ABOUT THE BOOK

You don’t have to go to college to be successful in life. 

Contrary to conventional wisdom, a bachelor’s degree is not necessary in order to succeed financially, have an interesting and fulfilling career, contribute to the world, or even to be a well-educated person and great thinker. 

You may have heard that a college degree is the only path to success. But many graduates end up mired in debt and underemployed, working jobs that don’t even require a degree. There are many promising career options for those who don’t want to or can’t attend college.

In Rethinking College, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Karin Klein sets out a new path for our country’s students and their families. Klein examines why the traditional college-for-all model is growing less relevant, and shares practical advice and real-world examples of exactly how others have succeeded without a four-year degree.

Discover an abundance of alternative paths, including white-collar apprenticeships, certificate programs, entrepreneurship, creative careers, residential public-service work, and more. Klein will guide you step-by-step toward a broad range of fulfilling and well-paid careers that don’t require a degree—ranging from pilots, costume designers, influencers, writers, computer programmers, corporate headhunters, film editors, and so many more. 

This is a must-read for anyone seeking an alternative to the traditional college path:

• Students, teens or even adults who are unsure of their next education or career steps
• Anyone looking to make a job pivot
• Parents seeking guidance for their soon-to-launch child
• School counselors who want to offer their students more and better options

Klein’s message: Don’t just go to college because everyone says you have to—find the path that’s right for you. The breadth of possibilities is wider than you think.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Karin Klein has been a member of the Los Angeles Times editorial board for the past 20 years, covering education, medicine, science, and environment, and was a regular columnist for the Sacramento Bee for four years. She shared in two staff Pulitzer Prizes for coverage of breaking news and was the 2006 recipient of the Eugene C. Pulliam Fellowship for Editorial Writers, the Logan Science Writing Fellowship at Woods Hole and Arctic Alaska, and the Metcalf Institute Environmental Writing Fellowship. She also has won numerous national, regional, and local journalism awards, including the Education Writers Association award for her creation of an interactive education page for The Times.

TALKING POINTS

• The epidemic of college debt and how to “just say no” to that pitfall
• Understanding the concept of degree inflation
• Evaluating the pros and cons of a bachelor’s degree
• Changes that need to be made at the high school, college, business/employer, and governmental level
• The myriad of options that exist beyond the most-cited college alternatives of military or trade school
• Real-world examples of people who’ve built fulfilling careers without a college degree
• Pathways that other countries offer to help transition students into workers