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Why the interest in college-educated millennials?
April 17th, 2009 by Mike Knutson
One of the problems I have with the “Attracting College-Educated, Young Adults to Cities” study is its focus on college educated young people. It seems to suggest that college educated students are more valuable than young people who didn’t go to college. Ouch!
Now, I’m a former teacher, so I get the importance of education–especially in today’s “knowledge economy.” But I also know a lot of very creative, talented entrepreneurs who never went to college. This leads me to think the study’s focus is somewhat misguided.
It also leaves me wondering, “Do non-college graduates want different things from their communities than college graduates?”
Tags: attracting college-educated, millennials, people attraction strategy
Posted in Community Development, Economic Development, Rural | Comments (
2 )
April 21st, 2009 at 9:27 pm
That’s an excellent question. I went to college for 3 semesters before I realized everything they were ‘teaching’ me was stuff I had learned in Jr. High. Chalk one up for small town schools.
Being back in the small town I grew up in, I can say that what I want from my community is more.
More new business. More new customers. More youth friendly events. More people who aren’t already retired. More hope. More support (even though my ‘young and crazy’ ideas can be quite different to the fogeys). More passion for everything we do.
I see so much stuff that our area has to offer that we can promote….
…..and nothing. Talk about an idea to promote it and you get one person agreeing, 9 people confused about this internet thing, and 17 people adamantly against it, because “we’ve never done that before.”
I don’t think being a college grad or not has anything to do with it, but we’d all like to know that our community is progressing forward, that someday our kids will still be able to have this town as an option to live in, rather than driving by, talking about what used to be there.
April 22nd, 2009 at 5:11 am
I know exactly what you mean about community members not jumping on your ideas. But, what I’ve learned is that persistence and willingness to work with others usually wins the day. So don’t give up.
As a millennial, your the type of person we need to be talking to: and unless I’ve misinterpreted what you’ve written, you don’t think there’s a difference between what college-educated and non-college educated young people want in a community. Would you agree or disagree with the specific attributes the study identifies (see today’s post)?
And for anyone who doesn’t know, Shawn occassionally publishes topics about rural communities on his blog — http://thattalldude.com/