Regretting Her College Education
A woman named Kathryn Beal tweeted this the other day: “I regret my college education. If you want to be a wife and a mom, you will likely feel aimless like I did. Many people see college as necessary, but it isn’t. For aspiring homemakers, the cost may not be worth the benefits.”
I can relate to her. I don’t necessarily regret it, but I would have been fine not going since all I wanted to do was to be a wife and mother. I had no debt after college since it was so inexpensive back then and it was a private Christian college. But I definitely felt aimless in college because it wasn’t where I belonged. I wanted to be in a home with a family.
I know too many young women whose college debt their husband now carries which puts off having children and the mothers unable to be home full time. Did you know that women carry two-thirds of the $1.3 trillion student loan debt? This keeps them in bondage to their jobs for many, many years. It sounds like a good plan by Satan himself.
Colleges’ purpose is to prepare people for a career and a paycheck. God never calls women to careers or making money in His Word. It also exposes them to godless teaching and feminism which is the opposite of being feminine.
In my opinion, any woman who comes out of college with a huge student loan debt, college was a waste! Where is it scriptural to go into mass amounts of debt for oneself which keeps women far away from God’s will for their lives? Do we think that our lives are meaningless and there’s nothing we can do without an expensive college education? Where is God in the equation and trusting in Him with our lives?
I asked the women in the chat room what their thoughts were on this matter.
“Absolutely. I’m in a huge amount of debt. I was not allowed to consider a career as a homemaker as a child. My parents saw it as unreasonable. My daughter will be raised very differently!”
“Yep. I was totally lost while at college. I wondered why I was even there. My mom put so much pressure on me to attend college.”
“I dropped out of college and I don’t regret it at all. Being a nanny and working in daycare prepared me for having my own children more than any of the classes I took in college, and I went for Education. Studying Scripture prepared me the most!”
“I regret college degree very much; a lot of time and money wasted.”
“I completely regret it. Everything I learned in college I could have easily learned on my own through reading or the Internet. As a homeschooling mom, I had to ‘unlearn’ some of the things I was taught in order to be a better and more effective teacher for my children. And even though I was aware of the liberal, feminist influence at college and *thought* I was not allowing myself to be affected by it, I was affected by it to a degree that I didn’t realize until much later. I could have spent those five years it took me to get my degree (not to mention the money) in much more useful ways.”
“I do. In my teen years, parents bought the lie that everyone needed to go to a university. I wanted to go to an animal husbandry trade school but was told that was ‘beneath’ me. In reality, I wanted to get married and have children, though I didn’t realize that. I was never encouraged to get married since my parents were miserable in theirs. I had many wasted years, lost and wandering despite being raised in church. I had my first child out of wedlock and faced years of heartache. We need to go back to extolling the virtues of marriage and family as a means to glorify God. It would prevent most from embracing disobedience and having years that the locusts have eaten.”
Christian parents no longer extol the virtues of marriage and child raising and instead extol higher education and careers for their daughters.
“This is something that has been grieving my heart lately. I was holding my two-year-old as he slept against me last night while seeing post after post on social media of homeschooling Christian families we know doing college visits with their daughters to expensive, private colleges, I might add.
“Then a friend of mine told me how her DIL is putting her just barely month old first baby in daycare to go back to work just because she likes working. I was there holding my sweet, precious son with tears in my eyes pondering all of this. It is such an honor and privilege to be a homemaker and mother.
“Why do Christian parents act as if they want their daughters to do anything, literally anything but ‘just’ be a wife and mom?”
If you don’t want to go to college, young women, then I encourage you not to go. Live under your father’s roof if you are able and he is a good father. Make money being a nanny or helping out in the local daycare or old folks’ home. This is good preparation for learning to serve others. Save any money you make to help in your future marriage, if you get married. Learn to be a good cook and homemaker. Study the Word daily and allow it to transform you into a meek and quiet-spirited woman.
As believers in Jesus Christ, let’s stop making college and a paycheck the idol that our culture has made them. It’s caused a lot of destruction in our culture from what it teaches. We are commanded to avoid false teaching and colleges/universities are full of false teachers.
