‘Is a college degree necessary?’, is a question many of those ask themselves. Yearbook advisor and English teacher, Daniel Leer said, “a college degree is not necessary to find a good job. I believe with a college degree, it opens opportunities you may not have had if not having one.”
Traditionally, universities modeled after institutions like University of Oxford and Harvard University emphasized classical education: philosophy, theology, literature, mathematics, and the sciences. These fields were considered intellectual pursuits aimed at developing reasoning, moral judgment, and scholarly inquiry. 
Professional degrees, by contrast, were explicitly vocational. They prepared graduates for regulated, recognized professions that required licensure or certification. Institutions such as Johns Hopkins University became synonymous with professional medical training, while Yale University and others built prestigious law programs.
In this traditional framework, the dividing line was clear; professional degrees led directly to legally recognized professions. As a result, the definition of “professional” expanded beyond licensed fields. Owatonna high school Counselor, Sara Craig said, “It depends on what you are going for, you need to meet certain standards and criteria for certain professions.”
Business education offers a clear example. Programs like those at Stanford Graduate School of Business standarized the MBA (Master of Business Administration) as a career-accelerating credential. Today, MBAs are widely considered professional degrees, even though business management is not a licensed profession in the same way medicine or law is.
“Professional” now frequently implies direct workforce alignment, not just formal licensure. For example, journalism programs at institutions like Columbia University combine theoretical instruction with hands-on newsroom training. Education degrees incorporate supervised classroom experience. Engineering programs integrate cooperative work placements.
Fields such as philosophy, history, English literatures, mathematics, and physics are often categorized as “traditional” or “academic” rather than professional. Yet, this distinction is increasingly contested. Student Records Secretary, Joni Churchill said, “if you get a degree for something, you should be able to use it for the field you graduated from.”
Historically, “professional” meant preparation for a formally recognized profession. Today, it increasingly means preparation for a specific economic function. At the same time, traditional degrees continue to shape leaders, thinkers, and innovators across industries.
