Summary Of Should Everyone Go To College By Stephanie Owen And Sawhill

Currently in America, the popularity of attending college is increasing, but so are tuition costs. Stephanie Owen and Isabel Sawhill, in their essay, Should Everyone Go to College?, refute the idea that college is a necessity to live a prosperous life. Their purpose is to inspire a change in legislation to make information on the drawbacks of college more accessible to high school students. Owen and Sawhill effectively appeal to their audience of legislators by systematically proving that college is not a necessity
At the start of the essay, directly after the thesis, Owen and Sawhill immediately address a popular counter argument. They point out that a common problem with statistics about college versus high school graduates is that “the smartest most motivated people are both more likely to go to college and more likely to be financially successful” (Owen and Sawhill 209). They then proceed to refute the claim through giving particular examples, like “comparing

Rather than providing trivial anecdotes, they use definite facts to improve their claim. The pair constantly support their claims with data ranging from “Earning Trajectories by Educational Attainment” to “Average Six-Year Graduation Rates by School Selectivity” proving that while college is an important step in the lives of millions of Americans, it is not the correct path for everyone (211, 219). Owen and Sawhill effectively appeal to their audience of legislators through statistics because their use of graphs stands out and demonstrates their argument much clearer. They understand these lawmakers are much more concerned about overall averages than individual emotional stories; therefore, their claim appeal directly to their intended audience. Numbers are hard to dispute while appeals to emotion are easy to overlook; Owen and Sawhill use this to emphasize their