名校光環不一定爲你換來幸福人生

A word to high-school seniors rejected by their first choice: A degree from that shiny, elite college on the hill may not matter nearly as much as you think.

有一句話要送給那些被自己的首選學校拒之門外的高中畢業生：那所高高在上、光輝奪目的大學的學位或許並沒你想的那麼重要。

A new Gallup survey of 30,000 college Graduates of all ages in all 50 states has found that highly selective schools don't produce better workers or happier people, but inspiring professors -- no matter where they teach -- just might.

蓋洛普(Gallup)新近對全美50個州各年齡段的3萬名大學畢業生進行了調查，發現錄取標準極高的學校並不會造就更優秀的僱員或更快樂的人，但鼓舞人心的老師――無論他們在哪所學校執教――也許能做到這一點。

The poll, undertaken this spring, is part of a growing effort to measure how well colleges do their jobs. This survey adds an interesting twist, because it looked not only at graduates after college; it tried to determine what happens during college that leads to well-being and workplace engagement later in life.

這項調查於今年春季展開，是越來越多的評估大學的工作做得如何的舉措之一。該調查增加了一個有意思的做法，它不僅調查大學生在畢業後的狀況，還嘗試去推斷大學期間的什麼經歷會讓他們在日後生活幸福、工作投入。

The poll didn't measure graduates' earnings. Rather, it was rooted in 30 years of Gallup research that shows that people who feel happy and engaged in their jobs are the most productive. That relatively small group at the top didn't disproportionately attend the prestigious schools that Americans have long believed provided a golden ticket to success. Instead, they forged meaningful connections with professors or mentors, and made significant investments in long-term academic projects and extracurricular activities.

該調查未比較畢業生的收入，而是借鑑了蓋洛普一項30年的研究；該研究表明心情愉悅及工作投入的人是最有成效之人。處於金字塔頂端的那一小批人並不是絕大多數都上過名校，儘管美國人一直以來都信奉這些名校能提供通往成功的黃金入場券。這些人與老師或導師之間有着對其今後發展意義深遠的關係，並對長遠學術項目和課外活動進行了大量投入。

'It matters very little where you go; it's how you do it' that counts, said Brandon Busteed, executive director of Gallup Education. 'Having a teacher who believes in a student makes a lifetime of difference.'

蓋洛普教育調查執行董事布蘭登・巴斯蒂德(Brandon Busteed)說：“你在哪所學校就讀並不怎麼重要，（重要的是）你是如何度過大學生活的。擁有一位相信你會有所成就的老師會造就不同的人生。”

The poll is the brainchild of former Indiana Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels, who became president of Purdue University in January 2013. As he prepared for the job, Mr. Daniels said he kept bumping into the same problem: a lack of benchmarked data to measure the value of a college degree. Last spring, during a trip to Gallup's D.C. offices, he seized on the idea of applying their engagement and well-being questions, which had been used in other contexts, to college graduates. The index will soon be broken down to the level of individual schools 'for those that have the will, and frankly, the nerve,' Mr. Daniels said.

該調查緣起於前印第安納州州長、共和黨人米奇・丹尼爾斯(Mitch Daniels)，他在2013年1月就任普度大學(Purdue University)校長。丹尼爾斯說，在爲這一職位做準備時，他不斷遇到一個相同的問題：缺乏衡量大學學位價值的基準數據。去年春季，在訪問蓋洛普華盛頓辦公室期間，他採納了用蓋洛普的投入度和幸福感問題來評估大學畢業生狀況的建議，蓋洛普的這兩類問題在其他調研中也有采用。丹尼爾斯說，對於“有意願，並且坦白說有勇氣”的大學，該指數將很快被細分至各所院校的層面。

'There is a lot we don't know about higher education, and there is a sense it's skating on its reputation,' Mr. Daniels said. 'We needed to know with more rigor how well the experience is serving people.'

丹尼爾斯指出：“我們對高等教育還有許多不瞭解的地方，它給人的感覺就是關乎於名望的。我們需要更精確地瞭解大學教育經歷對人們有多大用處。”

The poll found that just 39% of college graduates feel engaged at work -- meaning, for instance, that they enjoyed what they did on a daily basis and are emotionally and intellectually connected to their jobs. And only 11% reported they were 'thriving' in five different aspects of their lives, among which are financial stability, a strong social network and a sense of purpose.

