Endnotes
1 Jeffrey J. Selingo, “Does the College Major Matter? Not Really,” The New York Times, April 29, 2013.
2 David Runciman, “Politics or Technology-Which Will Save the World?,” The Guardian, May 23, 2014.
3 Thomas L. Friedman, “A Theory of Everything (Sort Of),” The New York Times, August 13, 2011.
4 Ibid.
5 Internet World Stats web site http://www.internetworldstats.com/top20.htm (accessed July 2, 2015).
6 Donald Melanson, “UN: Worldwide Internet Users Hit Two Billion, Cellphone Subscriptions Top Five Billion,” Engadget, January 28, 2011.
7 Andrew C. Revkin, “U.N.: Young and Old Boom on the Road to 9 Billion,” The New York Times, March 11, 2009.
8 Craolyn Duffy Marsan, “10 Fool-Proof Predictions for the Internet in 2020,” PC World, January 5, 2010.
9 Kirk Carapezza, “Survey: New England College Presidents Express Concern About Future,” The WGBH News Higher Education Blog, September 5, 2013.
10 “IBM 2010 Global CEO Study,” IBM Press release dated May 18, 2010.
11 Elizabeth Segran, “Why Top Tech CEOs Want Employees with Liberal Arts Degrees,” Fast Company, August 28, 2014.
12 Sergei Klebnikov, “What Employers Are Looking for when Hiring Recent College Grads,” Forbes, July 6, 2015.
13 Rahm Emanuel, “Chicago’s Plan to Match Education with Jobs,” The Wall Street Journal, December 19, 2011.
14 Across the Great Divide: Perspectives of CEOS and College Presidents on America’s Higher Education and Skills Gap, Civic Enterprises, Corporate Voices for Working Families, March 2011.
15 Ibid.
16 For more information on the Tofflers, visit http://www.alvintoffler.net/?fa=booksdetail&name=rw
17 Simone Pathe, “Why Are Fewer People Going to College?” PBS News Hour, September 29, 2014.
18 “Is College Worth It?,” The Economist, April 5, 2014.
19 David Leonhardt, “Is College Worth It? Clearly, New Data Say,” The New York Times, May 27, 2014.
20 Olivia Michael, “In Spite of Cost, College Degrees Are Worth the Money,” CNBC, February 15, 2015.
21 “The Rising Costs of Not Going to College,” Pew Report, February 11, 2014.
22 “Help Wanted: 11 Million College Grads,” The blog of Bill Gates, June 3, 2015.
23 David Leonhardt, “College for the Masses,” The New York Times, April 24, 2015.
24 “The Changing Role of Community Colleges in Workforce Development,” National Conference of State Legislatures press release dated October 21, 2014.
25 Fast Facts, Educational attainment, National Center for Education Statistics, https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=27 (accessed July 10, 2015).
26 Wikipedia, “Higher Education Attainment in the United States,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_attainment_in_the_United_States (accessed June 12, 2015).
27 “College Enrollment Declines for Second Year in a Row,” Census Bureau Reports, Census Bureau press release dated September 24, 2014.
28 Report: Current Term Enrollment Report, Fall 2014, National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, December 10, 2014.
29 Doug Lederman, “The Enrollment Slowdown,” Inside Higher Ed, February 28, 2014.
30 Meredith Kolodner, “Why Are Graduation Rates at Community Colleges So Low?,” The Hechinger Report, May 5, 2015.
31 “Institutional Retention and Graduation Rates for Undergraduate Students,” May 2015, National Center for Education Statistics.
32 Bob Herbert, “Putting Our Brains on Hold,” The New York Times, August 6, 2010.
33 Ibid.
34 “The Changing Role of Community Colleges in Workforce Development,” October 21, 2014.
35 “With Their Lives Ahead of Them: Myths and Realities About Why So Many Students Fail to Finish College,” Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, December 2009.
36 Ibid.
37 Drew Desilver, “5 Facts about Today’s College Graduates,” Pew Research Center press release May 30, 2014.
38 Jeffrey J. Selingo, “Does the College Major Matter? Not Really,” The New York Times, April 29, 2013.
39 Michelle Jamrisko and Ilan Kolet, “Cost of College Degree in U.S. Soars 12 Fold: Chart of the Day,” Bloomberg Business, August 15, 2012.
40 Steve Odland, “College Costs Out of Control,” Forbes, March 24, 2012.
41 Higher Education: State Funding Trends and Policies on Affordability, Government Accounting Office, GAP-15-151, December 2014.
42 Ibid.
43 Madeline Will, “U.S. Trails in College Graduation in Global Study,” Ed Week, September 16, 2014.
44 Hadley Malcolm, “Picking College, Major Comes Down to Money,” USA Today, August 15, 2013.
45 “Should Parents Pay for Their Children’s College Education?,” The Wall Street Journal, March 16, 2014.
46 “Survey: More Freshmen Than Ever Say They Go to College to Get Better Jobs, Make More Money,” Higher Education Research Institution press release January 23, 2013.
47 Douglas Belkin, “Today’s Anxious Freshmen Declare Majors Far Faster Than Their Elders,” The Wall Street Journal, March 19, 2015.
48 Kelsey Sheehy, “Study: High School Grads Choosing Wrong College Majors,” U.S. News and World Report, November 11, 2013.
49 “Many Students Select a College Major That Doesn’t Fit Their Interests Well,” ACT Press Release, November 11, 2013.
50 College Choice Report: A Profile of 2013 ACT-Tested High School Graduates.
51 Valerie Strauss, “Are College Students Declaring Majors Too Early?” The Washington Post, December 20, 2011.
52 David B. Spight, “Simply Declaring a Major Early Equals Timely Graduation, Right?,” Academic Advising Today, March 2013.
