The main purpose of a college education should be to prepare oneself for a specific career

The world is ever changing and the only thing constant is “time”. There is time for everything under the heavens; time to live and die, time to learn and become a better person and time to refrain from learning.

Education is part and parcel of mankind. Without it , a person is lost and forever doomed. In this ever changing world, one needs to be abreast of all that is happening and that is when education and learning comes in.

The purpose of learning is to improve, upgrade and becomes useful to oneself, family, community, country and the world at large. And if we may ask, what is education? Education is the act or process of acquiring knowledge and skills whether formally or informally. But the main issue here is acquiring knowledge and skills formally, which takes place in a formal setting as seen in colleges.

The process of acquiring formal education starts right from pre-school till tertiary institutions(which could be college, university etc). Knowledge acquired along the the educational path inspires a person to think out of the box and do something meaning with his or her life.

The final place of learning is college. From here, so many destinies and future would be decided depending on the kind of courses to be studied. The essence of a college degree is to equipped an individual with the necessary techniques and information he or she needs to succeed outside college.

In addition, specialisation is highly important in college. There is a course of study to major in, after which one becomes an expert or a guru in areas pertaining to the course. When choosing a course of study, one or more courses could be selected but the prospective student would surely concentrate on one.

Moreover, there e are two levels of education offered in college: the Undergraduate level and Post Graduate level. The former introduces the student to the necessary knowledge needed to become successful in which field chosen while the latter deals with specialised and intensive training in the chosen course of study. This intensive training makes the person become knowledgeable and grounded in his or her chosen profession. When this study is completed, they are awarded with Masters degree or PhD. These degrees signify that such an individual with an MSc or PhD certificate is savant in the chosen area of specialisation or study. From there, they can go on to invent thing, develop theories and other necessary things to benefit mankind.

However, it does mean that someone cannot specialise in another field of interest. Moreover, I have seen individuals who are specialists in more than one field of study. This can occur if such individual has a flair for being grounded in lots of thing. For example, someone with an MSc in Computer Science may decide to improve his knowledge base in commercial areas and thus decides to get an MSc in Economics. Life is versatile and so are the people living it.

Finally, the purpose of education is to improve our thought patterns, lifestyle, attitude to life in general and help sharpen our destiny so that we can live better life and become responsible and create opportunities for others to benefit from.

In conclusion, the essence of getting a college degree is to prepare oneself to excel and prosper in one’s chosen career. But one thing is certain, college degree makes an individual become useful in whatever area they find themselves.