Social Expectations Research Paper

Centuries ago, only the wealthy Whites could attend college, leaving dedicated, knowledge-seeking individuals with unfulfilled dreams, simply because of social status. Things have changed since then; now the ability to attend college has been given to the majority of high school graduates. This in itself is not a bad thing. However, it has become a social expectation for students to apply for colleges. College counselors around the nation are urging every student to fill out applications and find an education field that’s right for them (in my case, that’s all the college counselor did; she didn’t help at all with any of my applications, but made sure I was doing them). This widespread expectation for college enrollment can lead to students applying for colleges without a set plan, and unfortunately, I was one of those students. My parents always encouraged me to get a college education, since they didn’t obtain it themselves. They used to always say that money isn’t an issue, and to go to the college that I wanted to go to. This idea changed when my brother enrolled in his first year at Missouri University of Science and Technology. The loan overbore my brother and my parents, who were helping pay the expenses. Sadly, we just couldn’t afford his enrollment in his second year, and …show more content…
So, I worried about nothing but test scores, since it seemed to me that colleges gave a lot of money for students with high test scores. Once college application time came around, I realized a major problem. I didn’t really know what I wanted to do in my life. I knew what fields of education interested me the most (computer engineering & mechanical engineering), but I didn’t have a plan for after college. I simply wanted to go to college and get an education, then find some job and raise a family – a rather ordinary way of life that seemed “ideal” to my