Dennis Prager, one of my favorite radio personalities, believes it is a waste for everyone unless they are going to be a doctor or something that needs a college degree. He has said frequently that the Left poisons everything it touches. It has touched colleges and universities and they are definitely poisoned and poisoning others.
Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers: for what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? And what communion hath light with darkness?
1 Corinthians 6:14
23 thoughts on “Regretting Her College Education”
I went to college and can attest that it is very much a feminist and liberal biased place. No room for women who want to be wives and mothers…. Many women go because they need a stop gap career before they marry and can be provided for as feminism has also taught men that women are leeches if they don’t work and there’s no social values emphasizing providing for women anymore like in the past 🙁 For many women, it’s work or be out on the street homeless… Very sad!
I don’t regret my college education. I read many excellent books I would not have read on my own, many of my classes were thought-provoking, and my biology classes helped me understand the natural world a little. I needed my experiences to get the job I had until I had children, and I graduated with no debt or memories of bad experiences. My university was (and is) infected with leftist thinking through and through, but it also employed some intelligent professors who helped me stretch my mind in a way that is useful to me today, not merely as career prep. And frankly, watching the consequences of partying and hookups made such a lifestyle seem unattractive, even if I had been so inclined to try it out.
I agree that college isn’t for everyone, and also that it’s ridiculous that a bachelor’s degree is required for many jobs for which an adequate high school education should be sufficient. One problem is that many highschools graduate people who are nearly illiterate and innumerate, so a high school diploma is no guarantee of even basic competency. Another is, as you write, the nearly universal expectation that college is the next step after high school, and that parents who do not send their children to college are severely handicapping their chances of success in life.
Neither of these issues is going to be easy to change on a societal level. However, individual parents and children can make the choice to patronize a university or community college or not, but we can hope that this is an informed choice that takes reality into account and encourages moral decisionmaking.
Finally, it is quite true that parents seem to prioritize preparing their daughters for careers rather than for motherhood, even when they pay lip service to valuing motherhood. This should change.
It used to be where people graduated after 8th grade and then if further education was needed/wanted they chose high school (trade school) or college. The eighth grade education was very rigorous. Most college graduates today could not pass the eighth grade exam of yesteryear.
This is my plan for my daughter. I plan to start her on college at home during her “high school” years so that she can graduate college (in place of high school) so that she can graduate college at around 18. She really wants to be a wife and mommy so I am working on skills needed for that career with her and I’m keeping my eye open for potential Godly husbands and training her what traits to look for in a husband.
I studied computer science, found a job before graduation? paid my student loan in one year. I have a pretty comfortable life today and would do it all over again. Generally, I would recommend any talented and dilligent girl to go into a profitable STEM field.
On the other hand, I agree that many studies can be a total waste of money (graphic design, religious education, history, social sciences…) and people rarely find jobs in those fields.
My son and his wife are presently in this quagmire. My daughter in law spent TWELVE YEARS pursuing her doctorate. She had been sold the lie that once she finished her doctorate she could then transfer to a tenured professor position at the university where she is presently adjunct staff. Of course this didn’t happen and now my DIL regrets the 12 years she lost.
She is in debt over 6 figures. She barely makes $15/hour. Now, in her 30s, she desires family and children. But feels trapped under the weight of the debt and ongoing pressure to “use that degree”! My son is frustrated because he wants children.
Young ladies, it is a trap! Be thoughtful and prayerful about how you pursue life after high school. It will have life long impact.
But as Lori points out, getting a job is not the be-all and end-all of life. If we are truly serious about encouraging our daughters to marry Godly men when they are young, then popping off to school to find a STEM job is still not necessarily the right move.
First of all I simply do not believe that it is safe or appropriate for young women to live away from parental supervision in order to obtain a college degree.
Secondly the vocation God gives to the overwhelming majority of women is that of marriage and motherhood. A vocation which is (or should be) all encompassing, leaving no space for the kind of career for which college is intended to b a preparation.
