5 Reasons I Should Sue My College
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The blogosphere is abuzz with a story about the girl who’s suing her college because she’s jobless after graduation. Check out what our sister blogger at U. Got It? had to say about it:
After taking out $70,000 worth of loans in order to earn a bachelor’s degree from Monroe College, Thompson graduated this April only to find she had no job. Four months later, and the 27-year-old is still jobless, but now she’s too busy filing a lawsuit against her alma mater to bother sending out resumes.
The whole thing is hysterical to me, starting with the fact that the girl expects her alma mater to pound the pavement for her. Nothing is owed to you! College is about getting an education, not about getting you a job. Sure, career services can help — my husband actually got his first job out of school that way — but it’s up to you to do the legwork and market yourself. Of course, now that she’s made headlines, some dopey employer will offer her an opportunity that she doesn’t deserve. Even worse, imagine if she found a sympathetic judge or jury who wanted to make a statement against high college tuition? Stranger things have happened…
It got me to thinking that maybe I’m missing out on lots of lawsuit opportunities that could net me lots of cash. Here are some things I can sue my college for:
1. College was not the best four years of my life. So many people promised that it would be, but I can honestly say I liked high school better. And I enjoyed my graduate school experience even more than that. I was mislead and I demand to be paid!
2. I graduated second in my class, but companies did not come to me with job offers. Maybe that myth isn’t around much anymore (well, except in Trina’s case), but when I attended college, there was always rumors about graduates walking away with their diploma and near six-figure job offers. Recruiters would mysteriously swoop in — apparently having heard about all of the super term papers you wrote — and the next thing you’d, you’d have a corner office! Of course, this does not happen in real life. And now my college must pay me for loss of wages and mental anguish (I’m still not over the rejection!).
3. I never got to wear a toga, or throw up out of a dorm window. Just saying… More false advertising that college would be full of wild times. At the very least, someone owes me a keg. Bonus: I’m now well beyond the legal drinking age.
4. No one warned me about the Freshman 15. Sure, you all know about it now, thanks to informative articles on the Internet, but the Internet was practically new when I was a freshman. And those darn cafeteria cookies and french fries were there, luring in calorie clueless students like me. I think my college should be held responsible for my muffin top, and pay for a personal trainer and chef.
5. Textbook robbery. Why is it that after paying $100 for a new textbook, I only got $15 when I sold it back in near mint condition, yet you tried to sell me tattered and torn used books for $60? Isn’t that illegal, like ticket scalping? Or price gouging? Whatever you want to compare it it, I think I’m entitled to some of those profits.
I figure one of these can be my ticket to big bucks — which do you think is my best shot? And, hey, if you want to share some bitter college memories worth suing about, I’d love to hear them!
-Dawn Papandrea
Kathryn Marion said,
August 5, 2009 @ 5:17 pm
I love it, Dawn! I’m so glad you appreciated my column today on Examiner.com (http://bit.ly/dckbH) and felt ‘inspired.’ Maybe you can make up the monetary difference by going into comedy writing!
Candice Arnold said,
August 7, 2009 @ 9:24 am
I’m with you on the text books, Dawn! What really hurts is the ones that can’t be sold back, even for a fraction of the original price, because the professor changed books or a new edition was released before the end of the semester. Oh, the woes of higher education.
Ron@TheWisdomJournal said,
August 10, 2009 @ 8:24 am
6. They didn’t motivate me to study like they should have.
7. They didn’t help me enough when I ran out of money to pay for college and had to drop out.
8. They didn’t offer an “Almost Completed The Degree” degree.
9. They didn’t transfer 100% of my courses when I finally got with the program 15 years later and finished my degree.
10. They didn’t help me get a job making more than my parents right out of the chute.
Dan Papandrea said,
August 11, 2009 @ 8:44 am
Dawn really great points and much agreed. it saddens me that that person feels that she is “owed”
the problem is most college goers these days have a false sense of entitlement since the economy was more robust while they were growing up. this is certainly not the case and i would hope this leads to stronger conviction and dedication from recent graduates to carpe diem rather than expect diem to be diem exituum (days to be delivered to them) .
p.s. TOGA TOGA TOGA!
