Lowe
Kennedy Lowe
Mrs. Kingston
Ap Language & Composition
16 November 2018
The Ivory Tower: Is College Still Worth It?
In the United States, a college degree has always been seen as the key to upward social mobility, but with the past few decades’ skyrocketing college tuition, many only see this key as an open door to crushing debt and minimum wage employment. The documentary, The Ivory Tower by Andrew Rossi, shows the multiple views of the value of a college education and how many students have been impacted by the student loan debt crisis to further explain and answer the filmmaker’s question, “Is college worth it?”. Yes, The Ivory Tower by Andrew Rossi is created in the most effective way in order to support the filmmaker’s claim that college is still worth it in spite of the financial costs because it decides whether college is important by looking at it in a way that is more complex than just only looking at the wage premiums of people with and without college degrees.
In a progressing world, many employers look for employees who have important attributes such as communication skills that can be applied to the job. These communication skills as well as other abilities are most likely to be found within the obtainment of a college degree. In The Ivory Tower, Andrew Rossi supports his own claim that college is still worth it by stating many facts and statistics that show the benefits of obtaining a college degree. For instance in the documentary it states, “Statistics show that people who have a Bachelor’s degree make more money than someone with or without a highschool diploma.” Many businesses understand the positive effect that college can have on an employee’s performance which is why a college degree is typically required for more higher paying jobs. The Ivory Tower states that, “College provides students with knowledge, network of peers, and credentials.” Although the benefits of college are clear to some, the filmmaker looks further into the point of earning a college degree by looking at alternative programs which focus on finding success without actually having to partake into a “traditional” college experience.
The documentary shows a number of reasonable alternatives to traditional colleges and different types of schools that can be more appealing than a seemingly large and intimidating Ivy League university campus. The Ivory Tower incorporates multiple types...
