Two responses to my opinions: What contrasts!

First this, from an anonymous commenter, who was perhaps unhappy with my blog post on academic and football salaries:

You are a dumb dyke

BTW, that blog post has been trending upward with respect to what attracted visitors to my blog!

In contrast, the following was a letter in the paper in response to my opinion column on the overselling of college for everybody:

I’ve always enjoyed Western Oregon University professor Sriram Khe’s insightful articles on topics as diverse as the economy of India to his April 30 column, “College should be a journey, not a destination.”

I graduated from WOU, which was then Oregon College of Education, in the early 1960s. There was zero pressure from my family to attend college, and only 30 percent of my Newport High School graduating class did so.

That was in an era when tuition was less than $100 per term and college costs were easily met with part-time work on campus and summer jobs. I left college with nearly $4,000 in my savings account.

Five decades later students leave college with debts ranging from $5,000 to $150,000, depending on their academic programs.

As we enter the second decade of the 21st century, societal and family pressures scare kids into college; it’s the proverbial carrot on the stick, dangling higher lifetime earnings and family prestige as the primary goal for many college-bound students. Our grade schools, middle schools and high schools should promote critical thinking and creativity rather than instilling in students from kindergarten through high school that college is the endgame.

Is college for everyone? I don’t think so. A better idea for high school graduates may be as simple as taking a break for a year, acquiring life skills through temporary jobs and travel, then considering attending college.

Mike E. Walsh

Eugene

Whenever I have received negative feedback, especially those that are not constructive, it turns out that they do not want to reveal their identities. "Anonymous." Well, at least the anonymous commenter this time was not as hateful as once earlier :)