Response To Clive Crook's A Matter Of Degrees

In "A Matter of Degrees" Clive Crook argues that though improving our education system would help solve some of our economic problems, we should look at more education as enlightenment and not as the "economic cure-all." Crook begins by questioning how to go about improving our schools and where the problems reside. He points out many possible solutions that are not challenged for this important issue. One solution Crook focuses on is the well known idea that "more school means a bigger paycheck." He agrees that this is true for about two- thirds of the population though across a wider scale the opposite would occur and adding an extra year of education would simply "sort people" and "signal higher ability" to potential employers. This would …show more content…
The value of a degree would lessen if everybody attended school at Harvard University and the premium would diminish. Of course, some extra education would enhance productivity for the workplace but not by much. Crook explains that real focus should be on specific skills used to the specific job. A course to train a student of more computer skills could have more value than an extra year spent learning history. Crook believes that the data including the added figures of high school graduates who go on to college will tell you little when it comes to "material utility." Crook then begins to compare the percentages of high- school graduates in America who went straight to college in the years 2004 and 1972. Crook finds that in the more recent years the number of matriculations had increase significantly. He questions if the increase could actually show progress for our country. The thought of not going through college and getting a degree did not always mark people as "unfit for any kind of well-paid employment." A college degree now can signal drive and ability which has become "an expensive passport to good