This is the text of the speech I gave when I graduated from Provo College with my Associate's Degree in Business Management:
Education is Worthless.
This is the belief I held for several years throughout junior high, high school, and beyond. But I had an experience about a year and a half ago that changed my mind.
I was working at Novell at the time, and I had the opportunity to apply for a better job at Nu Skin, just here next to the Tabernacle. And, I thought I had everything I needed for the position. I had experience, certification, skills and abilities. I even knew the interviewer. But day after day went by, week after week, and I didn't hear anything. Finally, after three months, I was offered a position, but with the understanding that I would go to school. So the day I started my new job at Nu Skin was the day I started school at Provo College. And I found out later that I almost didn't get the job at all, because I didn't have a college degree. And if I had had a college degree, I probably could've come in at a higher salary.
Up until this time, I had thought that I could get by, and be successful, without a diploma. I was wrong. So I'd like to share with you a few insights that I've gained about education.
Not long after I started school at Provo College, I was talking with my grandpa on the phone. And my grandpa didn't go to college, but I think he wishes he had; so he strongly encourages his kids and his grandkids to go to school. And he said to me, “It's not so much the education that matters. It's the diploma.” And, this isn't to say that education and learning aren't important, they are. But, from an employer perspective, it's not just what you know, it's what you show. And if you can show a diploma, you'll be rewarded.
To illustrated: I recently received a promotion at Nu Skin that I wouldn't even meet the minimum requirements for if I weren't here receiving this degree today. But there are still a lot of doors that are closed to me, because I don't have a Bachelor's degree. This is why I plan to continue my education when I start at the University of Phoenix next month.
I had a teacher out at UVSC–and I went to UVSC for three weeks before becoming an official dropout–but I did get something out of the experience. I had a teacher, who actually now teaches at Provo College, who said that education isn't just knowing the answers, it's knowing where to find the answers. And I didn't write it down, but it had enough impact on me that I still remember it more than two years later.
It's true that some classes do require you to know the answers–so you can pass the test, so you can make the grade. So you go home, the night before the exam, you cram the information into your brain, you spit it out on the test, hope you never have to see the thing again. Some call it “scholastic regurgitation.” But according to Herbert Spencer, the goal of education should be, ”…to prepare us for complete living.” And by this standard, scholastic regurgitation, or just knowing the answers, doesn't qualify. But teaching people to teach themselves, or teaching them where to find the answers, does prepare them for complete living.
I'd like to share with you one last insight by reading a quote from a book by Richard Paul Evans called The Locket. “The most difficult of decisions are often not the ones in which we cannot determine the correct course, rather the ones in which we are certain of the path but fear the journey.”
Education is a long, difficult, and expensive journey. A journey which for some ends today; for others, this is just the beginning. But when we have reached our chosen destination, we will be able to look back and say, unequivocally, to those who wish to follow in our footsteps, that …
Education is Priceless.
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