The First College Dropout President

Everyone is speakme approximately, or at least Googling, Marianne Williamson, her new age guidelines, how-to e-book empire, and her secretive own family life. If she became president, there could be several ancient firsts—the first lady president, the first Jewish president, the first single president for 100 years—however one of these firsts sticks out as a capacity downside. Namely, Marianne Williamson did not graduate from university. In this, she stands wildly apart from each earlier US president, who all either finished at least a university diploma or served inside the army —Williams dropped out of a selective liberal arts college after only two years to pursue her targets as a singer.

The simplest President without an undergraduate diploma within the last a hundred years changed into Harry S. Truman, who have become President in 1945 after the demise of FDR. By no means went to university—alternatively, he enlisted inside the navy and fought in World War I. Nine other presidents served inside the military instead of attending college—commonly inside the Revolutionary War and Civil War eras. Every different president finished at least a four-year university degree (two, Martin Van Buren and Grover Cleveland, did not attend college, however “study the regulation” to come to be lawyers, which I counted as the same as university and law college). So Williamson would be the first President to have neither college-level training nor an army heritage.

That being stated, do you need to have graduated from a four-12 months university to be president? Of course, no longer—the best requirement is being a natural-born US citizen above 35 years antique. And I can renowned that, because the founding father of a university admissions consulting organization, I’m closely biased towards touting the benefits of a 4-yr university schooling—so I’m deciding on how not to talk in this text approximately the advantages it may have. After all, it’s really viable to make it thru 4 years of Ivy League college training without being organized to be president. Still, I’d be remiss to now not point out that Pomona College is one of the quality schools inside the usa (in 2015, it became ranked the first-rate, above each Ivy), and that better faculties are virtually less complicated to graduate from, no longer more difficult (after you get in). Pomona offers full need-based aid, and ninety-three % of college students graduate within six years (lots higher than the common university with a 59% six-year commencement charge).

But this isn’t approximately the fee of college schooling. Regardless of whether or not she would have been better-knowledgeable or higher-prepared after four years at Pomona, her selection to drop out is troubling. Williamson’s state of affairs is markedly specific from our former presidents or most of the people of Americans with partial university educations. She didn’t drop out of university to join the army or due to the fact she may want to now not come up with the money for it—she dropped out due to the fact she “had trouble locating her passion” and desired to pursue a career as a cabaret singer. Although Williamson is older now, we do take into account what applicants and presidents had been like as kids whilst evaluating their individual, and what I’m searching out in our next president is a person with the grit, stamina, and stick-to-it-iveness to decide to do their satisfactory for the full 4 years, now not leaving midway thru to attempt out something extra interesting.

Future-Proofing The Workforce: Why Digital Literacy Is Key

Artificial intelligence and automation are fundamentally transforming the labor market, impacting all people in all traces of labor. In fact, the Metropolitan Policy Program on the Brookings Institution launched a document earlier this yr concluding that clearly all occupations might be tormented by automation and synthetic intelligence.

Change is already underway. Even jobs not traditionally seen as “era jobs” today require a few diplomae of digital literacy. Take, as an example, a mechanic—it was once enough to know the way to fix a busted engine, but nowadays’s mechanics additionally want to recognize the software and apps built into contemporary cars.
As workers discover themselves displaced using generation or suffering to adapt, employers are having difficulty locating the body of workers they need to get beforehand. The modern-day Department of Labor record determined 7. Five million jobs are currently unfilled within the U.S.—jobs that continue to be open even as organizations fall brief of increased plans and successful candidates take a seat at the sidelines.