53 “Are You the Weakest Link? Strengthening Your Talent Supply Chain,” Insights from the Accenture Strategy 2015 U.S. College Graduate Employment Study.
54 “Many Students Select a College Major That Doesn’t Fit Their Interests Well,” ACT Newsroom, November 11, 2013.
55 Lily Altavena, “4 Out of 5 in Community College Want to Transfer, Reports Says,” The New York Times, July 14, 2011.
56 Lily Altavena, “More Affluent Students Are Choosing Community Colleges, Study Finds,” The New York Times, February 27, 2012.
57 Denise-Marie Ordway, “As Graduation Looms, Jobs Elude Worried Students,” Orlando Sentinel, April 28, 2014.
58 Josh Freedman, “Student Loans are a Drag on the Economy and Society,” Forbes, February 11, 2014.
59 “The Class of 2012: Labor Market for Young Graduates Remains Bleak,” Economic Policy Institute Report, May 3, 2012.
60 Cecilia Capuzzi Simon, “Major Decisions,” The New York Times, November 2, 2012.
61 Ibid.
62 That trend reflects the values of students facing greater financial pressure. A national survey of freshmen by researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles shows that students have grown consistently more concerned with their return on investment. In 2014, 45% of freshmen surveyed said an essential or very important objective of college was to develop a meaningful life philosophy; in 1971—the first year the survey was taken—it was 73%. Conversely, 82% of today’s freshmen said college was essential to being very well off financially, up from 73% in 2006—and 37% in 1971. Douglas Belkin, “Today’s Anxious Freshmen Declare Majors Far Faster Than Their Elders,” The Wall Street Journal, March 19, 2015.
63 Drew Desilver, “5 Facts About Today’s College Graduates,” 2014.
64 Cecilia Capuzzi Simon, “Major Decisions,” The New York Times, November 2, 2012.
65 “Many Students Select a College Major That Doesn’t Fit Their Interests Well,” November 11, 2013.
66 Yuritza Ramos, “College Students Tend to Change Majors When They Find the One They Really Love,” Borderzine, March 15, 2013.
67 Casey George-Jackson, “Generation Me: Influences of Students’ Choice of Major,” Project STEP-UP research paper, 2012.
68 Ibid“’”.
69 Scott Jaschik, “Majoring in a Professor,” Inside Higher Ed, August 12, 2013.
70 Ben Casselman, “The Economic Guide to Picking A College Major,” FiveThirthyEight blog, September 12, 2014.
71 “Many Students Select a College Major That Doesn’t Fit Their Interests Well,” November 11, 2013.
72 Liz Freedman, “The Developmental Disconnect in Choosing a Major: Why Institutions Should Prohibit Choice Until Second Year,” The Mentor: An Academic Advising Journal, June 28, 2013.
73 David B. Spight, “Simply Declaring a Major Early Equals Timely Graduation, Right?,” March 2013.
74 Jill Moely, “Despite National Trend, Penn Students Open to Academic Exploration,” The Daily Pennsylvanian, April 16, 2015.
75 Scott Jaschik, “Apology from Obama,” Inside Higher Ed, February 19, 2014.
76 “There are certain intellectual luxuries that perhaps we could do without.” Taxpayers should not be “subsidizing intellectual curiosity.” Gov. Ronald Reagan, Calif., 1967 “If I’m going to take money from a citizen to put into education, then I’m going to take that money to create jobs. … Is it a vital interest of the state to have more anthropologists? I don’t think so.” Gov. Rick Scott, Fla., 2011 http://politics.heraldtribune.com/2011/10/10/rick-scott-wants-to-shift-university-funding-away-from-some-majors/ “If you want to take gender studies, that’s fine. Go to a private school and take it. But I don’t want to subsidize that if that’s not going to get someone a job.”—Gov. Pat McCrory, N.C., 2013 “Folks can make a lot more, potentially, with skilled manufacturing or the trades than they might with an art-history degree.” President Obama, 2014.
77 Bourree Lam, “The Danger of Picking a Major Based on Where the Jobs Are,” The Atlantic, June 12, 2015.
78 “Beware Spurious Correlations,” Harvard Business Review, June 2015.
79 Nathan Green, “Correlation Is Not Causation,” The Guardian, February 6, 2012.
80 Liz Freedman, “The Developmental Disconnect in Choosing a Major: Why Institutions Should Prohibit Choice Until Second Year,” The Mentor: An Academic Advising Journal, June 28, 2013.
81 W. Chan Kim and Renée Maugorgne, “Red Ocean Traps,” Harvard Business Review, March 2015.
82 Frank Bruni, “Demanding More from College,” The New York Times, September 6, 2014.
83 James Clear, “Mental Models: Solve Problems by Approaching Them from New Perspectives,” Life Hacker, January 30, 2015.
84 Frank Bruni, “How to Survive the College Admissions Madness,” The New York Times, March 13, 2015.
85 Jeffrey J. Selingo, “Does the College Major Matter? Not Really,” The New York Times, April 29, 2013.
86 It Takes More Than A Major: Employer Priorities for College Learning and Student Success, An online survey among employers conducted on behalf of the Association of American Colleges and Universities by Hart Research Associates, April 10, 2013.
87 Ashley Stahl, “Six Reasons Why Your College Major Doesn’t Matter,” Forbes, August 12, 2015.
88 Jennifer Gonzalez, “Community Colleges Not Up to 21st Century Mission, Their Own Report Says,” The Chronicle of Higher Education, April 21, 2012.
89 Jim Riggs, “Leadership, Change and the Future of Community Colleges,” Academic Leadership: The Online Journal, Vol. 7, No. 1, Winter 2009.
90 Brian Klapper, “Free Yourself from Conventional Thinking,” Harvard Business Review Blog, May 6, 2013.