The point of college, ideally, is to learn. Yes, there are some people who do best on their own; such individuals are known as autodidactics. However, most do not have a diverse enough skill-base to teach themselves everything effectively. College provides instructors with specialized skills who can at the bare minimum introduce people to areas they'd never even thought of before they had to fulfill a requirement or went scrounging for a few last credits.
However, I will concede your point that a basic bachelor's degree has become a baseline for entry into most job markets, and not from necessity. I've seen a number of people who are not at college because they want to be, but because they wanted to be able to get a job. When you want to be there, college is geek heaven: all the knowledge you could want, there for the taking.
My student jobs taught me a lot, even though they paid horribly (generally enough for me to pay off my bookstore bill, which was typically about $400 a semester, and have something to pitch towards tuition and a small outing or two, though). My second one was in one of the best work environments I've ever had, which made up for a lot, and is much of the reason I've chosen to head for grad school and more debt.
My professors were, and are, awesome. They may not have been suited to be the top dogs in the corporate world, but they provide intellectual challege, excellent instruction, and ample office hours. Doesn't matter if you're looking at the very small, very education-oriented liberal arts school where I got my degree or the mid-to-large university that dominates my home city where I took a couple quarters' worth of courses, I had people who knew their stuff inside and out. That goes for the grad students, too, though they were either classmates or assisting the professors.
While I'm on this, I know my professors weren't getting paid astronomical sums. Probably 40-50K a year, with 40+ hours per week when classes were in session, and they often wound up taking work home. They got weekends off as frequently as their students did, which is to say not often. Additionally, I know they did what they could to find quality texts that didn't cost an arm and a leg. When that didn't happen, they'd use the expensive one as much as possible and cut back on other books they might have required us to buy. The publishers, on the other hand, can be stinkers: we had one text where they only shipped 1/2 the requested number. Naturally, this was the most expensive one, as well.
Sure, it'd help if we had a better K-12 educational system, and more apprenticeships available, but once you factor in the cost of maintaining the buildings, paying the faculty, providing the various services, etc., the costs aren't so bad. (I'm not touching the adminstration; I don't have sufficient observations to base anything on and I'm not entirely sure their salaries aren't inflated.) A waste of money to support college, though? I think not. It is one of the few places where people are encouraged to think about what they're told, rather than to believe without question, and I cannot imagine any skill with a greater need of honing than that of logical reasoning. How else are we to tackle publishing conglomerates?
One thing I've seen at the women's college I attend is that Snood has appeared on almost all the computers. Most of the women there - and, yes, it is small enough that I know most of them somewhat - aren't particularly into games. When they do play on computers, it's Snood and other puzzle/strategy type games. The remainder are either long-time video gamers or, like me, play adventure, RPG, and online multi-player games.
Personally, I think one key thing for most women is to have their minds engaged. If it has a good plot, or if you have the freedom to do anything (or at least try and get witty replies from the game), those earn it extra word-of-mouth advertising. Also, one key thing about most of the games women play is that there is a choice, if you are playing an avatar, in how you want him or her to deal with others. There is a measure of respect available in dealings with female/and/ male NPCs, even if it's only a multiple-choice dialogue. This isn't to say they're exalted, but merely treated as beings with minds and desires of their own instead of brainless eye-candy.
When the industry fails to provide games, the independant developers fill the void. Snood, for example. The last ten or so years of interactive fiction games from the IF Archive. Multi-player games like Dragon's Dusk and Kings of Chaos. The options are out there for anyone with the capability of using a search engine to investigate.
Slashdot Mirror
The point of college, ideally, is to learn. Yes, there are some people who do best on their own; such individuals are known as autodidactics. However, most do not have a diverse enough skill-base to teach themselves everything effectively. College provides instructors with specialized skills who can at the bare minimum introduce people to areas they'd never even thought of before they had to fulfill a requirement or went scrounging for a few last credits.
However, I will concede your point that a basic bachelor's degree has become a baseline for entry into most job markets, and not from necessity. I've seen a number of people who are not at college because they want to be, but because they wanted to be able to get a job. When you want to be there, college is geek heaven: all the knowledge you could want, there for the taking.
My student jobs taught me a lot, even though they paid horribly (generally enough for me to pay off my bookstore bill, which was typically about $400 a semester, and have something to pitch towards tuition and a small outing or two, though). My second one was in one of the best work environments I've ever had, which made up for a lot, and is much of the reason I've chosen to head for grad school and more debt.
My professors were, and are, awesome. They may not have been suited to be the top dogs in the corporate world, but they provide intellectual challege, excellent instruction, and ample office hours. Doesn't matter if you're looking at the very small, very education-oriented liberal arts school where I got my degree or the mid-to-large university that dominates my home city where I took a couple quarters' worth of courses, I had people who knew their stuff inside and out. That goes for the grad students, too, though they were either classmates or assisting the professors.
While I'm on this, I know my professors weren't getting paid astronomical sums. Probably 40-50K a year, with 40+ hours per week when classes were in session, and they often wound up taking work home. They got weekends off as frequently as their students did, which is to say not often. Additionally, I know they did what they could to find quality texts that didn't cost an arm and a leg. When that didn't happen, they'd use the expensive one as much as possible and cut back on other books they might have required us to buy. The publishers, on the other hand, can be stinkers: we had one text where they only shipped 1/2 the requested number. Naturally, this was the most expensive one, as well.
Sure, it'd help if we had a better K-12 educational system, and more apprenticeships available, but once you factor in the cost of maintaining the buildings, paying the faculty, providing the various services, etc., the costs aren't so bad. (I'm not touching the adminstration; I don't have sufficient observations to base anything on and I'm not entirely sure their salaries aren't inflated.) A waste of money to support college, though? I think not. It is one of the few places where people are encouraged to think about what they're told, rather than to believe without question, and I cannot imagine any skill with a greater need of honing than that of logical reasoning. How else are we to tackle publishing conglomerates?
Personally, I think one key thing for most women is to have their minds engaged. If it has a good plot, or if you have the freedom to do anything (or at least try and get witty replies from the game), those earn it extra word-of-mouth advertising. Also, one key thing about most of the games women play is that there is a choice, if you are playing an avatar, in how you want him or her to deal with others. There is a measure of respect available in dealings with female /and/ male NPCs, even if it's only a multiple-choice dialogue. This isn't to say they're exalted, but merely treated as beings with minds and desires of their own instead of brainless eye-candy.
When the industry fails to provide games, the independant developers fill the void. Snood, for example. The last ten or so years of interactive fiction games from the IF Archive. Multi-player games like Dragon's Dusk and Kings of Chaos. The options are out there for anyone with the capability of using a search engine to investigate.