調查發現，只有39%的大學畢業生感覺對工作投入――意即他們每天都享受自己所幹的工作，他們在情感上接納自己的工作，而且他們的工作與他們的才幹很匹配。只有11%的人表示他們在生活的五個不同方面都“欣欣向榮”，這些方面包括財務穩定性、牢固的社交網絡和目標感等。

That relatively small handful of graduates -- who tend to be more productive -- went to a variety of colleges, though they were slightly more likely to go to larger schools and less likely to have attended for-profits.

這些數量相對較少的畢業生――他們往往更富成效――讀的是各式各樣的大學，不過他們就讀於大型高校的比例略高，上營利性學校的比例則較低。

The strongest correlation for well-being emerged from questions delving into whether graduates felt 'emotionally supported' at school by a professor or mentor. Those who did were three times as likely to report they thrived as adults. Graduates who reported having 'experiential and deep learning' were twice as likely to be engaged at work as those who didn't.

與幸福生活關聯最大的因素從探究畢業生在校時是否感覺“得到（老師或導師的）精神支持”的問題中顯露了出來。調查發現獲支持之人表述自己成人後獲得成功的概率是未獲支持之人的三倍。表示經歷過“體驗式與深層次學習”的畢業生投入工作的概率是無此經歷之人的兩倍。

University of Pennsylvania Professor Martin Seligman, who has studied the psychology of happiness, said it was impossible to know whether the college experiences Gallup asked about were the cause of later success or simply coincidental to it.

曾研究快樂心理學的賓夕法尼亞大學(University of Pennsylvania)教授馬丁・塞利格曼(Martin Seligman)認爲，我們不可能確認蓋洛普提出的與大學經歷有關的問題是否就是日後成功的原因或者僅僅是巧合。

'One hopeful possibility is that if college were changed to produce more emotional support, this would result in much more engagement later in life,' he wrote in an email. 'Another, less interesting possibility' is that people engaged at work who said they were emotionally supported in college are simply upbeat to begin with, and that rosy outlook colors their memories.

他在電子郵件中寫道，一個很大的可能性是如果大學轉而提供更多精神支持，可能會促成學生在日後的人生中更加投入。另一方面，一個不那麼有趣的可能性是，在工作中投入的人聲稱自己在大學得到精神支持僅僅是因爲他們原本就比較積極樂觀，那種積極向上的人生觀美化了他們的記憶。

Other, less fuzzy correlations were between debt and entrepreneurship. About 26% of graduates with no undergraduate debt started their own business, compared with just 20% of those carrying debt from $20,000 to $40,000. Nearly three-quarters of college graduates leave school with debt; among those who do, the average is nearly $30,000. Graduates with that amount of debt were one-third as likely to report they were 'thriving' as graduates without debt reported.

而債務與創業精神之間的關聯則沒那麼模棱兩可。本科無負債的畢業生中約有26%的人開創了自己的企業，而揹負着2萬至4萬美元債務的畢業生只有20%的創業比例。美國約有四分之三的大學畢業生在畢業時身負債務；負債學生的平均債務額接近3萬美元。相比無負債的畢業生，揹負該數額債務的畢業生認爲自己的人生“欣欣向榮”的機率只是前者的三分之一。

The survey's most dramatic takeaway -- that graduation from an elite college provides no discernible advantage over Podunk U -- echoes a refrain that began getting traction about a decade ago. Stacy Dale, an economist at Mathematica, a New Jersey research firm, co-wrote a paper in 2004 that found that students who were accepted to elite schools, but attended less selective schools, went on to earn just as much money as their elite counterparts.

該調查最引人注目的發現是畢業於精英大學相比普通大學畢業並不具備明顯的優勢。這與大概10年前開始引起關注的一個看法不謀而合。新澤西研究公司Mathematica經濟學家斯泰茜・戴爾(Stacy Dale)在2004年與人合着了一篇論文，論文指出，被精英學校錄取但最終就讀相對普通學校的學生，他們在畢業後的收入與精英學校的畢業生旗鼓相當。

'Individual traits matter more than where you went,' Ms. Dale said. 'It's a lot more important what you learn later in life than where you got your undergraduate degree.'

戴爾指出：“個人特質比你上什麼學校更重要。你在日後的生活中學到了什麼比你在哪所學校獲得本科學位重要得多。”