WPE Sample Topic 2
The sample reading passage below is followed by a writing prompt.
Reading Passage
Adapted from “A Matter of Degrees”
By Thomas Frank in Harper’s, August 2012
“The world is awash with fake [college] degrees,” says Les Rosen of Employment Screening Resources, a leading background-check outfit. In several [instances], the fakers actually studied at the institutions named on their résumés—they just failed to graduate. Others conjured their accomplishments out of thin air. Still others simply purchased their credentials from unaccredited institutions. All three approaches are undoubtedly on the rise. A consultancy in Wisconsin has for many years maintained a tally of educational whoppers told by the various job applicants it is asked to investigate; the resulting “Liars Index” (a term the consultancy has trademarked) reached its highest level ever in the second half of 2011. Just how widespread is the problem? Rosen estimates that some 40 percent of job applicants misrepresent in some way their educational attainments. And he reminds me that this figure includes only those people “who are so brazen about it that they’ve signed a release and authorization for a background check.” Among those who aren’t checked—who work for companies that don’t hire a professional background screener, or who refuse to sign a release—the fudging is sure to be even more common.
It takes only a few hours researching diploma mills to make you wonder about the swirling tides of fraud that advance and retreat beneath society’s placid, meritocratic surface. And eventually you start wondering about that surface, too, where everything seems to be in its place and everyone has the salary he or she deserves. The diploma mills hold up a mirror to the self-satisfied world of white-collar achievement, and what you see there isn’t pretty. Think about it this way: Who purchases bogus degrees? Judging by how the industry advertises itself, the customers are desperate people whose careers are going nowhere. They know they need a diploma to succeed, but they can hardly afford to borrow fifty grand and waste four years of their lives at Frisbee State; they’ve got jobs, and families, and car payments to make. Someone offers them a college degree in recognition of their actual experience—and not only does it sound attractive, it sounds fair. Who is to say that they are less deserving of life’s good things than someone whose parents paid for him to goof off at a glorified country club two decades ago? And who, really, is to say that they know less than the graduate turned out last month by some adjunct-run, beer-soaked, grade-inflated, but fully accredited debt factory in New England or California?
[T]he sacred Credential signifies less and less each year but costs more and more to obtain. Yet we act as though it represents everything. It’s a million-dollar coin made of pot metal—of course it attracts counterfeiters. And of course its value must be defended by an ever-expanding industry of résumé checkers and diploma-mill hunters. The boundaries are artificial, and that is precisely why they must be regulated so intensely: they are the only thing keeping the bunglers and knaves who rule us in their jobs.
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Prompt: After reading the article, “A Matter of Degrees,” write an essay between 500 and 800 words in which you argue whether or not a college degree is merely a “million-dollar coin made of pot metal.” If you agree, support your point with original and compelling arguments and then explain why, nevertheless, you've chosen to attend Cal Poly. If you do not agree, defend your position using compelling counterarguments. Your essay should show an understanding of the article without simply repeating it, and you should incorporate specific details from your own experience and knowledge into your response.
