What if...? (Education)

What if you never really studied anything in college?

What if you just listened to your professor?

What if all you ever did was accept what the professor had to say?

What if you woke up one day and realized that most people around you don't do anything related to their major?

What if that worthless piece of paper you got at college did not really prepare you for your job more than the training your employer gave you at the beginning of your job?

What if to get that piece of paper you have to take out a $80,000 loan at 5% interest during your four year stay at college?

What if the average person without that piece of paper can make $120,000 in the same time period?

What if the difference between plus $120,000 and minus $80,000 is $200,000?

What if that difference is not counting the interest payments that will be required to repay that loan?

What if by the time computer science majors are out of college, their professors' information is so out of date, the students have to be retrained by their employers?

What if this was also true for doctors, nurses, scientists and others?

What if we were to change this paradigm?

What if companies were to introduce more apprenticeships?

What if instead of veterinary-interested students being forced to sit through art appreciation classes, they were shown the ropes with on the job training?

What if instead of archaeology students learning about Schliemann's Troy, they actually did what they wanted ...get their hands dirty in Troy?

What if all of the extra crap at college is just another way for the government to indoctrinate students in the "proper" way to think?

What if this idea applies to earlier incarnation of schooling as well?

What if almost no one uses the math that we used past the 6th grade?

What if the only education that is every really important is the education that is important to you?

What if any other kind of education should be considered no more than it really is: slavery, theft-of-desire, prison, torture...?