Welcome back to school, friends. Time once again to earnestly slave away at your desk, working toward…what’s it called again? Oh, yes! A degree!
In case you forgot, that’s the piece of paper for which you’re studying, testing and bleeding.
Look at you, diligently grumbling your way toward an official sheet of paper signed by important people that allows you to-get this-work toward MORE official sheets of paper signed by OTHER important people!
To you freshmen, a degree’s not just limited to temperature and angle measurements anymore.
It’s a palpable, paper representation of all the hours you slept through lectures, all the papers you started two hours before they were due, all the times you told yourself the lie that “Tonight, I’m going to STUDY,” and the all the empty cans of Coca-Cola you let pile by your desk.
After a few semesters at this lovely campus, you’ll talk to an “adviser” about getting your degree. He or she will assign you another two semesters of “real classes,” and then you’ll be ready to don those rental robes and funny caps, walk down an aisle and receive…a fake degree.
But don’t worry, the real one’s coming in the mail-First Class, United States Postal Service. They spare no expense because they spared you none.
You’ll shake with anticipation as you gently withdraw your degree from the official envelope, shake it a bit and put it somewhere conspicuous.
If you notice any wrinkles in the degree, don’t try to iron it. That’s not something they teach you at the university, but they should. Paper burns.
Now, buy a nice frame for the degree and hang it up on a wall somewhere. After $20,000 and a lot of headaches, you deserve to have people notice it.
Your degree will have signatures from people you never met, but you’re pretty sure you’ve heard of.
Between the fancy titles and fancy ways of saying that you’re officially a “Bachelor of Something,” your name appears in bright, bold letters.
Perfect! Now you get to work for $10 an hour!
When people see that you’ve earned a degree (you’ll have to show it to them), they’ll immediately think “Oh, me too,” and continue about their business.
If you’re an engineering major, or just lucky, they might even be impressed. These same people will probably ask whether you’ve had any professional experience.
At this point, you’ll be tempted to say, “I’ve been in school for the past 20 years, moron. How can I possibly have any (bleeping) professional experience?!” but don’t succumb to that.
You haven’t been working so hard just to flush your degree down the proverbial, professional toilet.
Just calmly reply that you thought your degree would allow you to enter into a profession and gain that experience.
So, when that day arrives, and you’ve proudly got your degree, don’t be surprised when you hear this from people and potential employers: “Silly you, degrees are for kids!”