Lab 5: Questions that Matter
While examining the information on the United States Census Bureau, my partner Samantha Sayles and I came across some interesting facts about higher education in Oakland County, Michigan. We came to learn that a good portion of the people in Oakland County started to receive a higher education, but did not finish or did not pursue higher education at all. We wondered why. Our assumption was that pursuing a higher education is much too expensive. We decided that crowdsourcing would be the best way to find more information.
Samantha posted a survey on her Facebook Page asking a series of questions about a person's pursuit of higher education. We got ten responses. Of the people that responded, 50% were college age. (19 -24) The rest were above college age. (25+)
Most of the people that responded (40%) stated that their highest level of education was some college. 30% stated that they had either an Associate's or Bachelor's degree. The remainder was a high school diploma or lower. When asked if it were possible, would they pursue a higher education, 50% responded yes. According to the Census Bureau, 90.9% of Oakland County residents have a high school diploma or higher, but only 52% of Oakland County residents have a high school diploma and some higher education experience.
We asked if they did not have a higher education, what was keeping them from pursuing one. The most popular answer was that they were happy with where their education was. (30%) The next most popular answer at 20% was they had no motivation/general lack of interest. The rest of the answers are tied at 10%.
The final portion of our survey was asking the participants to give comments on the issues surrounding the application process for higher education, or specifically why they found they could not continue their education. The most popular response we received was making higher education cheaper/more affordable. This is something we expected to see. However, the next most popular response was not having enough time/lack of motivation.
"I feel like college was pushed on me as such an early age I felt too pressured to move on in high school. " - Survey Participant
Upon further reflection, it is not so surprising to me that so few people continued their higher education. For me personally, I had a great support system that included my family, friends, and loved ones, and I can imagen if a person did not have that kind of support it would be hard to continue. Plus, all the financial aspects that go along with receiving a higher education.
I can also understand not having enough to get back into learning after pausing for a while. Someone might want to start working right away and then get married and start a family. I can imagen how difficult it would be to manage balancing family, work and school along with all the things that go with those specific responsibilities. Even so, I think higher education should still be encouraged for everyone no matter how old they are.
Data display from a survey conducted by Samantha Sayles
