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After reading so much about education and jobs for my work, it's good for me to step back and read about the issue through the eyes of an outsider -- a potential student, a parent, a laid-off worker.

After reading it, I'm not surprised that the public is confused about what education and training to get.

It's not that the article's reporting or writing is flawed. It's that so many seemingly conflicting dynamics are at play in the job market. Readers must be getting mixed signals everywhere they turn: market data, experts, anecdotal examples.

Just what are anxious students and parents to do?

Let's start with the big message that I (and I'm sure many others) have been hearing for a while:

We later learn she was in the IT industry.

Laid off? In IT? And locked out of her profession despite having an MBA, a degree that should open up numerous fields of business? You'd think that combo would have kept her safe.

Then there's Wendy Vyskocil, a medical transcriptionist in that once-hot health-care field ...

Jeannie Burke, laid off after 26 years from her carpet/upholstery installation job at Bayliner boat plant ...

(She did get a lower-paying job, however, in the insurance department of a medical center.)

So much for hot sectors. How can one plan for either education or longer-term training when the market changes so quickly, turning hot fields into dead ends?

Now let's talk degrees. It's the useful math-and-science degrees that are being recommended now that liberal arts and humanities are being derided as irrelevant.

Take Kate-Madonna Hindes, 30, who lost her job in risk management at Target Corp, for example. The 

Didn't Hindes did get that Target job with a theology degree to begin with?

And why is her degree a factor at this point? The woman is 30. Doesn't a degree becomes fairly unimportant after a worker has some experience under the belt?

Interesting statement. Considering her radical job changes, isn't that what Hindes has -- good smarts and education that can be widely adapted through a little specific job training? What's the problem here?

Now comes Tom Stinson, Minnesota's state economist, who tells the 

Note that wrong-subject-in-college message again.

 says pharmacology and agricultural economics are hot. 

 says chemistry and agriculture are losers.

Anyone care to explain to the average student or parent what the differences are between pharmacology and chemistry? Or why agriculture is a stinker, but agricultural economics is a winner?

Do you think the average undergrad choosing a major could tell the difference -- or care? After all, when I was in school, classmates talked not about specific jobs, but about fields: "I want to work in health care / computers / agriculture." A degree was just a means to get them into that field, and there were multiple ways in.

Finally, what should students think about shelling out for higher education?

We all, of course, have read that more education equals better job prospects and pay.

I'd understand if the average high-school senior and parent saw higher ed a pointless investment in this economy.

Fair enough. Unfortunately, they don't seem to guarantee the bare minimum of a job, either.

Still figuring this out. Feel free to chime in.

Alex Friedrich

Author

After reading so much about education and jobs for my work, it’s good for me to step back and read about the issue through the eyes of an outsider — a potential student, a parent, a laid-off worker. That’s what I did with this one that appeared in Sunday’s Star Tribune. After reading it, I’m…

How can students intelligently plan careers amid so many conflicting signals?

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