This idea of aimlessness is very accurate, and I never realized there was a word for what I felt in my years after college. I thought going for my masters degree would be the answer, and so I accrued student loans of exorbitant amounts to do so, as well as wiling away the time participating in more of the ‘extracurriculars’ that college kids get into: drinking, hookup culture, etc… (this was before I came to Christ).
My husband inherited the loan when we married, and it was an albatross to our finances for the first three years of our marriage until we finally paid it off.
I’ve had family members comment that sure, I am ‘able’ homeschool because one of my degrees is in education. Can you imagine? That’s like if I told another mom, “Oh, you’re able to potty train because you have a degree in child psychology.” If we needed a degree to do the basic things that Lord has required of us, we’d be a very sorry (and broke!) lot.
There’s this young Christian gal who I’ve known for a while. She was very open to receive instruction on biblical femininity, something older women seem incapable of these days.
I asked her to check some of your posts on why women, and specifically women her age, should seek a family first.
She seemed to agree with your articles, which was refreshing to see, but unfortunately she’s leaving to college soon. It was saddening news because this gal is born again. I wonder what type of worldly influence she’s receiving.
Government and corporations, are marrying up women through the means of college.
I have mixed feelings about my college education. I went to a top-tier university on full scholarship. I was very proud to be there, but I was immature, naïve and lacked any career goal. By my junior year I realized my major (Communications) no longer interested me but I pushed on and graduated on time. I met my future husband there and we married shortly after graduation. My MRS is by far the better degree, however my husband is a non-believer and this has presented challenges throughout our marriage. At the time I believed that whenever something came easy it must be the will of God. I was trying to discern God’s will based on my feelings and the subjective interpretation of “signs.” I know now the will of God is found only in His Word.
If I had it all to do over again, I would have attended the small Christian college near my hometown. I would have chosen a college major that prepares for a career serving others, and I would have strived to marry a Christian man. I hope my own daughters will be able to do this without incurring student loan debt.
What happens if marriage doesn’t happen? Or if a woman’s husband dies? Or leaves? What then? A woman needs a way to support herself and her children because sometimes you can do EVERYTHING right and still end up without a husband.
Growing up, both in the house and at school (before the DoEd went full-on SJW), I had required reading. The Bible was on the list, and many of the classics from fiction (eg. Alexandre Dumas, etc) and non-fiction (eg. Federalist Papers, etc) alike. This prepared me by knowing my place in Creation, and my place in the World.
Families today would do well with this proven concept. Reading the Bible in its entirety by 10 years of age is very realistic (use a translation that teaches the concepts but is not a struggle to someone learning the skillset of literacy). Requiring annual read-thru’s with conservative study-guides in middle school years and beyond should form the backbone of an upbringing. Pr 22:6, 2 Ti 3:16.
What other books will teach children to navigate the coming storms? High on the list for my children will be ‘The Millionaire Next Door’. This book details financial solvency, and a young adolescent armed with the knowledge this book contains will 100% skip right past the trap of The Sin-stitution of Financial Bondage (with it’s culture of sexual immorality) that awaits them at 18 years of age.
First step is realizing the role we play as men and women in Creation. Men were created to work (Ge 2:15), and women to procreate (2:18). Out of these primary roles, all other earthly commands sprout:
* men to provide for, protect, lead their families
* women to birth children in, submit to leadership in, keep the home
So what industries have a workforce demand that also serves the functions for which we were created this side of Heaven?
https://www.bls.gov/
Do. Your. Research.
1. You should never have to pay more than ‘pocket money’ for knowledge: ever. The best educations in life are free.
2. Never go into debt for anything other than a house.
Anyone offering ‘knowledge’ at the level of annual-income costs is selling you into a bloated line of work.
Avoid any industry with certifications. These ‘gatekeeping’ methods signal an industry prone to credential-inflation. Always invest in human capital: learn how to work with your hands.
A young man can obtain an AMP license in their high school years and can clear 100k with overtime his first year of work at 18 years of age. Little-to-no cost in obtaining a license, fills a societal niche that will ensure many years of employment, and arms the young man with basic mechanical know-how that can translate to electrical wiring of the home, plumbing, fixing a car.
