There are
quotes, herein,
that quite
possibly will
cause you to
HYPERVENTILATE.
A Look Inside
To get a feel for the book’s gumption and whit, hereafter is a random collection of quotes selected from each chapter. Enjoy!
Welcome, and I thank you for being here. This book is designed to help a mom or dad quickly and easily learn how to help their child or young adult become financially independent by an early age—around 22—without having to set foot on a college campus.
What if you learned about a collection of unique two-year degrees that have starting salaries of $50,000, with median salaries of $92,000, would you consider your time to have been well spent?
Importantly, this book serves to largely reduce the worry you may have about the quality of your child’s future; after all, worry is just wasted energy—it’s like shoving the end of a baseball bat into your sinus cavities: impractical, pointless, fashionably annoying, and a whole lot of hurt for absolutely diddlysquat.
Vocational programs, apprenticeships, entrepreneurship, sales, bootcamps, on-the-job or online training—this is where the money is at; whereas, college is primarily a debt factory.
So this book is all about OPPORTUNITY TRAINING: the exploration and study of opportunities that matter most to your child.
Opportunity training thrives on this motivational premise: I bet you didn’t know this life-changing stuff is out there! Here it is; now go forth and conquer.
Quitting will never, ever be a part of your vocabulary, except for those disquieting moments when you run out of cake.
In relation to the subject matter herein, if there were dreams for sale, which one would you buy—and what price would you pay? Would one of those dreams be about providing the finest education possible for your child?
We now have kids who are trained to expertly toss a tin can into the right receptacle, but at the same time they can’t determine its exact circumference—for that matter, they don’t even know what the word means.
The facts are: the average American student cannot read well nor write well, and he will not graduate from college unless he earns a humanities degree that will have him believing he can save the world when, in truth, he will not even have the ability to save himself!
Then, too, of the 46% who finish college, nearly half of them will demonstrate no significant improvement upon graduation in a wide range of skills that are critical for obtaining employment in tomorrow’s workforce.
In the best of all worlds, by now your young adult should have wisely limited her addictions to a positive attitude and chocolate—but not necessarily in that order. In reality, about 2 in 3 college students are offered prescription drugs by their senior year.
Thus, student borrowers have become serfs—bonded peasants having little more rights than to breathe, work, pay up—and die!
Imagine learning about Moby Dick’s great white whale while sailing the Pacific Ocean, or canning Alaskan salmon for a season. What kind of changes to your heart would you experience should you volunteer to work with injured animals?
Volunteer service trips range from helping with research projects at whale calving grounds in Maui to assisting with archaeological site restoration in New Mexico.
Want to take courses from Harvard, MIT, or Berkeley—for free and at the convenience of your home computer?
Students can take general education courses and then test out of up to two years of college for one low monthly cost (less than $200.00), plus exam fees.
Your young adult would be immersed in an environment that pits him against Mother Nature. In some ways he will briefly experience the life of many who struggle to survive in third-world countries.
There are already more than 700,000 open technology jobs in the US, and another half million expected over the next decade.
Over 3,000 alumni have been placed at 1,000+ companies, earning median salaries of $101,000 in San Francisco and $90,000 in New York.
As of December, 2019, 99% of the school’s graduates have found an employment opportunity within 3 months of graduation, with a current median annual salary of $109,000.
Travel and tourism, cruise and tour guide jobs, lodge jobs that have bears for neighbors, fishing, charter boat jobs—it’s all there.
There are around 18 military career fields to choose from, such as manufacturing, health sciences, marketing, cybersecurity, and information technology.
History majors fare the worst. In 2019, more than 37,000 history degrees were awarded—yet there were only 3,400 working historians in the entire country.
There are, indeed, colleges that are willing to offer a college education gratuitously, or they may require a few fees, but they are easily affordable.
For her, nothing is routine, eclectic is normal and versatility is way beyond paramount. She is a non-traditional student who would best fit in with a college that touts a non-traditional curriculum.
The following companies have made employee education a priority, continuing to support and invest in those who make their organizations tick.
BMW offered Renee a job washing cars after they were serviced. He then was moved to the tire department. His hard work got him another promotion, and now he is earning $68,000 as a Service Advisor.
