Is your education relevant?
Getting an education is about more than earning a diploma. Ideally, it should be about learning the skills you need to be able to pursue your goals, whether it’s starting your own business or having a high-paying career.
Of course, learning skills that are relevant for today’s workforce is one thing. Getting a job (or making something with what you’ve been given) is entirely another. That’s why outcomes, more than any other trait, are what are most important when assessing the quality of an educational program.
It’s not about going to school that values career readiness. Or one that leverages data and feedback to build programs that help you learn valuable skills.
What matters is whether the education you’re receiving is truly helping those who are acquiring it–whether the graduates of the track you’re considering have successfully transitioned into new careers or are thriving in their fields.
Unfortunately, there's not a platform that I know of that makes it easy to access this information. But it’s easy to imagine one.
By aggregating data–specifically, reviews and testimonials from alumni–and leveraging AI to analyze trends, such a tool could provide valuable insights into educational programs, career tracks, and majors–effectively helping students bridge the gap.
Plus, by allowing prospective students to see firsthand accounts of graduates’ experiences and outcomes, students would be able to make informed decisions about their education and chosen career path. So, ideally, they not only find the right path for them, but do so without going into massive debt.
I think the mark of a first-rate education is a program that truly prepares its graduates for success. Not merely by providing knowledge, but by equipping them with the skills and experiences they need to achieve whatever they set out to.
If we want what’s best for posterity, we can’t continue to encourage people to blindly pursue a expensive degree that may or may not lead to a viable career. Instead, we should promote programs that provide transparency regarding job placement, and encourage students to explore pathways that graduates can eagerly vouch for. Not just for the tangible skills their education helped them acquire, but the stories that illustrate how it helped them achieve their real-world success.