CDL drivers are needed by Fortune 100 companies in droves. It’s a hard life, but at a starting salary of 88k annually, not a bad way to go for a 21yo man in rural South Carolina. At least for a couple years while he gets his CPA license.
CNC machinists are in very high demand, classes available at every local community college across the nation. Couple this with welding courses. Master welders within Oil&Gas can command 400k and work on their own time schedule. With that kind of paycheck, you can- and should- be raising a little double-digit army of anklebiters.
For women, airline flight attendants can make 100k annually by working only 20hrs a week. The danger here is placing your daughter in the care of an airline, where she is sleeping in hotels away from home, prone to physical safety concerns and a culture of sexual looseness.
I would not advise it personally, but a real estate license can be obtained on the cheap (varies by state, ~1k) and can serve a discerning young lady with the opportunity to tour many homes in that line of work. She will learn the dark side of business and how to properly vet for well-built starter homes. She also could learn about interior design and decor in the process, helping to ‘make the house a home’ in marriage. Careful that she doesn’t fall for a smooth-talking businessman or get assaulted during a solo home tour.
Nevertheless, there are other solid industries young women can work while they seek a husband: becoming a nanny with a trusted family. This will teach her many assorted skills required for raising her own children.
Seamstresses with their own tools can repair pricey professional clothing for the hubby AND can continue to perform their craft on the side while baby is napping and husband is at work.
Nursing is always a viable option, but would caution about working nights or with sexually-hungry doctors or patients. Keep to neo-natal wards or pediatrics. Travelling nursing is a big thing, with highly flexible work schedules, and some women I know clear 100k annually easily when doing it full-time.
Want a white collar career, certain of it? Be smart about it.
https://www.jamesgmartin.center/2019/02/what-is-the-actual-value-of-a-masters-degree/
Pursue education that is cost-effective and allows you to stay with your support network of Christ-fearing relatives and friends.
https://www.uopeople.edu/about/
Finance, accounting are helpful with keeping the home budget and are industries that allow a significant portion of the workforce to work remote. A young lady in Montana can be remote-working out of the Charlotte NC office, while sipping her mornin joe in her pj’s, rocking the 2yo in the cradle.
Many homeschoolers these days can earn universally-accepted college credits with various online programs. Additionally, community college course dual-enrollment while in high school should be abused whenever possible by every Christian home in our country.
As parents, learn to recognize the lies of the Deceiver. He will put in your head “What if my babygirl never gets married?” The question that isn’t being asked is “What if she does?” Your babygirl was created with marriage in mind. Ge 2:18, 1 Co 11:9.
How well are the skillsets she is acquiring suited to finding a husband, keeping the husband, having children, raising children? If there is overlap with a societal niche, wonderful.
Her most fertile years are 16-24. Don’t allow her to squander these years at a 4-year Sin-stitution. Her youthful beauty will persist into her early 30s. Don’t encourage her to squander these years on building a career.
Do not just go along with the conventional wisdom that is echo’ed in society (1 Co 3:19). Know your identity in Christ, and the role you are to serve in Creation. Be smart about your decisions.
Don’t forget the gym. Life is a marathon. Keeping your health (teens, 20s) is far, far easier than trying to reclaim it (in your 30s) after years of caffeine-fueled all-nighters.
Oh, and learn all about, and practice, tax-deferred account compound interest. Start as early as possible. Even by staying in shape throughout your life, medical bills are gonna happen..
(The author of this post was born during the Star Wars microgeneration and received the ‘stay in school’ brainwashing growing up. He became fluent in various foreign languages in his teens, served Uncle Sam in his 20s and used the GI Bill to finish a technical degree by 30. He struggled to find work in the white-collar world for a handful of years and only started to earn ‘a real paycheck’ at 32. His career field will require repeated degree-chasing to stay relevant within the industry: credential inflation.
