Get your degree, sell some bras.

My best friend and I have a running joke that neither of us know anything about "typical" teenagers, despite the fact that we run across them all the time at work.

The reason for this joke is that, as a police officer, she routinely sees the "worst of the worst" - kids who damage property, steal, or hurt other kids. I, as a teacher at a small, private high school, see the "best of the best" - kind, motivated, thoughtful kids with exemplary support at home. Between the two of us, one could argue that we have never actually seen a "typical" teenager before (if such a thing actually exists; I have a feeling that it doesn't.)

Unlike my friend and I, there are lots of people who DO think that they understand the typical teenager, and they have been writing newspaper articles about them lately like nobody's business. Specifically, the articles lambaste teenagers for being lazy, infatuated with digital technology and completely unprepared for university. Well, I've got something to say about that.

First of all, I remember reading those articles when they were written about ME. Born in 1973, I am part of the much maligned "Generation X" who are technically people born between 1965 and 1980. (Note: who makes those "date" decisions about terms like "Generation X anyway? Probably some "Baby Boomer.") We were routinely described by the media in the early 90's as lazy wankers in plaid shirts (thanks to Cobain, Vedder et. al.) who had an overdeveloped sense of entitlement and extreme reluctance to move out of our parents' houses.

It was all hogwash, of course. Articles at the end of the 90's pointed out quite rightly that it was harder for university and college graduates to find work than it had ever been before, which explained both the disillusionment of the generation and the prolonged time in the parental home. I can relate: after I graduated in 1996 into an oversaturated teaching market, I had to work at four part-time jobs to make ends meet; teaching horseback riding lessons, doing publicity for a children's theatre company, selling camping equipment at the mall and, just down the escalator from the camping store, selling lingerie at La Senza.

Note: I am not making any of this up. I had four different sets of work clothes; casual for the theatre company and ultra-grubby for the horse ranch. I would work a morning shift in dressy black, white or navy clothes at La Senza (the only colours permitted unless it was Christmas, when you could add red) and then "click click click" my heels up to Hikers Haven and change into khakis and hiking boots and a uniform shirt. It was a ridiculous year. I liked Hikers Haven because I got lots of great discounts on clothes, tents and sleeping bags, but La Senza was way easier because, as a part-timer, I didn't actually have to know anything about lingerie. "That? That's a bra. It goes on your boobs." All that expertise for only $6.90 an hour.

So, as you can understand, I have read the recent articles about ... who are they? I suppose they are the tail end of "Generation Y", "Millennium babies" or "Echo boomers ..." with more than a little skepticism. If the media is to be believed, they are the "unprepared" generation. See this Toronto Star article which ricocheted around high schools and universities last week: Profs Blast Lazy First Year Students and this one about the effect that Facebook is having on university students that appeared a mere 6 days later. And if you think the articles are interesting, check out the "comments" sections that accompany them; they're full of parents blaming the schools, teachers blaming the government, professors blaming the parents, etc.

Here's what I think. I think that all of these people; the parents, the schools, the teachers, the professors and the government, haven't really thought this thing through. And I think that they're giving teens a bum rap.

It never crossed my mind that I wouldn't go to university. Both of my parents are very academic, and on my 18th birthday, two months before I graduated from high school, my dad gave me a suitcase and a dictionary. The message couldn't be clearer than that. Besides, I loved reading and analyzing novels and plays. I wanted to go to university and I was a good university student. But it also never crossed my mind that if I made another choice, I might starve to death.

Okay, that's an exaggeration, but in a workforce that increasingly seems to value academic credentials, it's easy to see how today's teens WOULD feel that way. An undergraduate degree seems to have become the basic requirement for employment in any job, and if it isn't a requirement, it's certainly preferred. That undergraduate "piece of paper" has become synonymous with proving diligence and societal worth and, perhaps more alarmingly, can seem to a high school graduate like the ONLY way to prove it.

Of course, teenagers shouldn't feel this way. Community college programs, apprenticeships and life experience can teach as much as university can and ... dare I say it ... in some cases ... more. But more teens are opting for an undergraduate degree than ever before, and I'm willing to bet that it's not because they're more interested in European History or Chaucer than before. I think it's because they feel like it's the bare minimum needed to get ahead. So they go into a liberal arts program (students who feel like university is a hoop to jump through rarely sign up for applied mathematics or organic chemistry) but they don't really enjoy it. And then professors wonder why they seem unmotivated?

I really think we need to reevaluate how much respect we give to alternative forms of education and life experience. I have one friend who left university to volunteer for 3 months in South America, and was so moved by the experience that she stayed there, working on community projects for the next five years. When she finally did return to Canada, she felt tremendous pressure to complete her degree, because she was nervous about her future prospects without it. Somehow, she felt like she had something to be ashamed of because she lacked an undergraduate degree.

Now is it just me, or is that INSANE? She worked for five years for minimal pay in order to make other people's lives better; surely that's an indication of her worth as a person and a potential employee. I'm sure that she felt a real sense of accomplishment when she completed her degree, but that's what it should have felt like - an enriching accomplishment - and not an anvil hanging over her head.

I'm not saying that kids shouldn't go to university ... not at all. I have spent the last 11 years working in highly academic high schools where university is the next logical step for 98% of them. But I'd be lying if I said that I hadn't come across the occasional kid who was sweating though courses to prepare him for engineering when what he really wanted to do was be a carpenter and spend his days building things. Or the kid who really wanted to do an NGO internship but was too worried about delaying her university education by a year to go through with it.

So you professors who are lamenting the work ethic of "those kids today", perhaps you should take a moment and ask yourself why they are there in the first place. Many of them are there because it's the right place for them; indeed, my friends who are professors said in response to the Star article that they felt that they have had some of the best students in their career in the last few years. But others are probably there because they really do want to succeed, but they feel like they have to bide their time in a program that doesn't really interest or suit them, because our society doesn't offer enough respect to college programs, internships, apprenticeships or life experiences. And that's not their fault; that's ours.

Who knows? Maybe I'm just spouting off here. But remember that job I had at La Senza Lingerie? There were five part-timers there, and four of us, including me, had two degrees; an undergraduate and a teaching degree. Did those degrees help me get that job? They probably hired me over someone that didn't have them.

I guess that's not all bad though. The teaching degree certainly helped me be a true educator at La Senza:

"That? That's a bra. It goes on your boobs."