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For me the ques­tion of "Why Col­lege?" is some­thing I have con­sid­ered very seri­ously in the course of com­plet­ing my degree. I am tech­ni­cally an alum­nus of Uni­ver­sity Col­lege Lon­don. When I fin­ish the degree I started in 2005 I will also be an alum­nus of the Uni­ver­sity of West­min­ster. One degree, two uni­ver­si­ties: I have asked the ques­tion "Why Col­lege?" not once, but twice.

The first time I asked myself that ques­tion I barely had to think about it. I was already going to col­lege and I was going to a good one. I got into UCL, described as a “British Ivy League uni­ver­sity.” I met inter­est­ing peo­ple, I had a great time, and through it all I even had time to study and write essays, which are the basic ele­ments of a His­tory degree. Why ask “Why Col­lege?” when things are pro­ceed­ing as peo­ple expect and life is good? I did not feel the need to answer that ques­tion at any length.

The sec­ond time around was dif­fer­ent. I thought about the ques­tion "Why Col­lege?" a lot – I had to.

Due to a unique con­ver­gence of per­sonal cir­cum­stances, I left uni­ver­sity in Lon­don on my own terms. When I came back to the UK a year later, I landed in the mid­dle of a tough reces­sion with half a degree. Despite my alumni card and warm rec­om­men­da­tions from well wish­ing pro­fes­sors, I was under-qualified for posi­tions that a grad­u­ate should have been able to get, as I had not graduated.

I was deemed over-qualified for almost every­thing else. Try putting that you did two thirds of a degree from a lead­ing col­lege on your resume and then apply for jobs at a hedge fund or think tank – or for the con­trast, your local Wal-Mart or gas sta­tion. Such a state of limbo closes many doors everywhere.

And so I learned one of the very impor­tant answers to “Why Col­lege?”: a col­lege degree opens doors that are oth­er­wise shut, and can help you reach your pro­fes­sional aspirations.

Of course, col­lege is not just about the degree: study­ing and spend­ing hours in the library, extra-curricular activ­i­ties, gain­ing wide-ranging trans­fer­able skills like effec­tive com­mu­ni­ca­tion and ana­lyt­i­cal skills, and meet­ing new peo­ple, mak­ing con­nec­tions, and build­ing insur­mount­able friend­ships are just a few of the won­der­ful aspects of the col­lege expe­ri­ence. Still, as I painfully learned from my brief occu­pa­tional malaise in between uni­ver­sity stints, a col­lege degree is an incred­i­bly valu­able asset to pos­sess in your quest to achieve your career dreams – or, really, just to get a job.

Dominic Tarn
Lon­don, United Kingdom

The author is a his­tory major at the Uni­ver­sity of West­min­ster. He is the Edi­tor of The Ori­ent News, a Mid­dle East focused pub­li­ca­tion, and cur­rently works for San­tander Bank. He stud­ied at UCL from 2005 to 2007.

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"Why Col­lege?" is a series of op-ed arti­cles writ­ten by Bet­ter­Grads staff and guest con­trib­u­tors about why we chose to con­tinue edu­ca­tion after high school, how we got there, and glimpses into what we learned.