The Speech Every 2015 College Grad Needs to Hear | 5 Minute Video
There were thousands of college commencement speeches around the country this year for the Class of 2015. But there was one missing — one very truthful, funny and witty speech that graduates should’ve heard, but didn’t. Well, here it is, spoken by George Will, Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist at the Washington Post.
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Script:
College commencement addresses often are collections of bromides and boring advice. You know what I mean:
Go forth, graduates, and save the planet. You are the nation’s hope. You have worked hard and learned much from devoted faculty. And don’t forget to floss and to use sunscreen.
Bor-ing.
Just once, a commencement speaker should puncture the smug complacency and cloying self-congratulation on campuses. Someone should give the following commencement address:
Members of the Graduating Class: You who are about to receive your diplomas should also receive an apology from this university — and a refund of a large portion of the tuition you have paid.
You have been cheated, bilked, propagandized and badly educated. Your tuition has been much too costly, for which you can blame the federal government and the avarice of the university.
Washington has produced a bubble in higher education just the way it produced the bubble in housing. Some government planners decided that too few people owned homes. So the planners decided to force an increase in home ownership.
They lowered lending standards for people seeking a mortgage. This produced a glut of sub-prime loans — and subprime borrowers. And then a crash. Next, some government geniuses decided that there were too few college students. So government made student loans and other tuition subsidies easier to get.
Of course, colleges and universities responded by increasing tuition to capture these government subsidies. Which is why the cost of college has been rising four times faster than the rate of inflation. The cost of college has increased faster than the cost of health care.
There is now well over a trillion dollars of student loan debt. There is more student loan debt than credit card debt, or than auto loan debt. Most of you are graduating today with debt. In effect, you are graduating with a mortgage — but no house. And what did you get for all this expense?
A sub-prime education.
Today’s students study many fewer hours a week than students did a generation ago — but they are getting higher grades. This, too, is a result of government creating perverse incentives. The government money gives colleges and universities a powerful incentive to admit more and more students. Inevitably, this means more and more students who are marginally qualified — or unqualified. Many of these will pay tuition for a few semesters and then leave school with debt — but no degree. Others will plod along, paying tuition, piling up debt, and eventually getting a degree — but not in four years. You have seen the T-shirts that read: “College — the best seven years of my life.”
Those of you who majored in gender studies —
or women’s studies —
or ethnicity studies —
or cinema deconstruction —
or any other of today’s academic fads —
to you, I have this advice:
When this commencement ceremony is over and you take off your cap and gown, do not bother looking for a job. Instead, go straight to the unemployment office. This university did not equip you to add value to the American economy.
Soon, this university’s office in charge of alumni giving will ask you for money. Your response should be: Are you kidding? Instead of sending money to this university, just send a schedule of your student loan repayments.
For the complete script, visit https://www.prageru.com/videos/speech-every-2015-college-grad-needs-hear
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Regrettably, Mr. Will did not anticipate the restrictions on free speech outside the university. Cancel culture is far worse today than 8 years ago.
Good.
Interesting that this was 8 years ago…..but all it is today in 2023 is much, much, much WORSE !!
I take my hat off to you sir!
Correct! The world does not owe you a living and it is under no obligation to consider your feelings.
Eight years later and George Will’s commencement speech more necessary than ever
This is even true for places like North Dakota State University
One day our government will reach its pinnacle and succeed! To destroy everything that means anything!
Another reason that it should be illegal to charge college tuition
i thought mortgages were offered by individual companies, not the government
and as far as i know the people responsable for the 2008 financial crash were bankers and morgage loan companies, not the government
who knows though, maybe this university offers courses for people looking to study economics 🤔
Thanks for this truthful graduation information and speech.
Yes, communications and education plus business jobs got me nowhere, but in all the low paying jobs to get through these three rounds of college finishing in 2017, I did not have the connections, right place and right time to get the great job.
Wow, after 17 years of college and study, I have no job. Yes, much propaganda, high prices and what skills, experience and career at the end of all that garbage?
Straight up falsehoods. The subprime mortgage crisis was caused by DEREGULATION, not by overregulation. Like you're literally lying. The banks just realized they could make more money by giving out as many loans as possible and selling them to Wall Street. And once housing prices stopped rising and people could no longer refinance, mortgage backed securities came crashing down. And many institutions had a lot of money invested in them because they were supposedly "safe investments with high returns". How can you say with a straight face that the Federal Government forced banks to give out those loans? Are you on crack?!?
Agree. Refused to pay for State University (Marxist indoctrination) for my children. Sent my children to Private University (Moral and Fiscal Constitutional Conservative Values). Although this also costs too much, the classes were rigorous and my children are productive in the fields of engineering and medicine. There is a path for conservatives that is not just trade school.
Right on. So much blame to go around.Schools that think it's taboo to teach critical race theory. Making schools into a business instead of a public service. Schools that build stadiums instead of offering scholarships. Employers that will offer jobs to people with degrees even though someone without a degree can perform the same job. Lenders to make loans knowing that they will have to be paid back one way or the other.I love your money back idea the school should offer a guarantee if you can't get a job in you're chosen field of studies you get a refund. One final thing take the sports programs out of the schools, school should be a place for education not to play games. Time to reform our higher education system and how it's paid for.
MUERTE A LA DEMOCRACIA.
Besides, these Marxist professors in some of these schools need to be sued for selling a defective product.
Truth!!!
BRAVO Prager U.
Excellent and enlightening video. Unfortunately there are plenty of woke corporations, who have gladly implemented the very same sensitivity, emotion-driven, I-am-offended-by-anythiung-yousay-because-you-are-a-aconservative policies, forcing their employees to go to sensitivity training, which is nothing more than a glorified reeducation camp. No sir America is no longer a country, where free speech can be exercised., unless you live in the corn fields. No sir, the big corporations, from Nike, to Google, Apple, Microsoft and ALMOST ALL OF THEM are woke and do not believe in free speech!!! America has been hijacked by radical Marxist/progressives and is only going downhill, which by the way is their ultimate goal!!!