Question Details Every so often, a disgruntled college graduate sues her school

Question

Question Details

Every so often, a disgruntled college graduate sues her school on grounds that her tuition payments did not land her the good job she was expecting when she started there. Courts invariably throw out cases like hers. They are, however, willing to entertain suits against trade schools (those that teach skills such as welding and computer repair) by guarantee that make the same claims about inability to qualify for jobs that use the skills they learned in them. Why the difference?

Explanation / Answer

The difference has to do with the education provided by these colleges and the jobs they lead to. Let's start first with a trade school. Trade school's purpose is to teach a skill that upon completion of the education leaves the student capable of pursuing a career utilizing that skill. These jobs tend to involve manual labor and are commodity jobs in nature. That is, so long as a person has a minimum level of proficiency, all workers are the same. For example, it is hard to differentiate between welders on an assembly line. So long as the worker is capable of making the necessary weld, the output between workers is undifferentiated. The promise that a trade school makes to prospective students is that they will certify that the student has obtained the level of proficiency required to complete the job satisfactorily. If the student is unable to receive a job despite this accreditation, it means the school has not provided the necessary skills and thus has not lived up to their promise. With other colleges, the results of the education process are far less tangible and the jobs they lead to have much more variability. As a result, selecting a person for a job involves much more subjective analysis. Getting a business degree from college does not certify a person for any job in business, which differs from a welding degree from a trade school certifying someone for any job involving welding. Furthermore, a college does not explicitly guarantee accreditation for proficiency into the job that is desired, and is therefore not liable or responsible for the person's inability to land the job.

Related Questions

Navigate

• Browse (All)
• Browse Q
• Subjects

Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.