a very large scale.)
I agree with grouchy. I want to make the additional point that just because an activity or article of clothing or whatever has signaling value, that doesn’t mean it can’t have any intrinsic value. A Gucci purse still holds your car keys.
I think it is possible that the signaling model of higher education is more in play for the elite schools, as I have certainly read writers who had first-hand experience and claim as much. The signaling model would explain the much higher price tag for an Ivy League education.
Still, any college with anywhere decent facilities and at least a few good professors has enough for a determined and healthy person to get an education that will make them a more effective, interesting, productive, sociable, and thoughtful person. Those are all traits employers want, but are not easy to identify in applications or interviews. So, a college degree is pretty good evidence of progress in that direction.