College

First, watch this video:

Credit to my friend Frank Piscitello (http://twitter.com/#!/fpiscite) for sharing

What, exactly, is one SUPPOSED to learn on a college campus these days? What DOES one learn? As a college senior myself, I am continually amazed at how many students have no concept of basic life functions. I find there are many students can’t do ANYTHING in moderation. Administrators can’t make up their minds – on the one hand, they acknowledge that almost all the campus community are legally adults, yet they enact rules to “protect” the students from perceived evils of society. While the campus does have walls… by design, access is almost unrestricted, for convenience if nothing else.
As the video points out, the current educational concept relies on the student accepting everything the teacher presents as face value – even when the instruction is blatantly biased. And the student that would seek to challenge bias is seen as a troublemaker.
When did our society change that a college degree is a requirement to enter the “real” workforce? What miracle happens at a college campus that makes a person with a B.A. or B.S. a good manager? Or qualifies them for a 9-5 job, where overtime is uncommon, and things like vacation time and holidays are expected?
I work 12 hour shifts, sometimes 2 or more consecutively. My “office” is a box on wheels with about 300-400 cubic feet of workspace. In that, I have enough tools at my disposal to at least attempt to “fix people”. EMS is the only part of the medical system that routinely makes house calls anymore. EMS, on average, has 30 TIMES the chance of being injured in an assault than the “average” worker. I work outside in extreme cold, extreme heat, and sunlight, darkness, rain and snow are all “normal” things that I’m expected to work through. If I call in sick, it means that someone else is called in or held over… or that the community isn’t as well protected as it would have been, and my co-workers have to make do with fewer resources.
In many cases, my peers and I are paid much less than a nurse… even though the actual responsibility and delegated practice model under which I perform makes me more of a Physician Assistant Lite. But because I have 3-4 years less schooling, I make a small fraction of what a PA makes. Why? Because the only letters after my name are NREMT-P…. not B.S. Even adding additional competencies such as FP-C or CCP-C doesn’t win me much of an increase, if any.