Following on somewhat from yesterday’s post on what you should do for your own education, is today’s post on what you should do to encourage your kids education. To a great extent this is going to be quite case specific in that what I’m going to say is targeted for my own kids. There’s an element of family legacy and inspiration at work here, so obviously your mileage will vary greatly.
So here’s what I say to my girls about college et al.
“When you go to college, you can do whatever it is that you want to do, but if you get there and you don’t know what you want to do, you’ll do an Associates Degree in Nursing and become an RN”.
The rationale is quite simple – I don’t want them wasting time and money in a very expensive playground. The point of college is earning some sort of ticket to something better than minimal wage slavery. An associate’s degree in nursing currently takes just two years and after graduation you take your boards and bingo you can be a 20 year old with a $30 an hour job in Connecticut. You’re earning pretty good money right out of the gate and there’s always going to be work.
If you’re going into the medical field the other obvious option is doctor of something. Ultimately it’s more money over the long haul, but there often seems to be a family cost. Plus you’re really pigeonholed into nothing but doctor for a couple decades just to break even. As a nurse you have a little more option to start, stop or continue with further education it you want to go further. Plus the way APRNs are progressing with the doctor shortage you’re likely to have 98% of the authority of a medical doctor plus get called “doctor” to boot seeing PhD is going to be the standard for APRN.
Plus nursing can be quite family supportive in that you can work around child care, work part time, full time, nights, weekends, start working, stop working almost at will. It’s one of the things I’ve most liked about it. Should they ever want to mommy track for a bit they can. When they want to get back into things they can.
Personally I just don’t see that the SAHM job description really has enough to do to keep an intelligent woman stimulated unless you’re going the full on home schooling and/or crap load of kids. And for the record I’ve been the SAHD (plus worked weekend wrap as a nurse) and it was far easier taking my kids to the park et al than caring for patients. Of course seeing there’s a supposed marriage strike going on, they’ll have to support themselves anyway. I can’t imagine the terror to future sons-in-law I’ll be, though I suppose saying their mother does it like a bunny is basically a sales pitch so things will even out I guess.
So anyway – youngest daughter just loves this plan, but eldest daughter in the words of Steve Irwin… “Whooooooaaaaah look at her hood up! This is rooly dangerous. I have to be roooly careful. Just one bite and I’m going to be fighting for my life.”
Youngest loves the idea of being done with school fast and earning money fast, plus she loves the idea of actually being a nurse. We’re talking “Daddy it’s career day can I borrow some of your nursing stuff to take to school?” One year I pulled some strings and she did a “med pass” in her classroom with Skittles in pharmacy packaged blister packs lol.
Eldest…. yeah… doesn’t like needles, though honestly it’s much less annoying to be on the non-pointy end of those. Plus she doesn’t like school all that much, so more school planned into the future is just the suck. This is the queen of high honors and associated inter-school math league games so she’s likely going to mess about until she fixates on something and then excel at it. She’s into anime and drawing and creating icons and clip art for friends and has a good eye. So graphic artist of some sort is a possibility too. Even so in the real world – being an RN and working part time could mean the difference between being a starving artist and an artist. Plus all those nursing credits can be cross credited to another degree as well. It’s not time wasted.
So like I said earlier, kids you’re going to have more education after high school and can do whatever it is that you want to do, but if you don’t know what you want to do, you’re going to nursing school. And as I said before, I really don’t care what it is that you choose to do. And trust me on this – nursing school is hell – you’ll figure out what you’ll want to do if it’s not nursing pretty damn quickly.
I guess all that’s left is to explain why this whole thing gets me laid more. Well I figure the faster these brats are out of the house the faster I get more time with the MILF setting standards and direction is an Alpha Male trait. You have to be the Alpha Male of the Group to really pull the Alpha Male thing off properly and from Jennifer’s reaction she obviously likes the viewpoint as well. We’ve both had “oops” with our degrees and have bounced back well from early mistakes, but we both see the value of a two year and out plan if nothing else appeals.
After that, their life is their own. By which I mean I’m not paying for anything else.
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