Degreed, Trained, or Educated?

I was running yesterday and the tangentiallity of my thinking led me to this topic. It is one which I have given a fair bit of thought and discussion with others. It is also one I have some strong opinions on. First off, my definitions are my own and may not be exactly what others would use to describe the ideas.

I'll start by giving how I define the words and then move forward.

Degreed-- a college degree of some sort
Trained-- taught in a trained separate from the degree not necessarily above or below it
Educated--nothing to do with degrees necessarily, but the basic principal being you know at least a small amount about alot of different things.

I think it is important to first describe trained as not necessarily meaning a vocational training. I am in training right now with my residency. My knowledge in psychiatry will not add a great deal to how educated I am, in my opinion, but I will be trained in a particular area. Just like a welder, a chef, or many other things. Training is great becasue it brings in the paycheck but it doesn't make you educated. For that matter money alone doesn't get you to the highest socio economic class. That is made up of income, education, and respect of your career.

Educated people are usually also degreed and maybe even also trained. Liberal arts schools push being an educated person by giving you a bredth of knowledge. There are a lot of people who get there BS and they are not educated in the least. Let me give you an example how this has played out in my experience. Piccu, Bratch, and I have been around many groups of people who are all educated though don't have a college degree. If you make some reference to big historical moments or people, literature, science, politics, .... these people know what you're talking about. Now, the other end of the spectrum are some of the people I have met while in medical school, so of them were in med school. These are groups of people who all had degrees, but probably didn't know that Ben Franklin was never president, any title to any Robert Frost poem, any of the elements on the periodic table, or any title to any piece of classical music. Now, these are random things and not knowing one or most of them is no big deal if you know other things, but the point I am trying to make is that they were degreed, but not educated.

I have to say that it was during that time, and I have mentioned this to my wife, that I realized how much I took my friends growing up for granted. I am not saying were all geniuses (although I may have been the smartest child alive and not Piccu), but we were pretty smart.

College degrees are important, being trained to get a specific job with more money is good, but it is all a pretty sad state of affairs if you are not educated. Being educated doesn't require more than a library card and more so it is a state of wanting to continue to learn things throughout life and not just to get a check.

I am a pretty driven person, and more than one person has said that I will be hard on my kids if I have children. I don't think so beyond the point of wanting them to be educated. I want that for everyone and realize just like every other aspect of life, people have to take responsibilty for themselves.