Becoming a Household Name

Ever had a PC at home or work? What was the first Disney movie you saw? Do you possess an iAnything? Do you know what the old gang is up to thanks to Facebook? Do you use lights at the office? Ever say “Yum-o”?

Three. Fox and the Hound. Not anymore, after trading in a contest-won MacBook Air for a PC upgrade. The funny man from youth group sells cars in Texas. Every day. Not that I can remember, though her food has made it to our dining room table.

Bill Gates, Walt Disney, Steve Jobs, Marc Zuckerberg, Thomas Edison, and Rachel Ray have influenced our world in resounding ways, though not one received a college diploma. No degree, no alma mater license plate frame for Mom and Dad to display with pride, nothing much in the Education section of their resumes. Yet their reach staggers the mind. They’re everywhere.

It’s like Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon without the separation: Edison’s work glows right here on my desk, and I’m able to see by it to do my work. Two degrees at most, connected by the light bulb. (Kevin didn’t go to college, by the way.)

The list goes on: Ralph Lauren, Henry Ford, Jenny Craig, and Michael Dell. Mary Kay Ash, Woodrow Wilson, and Dave Thomas (“Where’s the beef?” Dave asked. Apparently not in academia). Moses didn’t go. Nor did Rosa Parks.

Names like these have become as familiar to you and me as "Ronald McDonald" (Did Ray Kroc attend? Nope). "Billions and billions served": proof that you can make an impact on the world and on your bank account simultaneously, higher ed optional.

So what?

Recently, I interviewed David Naugle about influence through education. David graduated from high school, then college, then grad school, and then two—two, I tell you!—doctoral programs. For all the good Dr. Naugle brings into the world, Ms. Parks still stands taller. And why do I get star-struck when I read that Sir Richard Branson (high school dropout) was only 28 when he bought a 74-acre island in the Caribbean? I’m 40 and live in 1300 square…

feet.

"Is College Worth It?" No, it seems. Who needs education when the Food Network hands you $360,000 to cook 30-minute meals for TV-viewers across America? According to the NY Times, that was Rachel Ray’s big break, and she says, "I have no formal anything. I'm completely unqualified for any job I've ever had."

She’s either being grossly humble, or she stumbled upon the most peculiar equation for success: Lack of training + Winging it = Influence.

I joke. "No" is the gambler’s response. Influencers who take up this amount of public mindspace turn out to be people who win a kind of lottery. Discipline, vision, stamina, personality, wealthy parents, bravery, being chosen, being in the right place at the right time—these define the odds. Zuckerberg, for example, dropped out of Harvard. Laziness and Average don’t go to Harvard. Similarly, we tell kids in church that they can be like the little shepherd boy, David, as though he were the runt of the litter who ends up taking on giants. He wasn’t. I’m convinced David would have gone to Harvard. Or West Point. Or replaced Russell Crow in Gladiator.

Me, too?

Dave Thomas said, "There’s no one to stop you but yourself." He’s partly right, I think. Mediocre S.A.T. scores or timidity or poor people skills can diminish your chances. On the other hand, the Wendy’s founder is partly wrong. For every self-made superstar influencer with the total package, you find thousands of surprise winners, rising unexpectedly from the masses to make history—formally educated or not.

To see them, though, requires a different perspective; it requires looking at the quality of influence (which means island size does not count). My mother didn’t finish college and she never got to cook on television, but Rachel Ray is a nobody in comparison. Not to me, anyway. And my neighbor Tom didn’t finish college and he got laid off and had to move away, but Henry Ford couldn’t teach me hospitality like Tom could.

As long as I shoot for "superstardom" in my pursuit to leave a mark on the planet, I will remain out of sync with reality, impatient, and sad. And I will miss the opportunity to influence locally, today.

"Even the resurrection of Jesus, the most extraordinary intervention of God in history, took hundreds of years to have widespread cultural effects" (Culture Making, Andy Crouch, 59).

If you want to gamble, cook 30-minute meals and hope you get discovered. Chances are you’ll have trouble putting food on the table. Instead, ask God how you can grow in influence. Crouch says, "The bigger the change we hope for, the longer we must be willing to invest, work and wait for it" (57). This advice alone might affirm/question the decisions you made about higher education.

For more on the current worth of college, even for nostalgia's sake, check out this infographic by the Pew Research Center.

Image by Robert Digby. Used with permission. Sourced via Flickr. Post by Sam Van Eman, YP editor and narrator of A Beautiful Trench It Was.