The lifestyle she currently has on backorder will be in stock just as soon as she learns to fulfill the needs of others. Work responsibility has a way of waking up a sleeping giant—of turning a lethargic, unfocused teenager into a productive and respected manager of a fast food restaurant, or a Home Depot, or a Big O tire center, or a bridal gown boutique shop.
Realize, roughly 70% of our nation’s workforce does not have a bachelor’s degree, and more than half of our college graduates will enter the labor force with degrees that are useless—bereft of valuable skills and useful knowledge.
An apprenticeship is two different things: It’s a paid job. But it’s also a school. Mostly, though, it’s a great opportunity!
To get a glimpse of the nature of an apprenticeship program, what follows is a collection of program descriptions—from the mature, blue-collar programs, to the new, on-the-scene white-collar programs that are employer-sponsored.
But now, she’s an apprentice ironworker, making $32.42 an hour, or more than $60,000 a year, while continuing her training. At 5-foot-2, “I can run with the big boys,” she said, laughing.
The average bachelor’s degree in the United States costs $127,000. The average trade school degree costs $33,000. Plus, on average it now takes five years to earn a bachelor’s degree vs. two years for a trade degree.
Students in trade schools are sitting in a sweet spot—they are hired even before they graduate—for their honed skills will ensure that there will always be a clamorous bidding war for their services.
We are lending money we don’t have to kids who can’t pay it back to train them for jobs that no longer exist. That’s nuts!
Shockingly, more than half said they’d rather work in a coffee shop as a barista ($25,000 annual salary, including tips) than as a welder, even though top-paying welder jobs can pay well more than $100,000 a year.
It is considered the Harvard of animation.
So where do professional baseball umpires come from?
There are welders, and then there are welders whose unique skills help them earn over $200,000 annually.
Flying drones part-time can earn you $500 or $600 a week, and by flying full-time, you can make six-figures annually. Flying for big name companies can net you $3,500 a day.
Lambda School CEO Austen Allred says their programs can keep pace with technological changes in ways traditional higher education institutions can’t.
Salesmanship is the oldest profession in the world. I know, some would argue that the business transaction undertaken within the backroom of a seedy brothel is much older, but let’s face it, the ladies of the night must first sell their wares at a price their customers would be willing to pay.
The school specializes in placement of a non-traditional candidate (no device experience) into the lucrative field of medical device sales.
Between 1963 and 1977, Girard sold more than 13,000 cars (that’s roughly six per day). What was secret weapon? Greeting cards—unbelievable, right?
Working strictly by commission has a fantastic perk—it allows you to give yourself a sizeable raise anytime you set your mind to it.
There isn’t a profession in the world that can exist without the involvement of a sale.
Thus, mom and dad, as your children grow, so too you must grow equally in the knowledge that will help to prepare them for employment that doesn’t exist today.
A futurist sums everything up nicely: “It is certain that those with the clearest vision of the future will naturally rise to the top, becoming critical influencers, industry leaders, and the voice of authority.”
There are over 22 million individuals who are self-employed in the U.S., with no employees other than themselves. That’s about 14% of the entire American workforce.
If all the people who created thriving businesses without the help of a college degree were listed, you would have to suffer through scores of bio pages.
Gary Vaynerchuk, a self-made millionaire at a very young age, and a staunch critic of public schools, said it best: “The quicker children get off their parent’s payroll, the more likely they will be happy in life.”
An introduction to the lives of these history makers can influence your young adult’s perspective regarding his work life for the better—that’s the point of a history lesson, after all—to grow by learning how others grew.
Entrepreneurs have an ability that few of us exercise. They can see a niche, a need in the market that needs to be satisfied either by the development of a new product or service, or by enhancing the features of an existing product, or by enhancing the features of an existing service. And once they see an anomaly that needs attention, they pounce.
In fact, the word, entrepreneur, so I have been told, is simply a common misspelling of risk-taker. Look around you—every product you see or feel or smell was created by someone who was willing to take a chance at building something that could possibly be a hit with the consumer.
Yet today’s parents feed all these forms of entertainment, and others, to their kids hourly each day until they become mentally obese from having too much ignorance, apathy, hate, and lifelessness.
It is you who will help him find what’s out there in the world that will greatly enhance his opportunity to live a productive and responsible life. It is you who will direct her to explore every nook and cranny that has anything to do with the schooling and profession that has captured her attention.
Therefore, starting today, what will you do to enhance your child’s future? Concisely, will you choose to give a damn—or not?
