cowhorse,
My take on all this is simply to pass a law that states 'ATPL holders need to have a college degree.'
What a ridiculous idea, in the UK at least anyway.
It costs circa £30,000 - £60,000 to obtain a university degree (UK equivalent) these days...
Just how much do you think people can afford? In the worst case scenario, you're talking about people spending nearly a quarter of a million pounds to become an airline pilot!
As things stand, you have the choice of going to university and working in a half decent job for a few years to pay for training, or beginning work at a younger age in a crappier job to accomplish the same within the same time frame.
On the one hand you have somebody who has demonstrated that they have the ability to learn, quite correct.
But on the other, you have somebody who was prepared perhaps to do what the other wasn't? My previous employer (pilot job) always took the 'life experienced' over the 'university experienced'... It was discovered that the former were generally better people to be around and got on with the job to a higher standard.
A degree shows that you are able to drag yourself away from a drink fueled stupor to get to lectures on time and you know how to pass exams. No disrespect meant to those learned individuals who went to university for the right reasons, I'm talking about the 80% these days and I'm speaking from experience.
Degrees are no longer what they used to be.
In the modern world it's the money that does the talking.