He’ll be ok, is well on his way to become a top 1% earner in society through many years of pure hard-work and all-nighters, but at the major cost of his healthy and 15-20 years of prime money-making opportunity that could have been prevented if he had received the guidance offered here.
He will never make up those years fiscally considering compound-interest gains. He will never get back those years in building a family.)
Hi Lori,
Have you written anything on how you think young girls and ladies should approach dating/courting and the boundaries they should implement? If not, can you please write a blog post on this?
Yes, I have Hadassah. Put in those words into the search engines of both of my blogs for posts on these topics!
I graduated high school a little over a year ago now, and had a hard time figuring out what exactly I wanted to do. Eventually I settled on going to school for psychology and becoming a therapist (this was in my junior year), because the Psychology classes I took seemed fun, and I liked to help people with their problems. However, I mostly settled on this because I felt as though I needed to make a decision and be ready to go to college. I didn’t do that. I have talked to many of my friends and acquaintances who went, and many of them decided to go to college with no real plan, but went because that is the “thing” to do. I believe thats how many people end up wandering aimlessly through college. I dont know how other schools worked, but my high school spent so much of its resources of trying to get its students prepared for a college, but not for what they would potentially like to do once they got there. It also did not give students many options if they didn’t want to go to college at all, apart from a “go join the work force, good luck.” Again, there was no preparation for what kind of workforce jobs are available to people who had no interest in college. In the media as well, I’ve seen a lot of similar sentiments: that college is the end all be all after you graduate high school, so you can get a proper white-collar job. The inevitable debt you’ll have to pay until you’re 50+ years of age is just something that everyone deals with. I’ve found it’s rare to see anyone encourage an alternative to college, whether you’re a young woman or young man, whether you want to be a homemaker or go out into the workforce, or go to a trade school or find an internship. I don’t think anyone should be made to feel like they need to go to college if it’s not what they want to do, and especially if they are not prepared for what they want to do going into college.
Re:Regrets about college
Who are the husbands or children who would prefer an uneducated
wife/mother? My husband likes conversation with intelligent/educated women. What happens to a woman without an education when her husband dies or leaves her. Who will support her then?
So are you saying that K through 12th grade doesn’t educate women? If you are, then there’s something seriously wrong with the public school system!
What if a marriage does happen? What if her husband doesn’t die or leave? What then? She has a load of debt which will be a heavy burden for her husband for years to come.
Sounds Good but the bible says a man who finds a wife obtains favor from the lord not the mother who finds a husband for her daughter will obtain the favor . Keep raising her Godly and a Godly man will man
Will do!
Thank you very much!
I can relate to what this woman’s feeling. I regret going to college too. My father isn’t a good father. He’s like most in the community I was born into, an indolent angry Beta man who rather have a ‘strong can do call super woman’ (even though he hates women) than a modest, ordinary woman. Whenever I told my ultra feminist mother that I wished (after becoming a writer) to settle down, marry and have a litter of children by the time I’m 30, she and every other harpy in my community laughed. I was told I HAD to go to college or else. I didn’t have the boldness to run away from home or her saying no. After much emotional abuse I was broken and afraid of my parents, I went there. It got me nothing. I’m 31, no kids and a job that I have to do because there’s no other choice. If I could go back in time, I would run away from home and go into a convent of jump from the highest building. I wish I could have help to leave this place but I feel like I’m chained to these people and this culture.
There’s nothing wrong with wanting to be a mother over a career. Motherhood and women who want a simple life shouldn’t be demonized. Wanting these things doesn’t mean a woman is weak or lacks ambition or is something she should be ashamed of.
I love this! I have had a similar experience myself and have also helped convince my sister in law to drop out. She was originally in medical school as she believed becoming a doctor was her calling, but I explained to her that despite her good intentions, her place was in the serving of her husband and the raising of children. At first it was hard for her to let go of her dream of saving lives, but now she has 6 beautiful children, who would not be with us if she had continued her education. I know that sometimes she wishes she was a doctor, but I know she wouldn’t change it for the world!
Yes it does up to a certain point. k-12 is a basic education. What you learn after k-12 is what makes a person more well rounded and educated.