Women are in a hurry because of the biological clock. If you want them to have children, your program had better keep that in mind. Telling them to wait until age 22 to start college pretty much keeps them out of PhD programs, and probably some Master’s programs as well, except for the stalwart few who can handle kids and PhD programs at the same time.
I disagree, but I have Mom as my role model. She had to give up a full scholarship to a private high school to help out her family during the depression and didn’t even get her high school GED until her late 20’s. After 6 kids, she went to college and wound up with 2 master degrees while working full time. Of course that was a time where it was less expected that you would chauffer your kids here there and everywhere, and there tended to be much more hands off parenting, as well as more family nearby to be able to help out.
I am also not talking about waiting until 22 to start college. Most kids graduate high school at around 18, making a 1-2 year delay starting college at 19-20. Additionally, in general, couples are getting married much later as it is. I was in my 30’s when I had our kids, which was admittedly late for that time, but typical now. Plenty of time to get advanced degrees had I decided that was the route I wanted to take. I even considered going back for a masters degree after the kids were in school, but given early retirement was a goal for me, that did not make sense economically.
Society is also more accepting of SAHDs these days. I find your statement “Women are in a hurry because of the biological clock,” to be rather sexist and dated, a thought process that is in part responsible for lower salaries for women compared to the male peers. I have faith that woman can have it all should they chose to do so, even with a 1-2 year delay in the start of college. It’s the rare college freshman that knows exactly what they want for a career from the start, and the girls at college are not immune to the Freshman Party Freedom syndrome that the boys go through. It’s part of growing up. I personally graduated high school as a Junior and went to work in France for a year as an Au Pair, returning to go to college with kids my own age. It was stunning how immature the girls in my dorm were, and how hard they partied, while I already had much of that out of my system and was able to buckle down.
So yes, it would be slightly different, but I do believe strongly that kids would benefit from getting some practical experience and life experience before putting down large sums of money to study a field they have no real concept of. And there is nothing to say that they cannot go do something in their desired field, which would make their route through college potentially quicker and focused, or some will skip it entirely having found a field that they can enjoy and excel in without a college degree.
No perfect solution, but what we have works poorly, is economically inefficient.
IP
(“Trust” reached 72% shortly after Watergate, but settled back around its historical average of 65%.)