Diploma in Hand, Empty Mind: The Crisis of Youth Unprepared for Reality

Luís Júnior"

I studied, as the rules dictate. I started school at six, put up with the teachers, the tests, the pressure, the noise in the classroom and the promises that always came with the same refrain: “If you study, you will be someone in life”. I did what I was supposed to. I did my part. And now? Now here I am, diploma in hand, and nothing in my pocket. Worse still, my head is full of empty theories and my heart is full of frustrations. That is the reality. An entire generation leaving university with degrees and no idea. With grades on their report cards, but no tools for life. It is not a lack of effort, no. It is the system that is poorly set up, outdated, dishonest. It promises the future and delivers disappointment.

Today, university seems more like a ritual than a path. You go because that’s what’s expected. You get in, pay, study, graduate. The question is: what are you training for? Who are you training for? The market no longer accepts amateurs; it’s demanding skills, but college is serving up photocopies. They fill you with PowerPoint, foreign bibliography and multiple-choice exams, and then release you onto the street as if you were a finished product. But the product of what? Of a course that no one wants? Of knowledge that no one uses? Of professors who have no idea of ​​the market and teach you from outdated manuals? Of curricula designed to impress deans and not to solve real problems?

We are training people who know how to say everything, but know how to do nothing. Who can explain the life cycle of an organization, but cannot resolve a customer complaint. Who have an average of 17 out of 20, but do not know how to work in a team, lead, or think. Is it hard? Yes. But it is true. Young people are leaving school unprepared for life. And it is not their fault alone. We live in a country where diplomas are confused with skills. Where it is believed that being educated is the same as being ready. But it is not. A diploma is just paper. What matters is what you know how to do with it. And, unfortunately, most people do not know how. Because the university did not teach them. Because the teachers did not require them. Because the system is concerned with graduation statistics, not with social impact or employability.

Worse still: young people start to realize this too late. After the unpaid internship. After the third interview that didn’t lead to anything. After the disguised volunteering that only filled the boss’s pocket. That’s when the penny drops. And despair sets in. And the discourse changes: “Maybe you should start your own business,” they say. As if starting your own business were just a matter of pressing a button. As if we had financing, a support network, a structure. As if living off our dreams were enough to pay the bills. Meanwhile, parents continue to pay tuition fees, telling their neighbors “my son is studying at such-and-such a college,” as if that were a seal of quality. And educational institutions continue to open vacancies, inventing courses with names that not even employers understand. And the country continues to push young people into an abyss, with an institutional smile on its lips.

And what about us, the young people? Some leave. Others sink into “complementary training”. Others, like me, start to scream. Because we can no longer pretend that everything is fine. It’s not. We are leaving school without knowing how to live. Without knowing how to negotiate, how to lead, how to resolve issues. Worse still: without knowing our value. It’s not enough to educate. We need to prepare. Teach practical skills. Teach how to think, how to act, how to adapt. Connect academia to reality. Open universities to the real world. Evaluate teachers not only by seniority, but by relevance. Put students in touch with life, with the country’s problems, with the challenges they will face. Educate for the present, not for the ideal world of books.

And above all, we need honesty. To tell young people that no, studying is not enough. That the world will not open its legs just because you took a course. That a degree is just the beginning. That you have to move, to learn outside the classroom, to gain experience, to make mistakes, to fall. And that no one owes you anything. Not the State, not the company, not society. Yes, college is important. But it is not everything. It is not magic. It is not a guarantee. And the most dangerous thing is to continue to push young people into this deception. Because after four years of investment, when the market turns its back on you, what is left is frustration. It is the feeling of failure. And with that, you lose more than money: you lose energy, you lose time, you lose faith.

I am writing this column because I am in the middle of the fire. I am that young man with a diploma in hand and a mind full of doubts. And I know that I am not alone. Thousands are with me, waiting for an opportunity, a light, a way out. But perhaps we have to be the ones to create that light. To step out of the queue. To break the narrative. To demand a new teaching model. A new type of training. A new respect for our time, our intelligence, our potential.

Because what is happening today is a crime. It is a machine that consumes youth and expels frustration. An industry of failed dreams. A cycle that needs to be interrupted before it is too late. Enough. It is time to stop pretending that the problem is the student. The problem is at the top. It is at the top. It is in the policies, in the curricula, in the leaders who have never sat in a real classroom. It is in the rectors who do not listen to students. It is in the ministers who talk about youth but are surrounded by secretaries.

Diploma in hand, empty mind. This is the portrait of a generation that believed in the system and was tripped up.

2025/12/3