College makes you a better parent

The argument

The case for college is usually made in terms of what the graduate gains. This argument makes it in terms of what the graduate's children gain, and the claim is that the benefits appear before the child is old enough to have been taught anything. They begin at birth. Mothers with a university degree are more likely to give birth to a healthy baby, and more likely to ensure their child is reared at a healthy weight afterwards. Both outcomes turn on decisions made long before a child could participate in them — what happens during pregnancy, and how a household feeds itself — which is why they are attributed to the parent rather than to anything about the child. The educational effects follow the same pattern. By the time the child enters school, it has a higher probability of performing better at school and of being able to read at the age of 5. Reading before school is the clearest instance of the point, because it is not something the school can have supplied: whatever produced it happened at home, in the years when the graduate parent was shaping the child's environment. The children of college graduates are also more likely to participate in extra-curricular activities, which extends the same pattern beyond the classroom into how the parent organises the child's time. The evaluative step is what turns these outcomes into an argument about worth. It is a parent's responsibility to give their child the best start in life, both in terms of health and education. If a degree measurably improves a parent's ability to discharge that responsibility, then its value is not confined to the graduate's own earnings or career; it is passed on to someone who never attended. Therefore college makes graduates better parents, and that benefit is part of what the education is worth.

Context

The children of college graduates are more likely to be healthy and perform better at school. A parent's job is to prepare a child for school and keep them healthy. Therefore, college makes students better parents.

Premises

Counter-arguments

A parent's sole responsibility isn't the health and intelligence of the child. A parent's responsibility is also to raise a happy child, to raise a child that feels loved, to keep a child in a home, to ensure that the child is well-fed, and to educate the child on right from wrong. A college education does nothing to change these aspects of a mother or father's parenting ability. Therefore, it is not accurate to conclude that a college education makes someone a better parent.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejectin P1] This isn't a parent's only job.