Lynn M said,
August 20, 2009 @ 9:51 am
Hey Dawn,
Loved your post….despite your bragging about being smart, sober, and skinny! Methinks more networking, positive actions, and resume-tuning would have served Ms. Thompson better than whining about a job not being handed to her on a silver platter. Don’t worry, even if she does get a job out of it, she’ll have to live with her whiner status and once the attention wears off it won’t serve her well in the future.
I think she might be one of those bad Millenials!
http://www.collegejobbank.com/articles/millenials-in-the-workforce-4155-article.html
Carnival of College Admission Dog Days of Summer Edition said,
November 12, 2009 @ 11:18 am
[...] sued her college after graduation because she can’t find a job, Dawn Papandrea came up with 5 Reasons I Should Sue My College posted at CollegeSurfing [...]
UWMstudent said,
July 12, 2010 @ 3:45 pm
My school professor ignored a serious case of academic misconduct, they also grade solely on the basis of personal opinion, and there is no accountability for this because she is tenured. I am now finding there is no way of holdiong any of them accountable. This is rediculous when my future and a lot of money and even more effort is all on the line
Nic said,
September 10, 2010 @ 11:05 am
After my initial outrage and huffing and puffing about this story, I do have a certain degree of sympathy for her, right up until she filed the lawsuit that is. The real world is scary and having to join it is horrible. But graduate jobs aren’t just handed out and filing a lawsuit is not the solution.
We once had a guest lecturer come in and basically tell us all that we were wasting our time and money, he would never employ any of us and no-one else would either. I’d quite like to sue my university over making me into a gibbering wreck for a whole week after that, before pulling myself together.
But someone did employ, which was the best way of getting back at him.
Nic said,
September 10, 2010 @ 11:06 am
*employ me, sorry.
Dave said,
September 17, 2010 @ 1:03 pm
Her claim is stupid. If you wanted to sue your school, this real story is: How do you google for that. Try it. I cant find jack. Here’s my nightmare when I was 12 units from a degree back in Aug 2008.
My college dropped my major and stopped offering the classes I needed to graduate. They never told me or any of the students in my major that this was going to happen. They didn’t offer any assistance or a path to completion. When I asked for the money back they declined.
Let me be perfectly clear, this was a state school that dropped the Web Programming major but kept the Construction major after the housing bubble burst and the tech industry made nothing but gains.
Matt said,
December 28, 2010 @ 8:16 pm
Ok, I have a story for you. I do not know if I can sue, but I sure do feel like the university I am attending owes me money. I am in my final year at a university where I am studying physical and health education. There have been a number of things go wrong within the past 4 weeks…I am scheduled to start student teaching in January.
*The first thing that I am upset about is that the university hired a professor in the P.E department 2 weeks prior to the fall semester. The professor used the same syllabus and assignment instructions even though she had different expectations. She was clueless about the class and a majority of the time made up things and assignments on the fly.
*The second thing that I am upset about is that my other P.E. professor had no clue how to do her job. We are required to complete an online portfolio. I went to this professor for help with the portfolio and she told me “I am not completely familiar with the process, if I were you I would ask for help from one of your classmates.”
*The third thing is that after I spent numerous hours on the portfolio and passed the requirements, the department head did not check off that I passed it on the departments webpage. I was notified by the university that I was not eligible to student teach, because of this. I had to email the department head, to remind her to do her job.
*A few other things. If you ask the physical education instructors for activities they will just refer you to pecentral, which is a website with a limited number of activities. My financial aid was canceled, because I took 1 or 2 classes while I worked for 2 years. They said I should have graduated by then. It has only been 6 years and I worked full-time for two of them. There have been other things, but these seem to be the problems that I have been faced with over the last couple of months. Let me know what you think. Thanks!