So, here you are. At college, but I would pose the fundamental question,
why do college at all? Anytime somebody tells you what to do,
you should say, why? Well you shouldn't stop there, you should seek out relevant
information
and understand it critically, evaluate it, assimilate it and make
informed decisions. So I'm Chris Dula.
The Dula class is typically Intro to Psychology. There are spaces available.
I am a faculty member here
in the Department of Psychology. That's within the College of Arts and Sciences,
which is housed within this great
University of ETSU. Now,
you have a name badge, if you have it on it will tell you what department you're
part of. If you've declared a major,
you're part of a Department, you're part of a college and that's part of the
University. If you haven't declared a major, if you're undecided, you're still a Buc.
Yeah!
Some people asked before, "You slammin on the undecided?" No! I was decided!
Right? I was in construction. Then I was in community college and I had no clue that
any of that would lead to this here today.
So it provides a pathway to change your life.
Be open to new pathways and realize that us faculty are here for you.
We get paid to help you. That is our job.
Some people are afraid to approach faculty. "I can't go up and talk to them."
Yes you can. Just do it. Why not do it?
In short, you're gonna get more money ,more freedom,
and greater job security is the short answer to that big question of why do
college.
Can I prove it is the bigger question and the answer is yes.
I can prove it. I'm gonna prove it with some numbers. Now these numbers are intended
to make a general point, not
have pinpoint accuracy. These are two thousand numbers here, but what you'll
see is the general trend
will hold in answering your question. I think you can make more money.
2000 numbers. You get your high school diploma or GED you're looking at twenty
six thousand dollars a year on average
in earnings on average. That is not you're starting salary.
That's everybody with a high school diploma or GED from the beginning of the
career to the end of the career.
You go get that two year degree, associates degree like I did at community
college
and you're at 33,000 a year. Get this Bachelor's degree that you are here after today,
you're up to forty two thousand dollars a year. Master's degree, fifty-two thousand
dollars a year.
Doctoral degree, I don't make that because I work in education. (laughter)
So what we see is a trend line upward where you can
get more money, but you can also do what you love for a living,
right? Update it a little more with 2009, dollars. We've seen over a lifetime this
will add up.
Less than a high school, anything wrong with people who don't get their high school? No,
of course not.
These are just different paths that one can take in life. Little under a million dollars.
Get their GED or high school diploma and you're at 1.3.
Some college, even without the degree, you up to 1.5. Associates degree, two year degree
at community college, 1.7.
A bachelor's degree, 2.2. And you see that trend continues
upward.The more education you get typically more money
that you'll make. You think of a forty-year career for example, 25 to 65, assuming
full-time work and you can't assume that
because people, individuals, they may or may not work full-time for various
reasons throughout their career.
But you just graduated high school you're looking at an extra five thousand a year.
Get some college, $12,500 a year.
Get a two-year degree, an extra $15,000 a year and if you get this four-year
degree that you're here to get today
through the next four years, which might take you five,
$27,500 dollars a year. That's an extra 1.1 million dollars in your lifetime. Is that
worth it?
To take out some loans. You all understand how the stock market works, right?
13 percent return annually on average. Then you got a crash and a boom.
You invest in yourself, you'll get it back many fold over.
What's the five thousand dollars a year look like? I like tangibility. I like things to
be concrete. I like to see
what we talking about. When I first made this presentation
a flat-screen TV cost five thousand dollars. It don't anymore. You go to a Sam's
Club and get them for a grand.
But you get you a big wad of cash, you can get you a used classic
Les Paul. You get a new one for three grand, right?
Lounge suite for your house
or you get some bling. But you go ahead and move on upward,
what's this extra fifteen thousand dollars a year look like? You get one
of these every year!
You have you a flotilla and you can be an admiral!
You get that extra $27,500 a year,
you can have one of these every year year! Wow a fleet
of Corvettes and Stingrays and things, but most people won't do this every year
because they gonna get some of these.
And these are priceless!
(clapping and laughter)
They are priceless but they are very expensive to maintain,
Some of you ate here with the people that you made like this and
you see how they're going onward and upward, right? So
I said more money, but it also equals greater job security. Can I prove it? Yes I can
prove it.
So we know we in the Great Recession,
worst economic situation since the Great Depression,
right? And we're not out of it. You look back in 2010
and people were talking about 8% unemployment rate. You notice that nobody ever said we got
a 92% employment rate.
That's an A... minus,
right? There's some room for improvement.
But for the situation you see that the people
who are unemployed are not equally represented across educational lines.
75% of all the people who are unemployed have less than a
bachelor's degree.
Is that fair? No, it is not fair.
It is reality, though. These are harsh realities
and getting this degree will pay you back in terms of some job security.
I could show that over time. People are like, "Well I don't know about this economy, if
its worth having college degree anymore." It is! It depends on what you want to
do. You don't have to have a college degree for everything you want to do in life.
But it will show you this -See I, myself, am
rabidly independent, registered Independent, politically speaking.
I love everybody on the right and I love everybody on the left
cuz I'm an American and so are they. And a little bit of respect for everybody makes things
a lot better.
But what you will see is partisan politics does not play out with
economies. Economies do what economies do.
They always have and they always will. There will be booms and there will be busts.
There will be good times and there will be recessions. The spikes are recessions.
What you'll see Republican, Republican, Democrat, Republican,
Republican, Democrat, Republican. You know where we are now;
Democrat. If you think one person in
office controls an economy, you need to go to college.
It's a lot more complex than all that. What you will see that holds consistently
over this time
is these are unemployments, right? The people on the red line are people with less
than four years of high school,
they suffer the worst when economies go bad.
People in the black line are people with a bachelor's degree or above.
They fare best on average when economies go bad.
It's just a matter of understanding the numbers. But it's more than about numbers.
It's about having a life that you love.
I get to do this for a living. I enjoy what I do for a living.
You wanna have a job you enjoy going to. You don't want to end all this and go,
"Man, I gotta go to work." You wanna go, "I get to go to work today!"
And you can make that happen by picking a career that you
have passion for. It's about creating a better life. It's about becoming educated
citizens. It's about making a better world, a better country, a better family, a
better everything that you want to apply
your knowledge and skills to. You will meet all kinds of other people here.
You'll be able to learn about virtually anything that you want to learn about on
this campus.
We have subjects covered that you wouldn't even imagine are covered in college
campuses.
And you need to stick with it. You need to stick with ETSU.
Take at least 15 hours per semester works!
Happened for me. I had a wife, two kids,
a 20 hour week job and I still took 15 plus hours
every semester. And I got through it. It wasn't easy.
But it helps if you have a support system. Engage your family. Engage your
friends. Make new friends. Join organizations.
Declare majors. Meet faculty. Get advised regularly, so you don't wind up on a dead end path.
Learn about and plan about possible careers.
Learn about where you wanna go so when you get to the end of it all, you don't
wind up doing something
that you didn't think you wanted to do. Find something you love and go with it.
Do well. It will pay you back. Get involved. Motivation matters.
You have to work on that yourself. We can provide you with all kinds of skills
in all kinds support services but the motivation has to come from within.
You gotta make every class a priority and get help if you need it from people
like me
and all the staff and all the other faculty here because with enough desire,
you have to want it bad enough, with enough effort,
you have to work hard enough and enough persistent, you have to stay at it
long enough,
you can do almost anything!
Go Bucs!