Let's face it; getting a degree in college has become a joke. A generation before ours, and I'm speaking as an early 20-something, graduating college meant being better than everyone else your age. Now, all you need is a part-time job at Home Depot and a student loan. Boring.

I'll be the first person to proclaim that I'm so glad tuition got raised. I really am. A university education needs to become so expensive that only the rich and students determined and intelligent enough to get scholarships can possibly attend.

Did you get Cs and Bs in high school? Fuck off, you're going to be doing landscaping for the rest of you life. Are you coasting through college just so you can put, "I graduated from (insert college here)" on your resume? Fuck off, you'll be answering phones until you die.

Students you aren't completely to blame for not only going through four years of high school in a daze, but now, in our current state, going through four to five years in college in a daze. Jobs are also to blame. At some point in time employers had the idea that hiring people who have gone through college was necessary. At that point it was actually true. Now that it has become such a necessity for getting a decent job, the college degree has become the high school diploma. Everyone has one and it isn't worth shit.

Take a look around your classrooms. For the most part you will not find students eager to learn. You're going to find students text messaging their friends about what they aren't going to be wearing tonight. You will find more students interested in the score of the Miami Heat game than global warming. You will find the same students that didn't give a shit in high school, still not giving a shit in college.

I pray and hope that one day these people, these lemmings to the idea that a college diploma is a must, will wake up. Maybe it will be their fourth year in college. Maybe it won't be until they actually graduate and do more with their Friday mornings than drink PowerAde and wish their hangover doesn't last until their favorite trivial show on MTV is on. But, one day these people will wake up and realize that they had access to texts they didn't read, teachers they didn't listen to and resources they ignored because they would much rather "get fucked up."

Before you say it, I will. I sound like an old man, but you people have made me this way. I'm not some straight-edge, wannabe journalist looking to pick a fight with every jock and slut at this university. I'm a young adult who has opened his eyes one day and has seen no promise in 85 percent of what is supposed to be our future. I also enjoy "getting fucked up," maybe as much as the next guy, but there is a time and a place for that, and a time and a place to educate yourself. I suggest you make time for both.

It's a little too "I'm so much smarter than everyone" and not enough "You guys make me sick, you fucking pigs." I'll work on it when I plan on printing it. I mean, there are some classes I don't give a shit about myself. It's just the overall feeling, even in someone's major, that they would rather watch The Simple Life 2 than just listen. Or would rather destruct than debate. Hmph.

Edit 2: I think I found the problem. There are really two ideas here and one of them is good (the value of a college education dropping) and a decent one (no one in college giving a shit). In order for this to work, I think it might be best to seperate them and make them stronger.