Prager U: I Learned More at McDonald's Than at College

"I learned to take care of myself."

8.1.2016

Wisdom comes from life experience, not the precepts of a leftist professor at a prestigious university. Nothing better demonstrates that axiom than the latest from Prager U.

In the video, Olivia Ligaspi of Haverford College explains why she gained more invaluable life lessons while working at McDonald's than she did during all four years of college.

Much of Olivia's argument hinges on the fact that college trains students to think only about themselves and their hurt feelings, their safe spaces, and their gender fluidity. These precepts all surprised Olivia, because her previous job working at McDonald's allowed for no such narcissism.

It surprised me because at McDonald’s, where I worked before I started school, acting in this way would have probably cost me my job, a job I needed in order to go to college.

The most important thing at McDonald’s was not how I felt but how my customers felt. It was my job and the job of everyone working there to make others – namely, the customers – happy.

I worked at the front counter. That meant that if there was a problem with an order, I had to deal with it.

For all the times Olivia had to deal with those problems, which usually involved unhappy customers with much bigger problems on their plate, Olivia did not have the same pampering given to her in college. Whenever she made a mistake or if a customer showed rudeness, she had to toughen up and mature.

At McDonald’s there was no “trigger warning” for when a customer was about to start yelling, no safe spaces to go to when the restaurant would get so busy that I barely had time to breathe between orders. When a group of men in the drive-thru would whistle and catcall me as they pulled away, there was no university administrator for me to run to for soothing and reassurance.

And from these experiences – the good, the bad, and the flat out ugly, I grew. Or, to use a word one doesn’t see much anymore, I matured.

I learned to take care of myself in ways that didn’t inconvenience anyone… Or draw unnecessary attention to myself… Or let my personal problems interfere with the work that had to be done.

In short, I had a job to do and people counted on me to do it.

Had I complained to my McDonald’s manager that I became anxious when the restaurant was crowded or that hearing complaints from customers made me nervous, he would have politely handed me my paycheck and shown me the door. I would have gone home and been unable to pay the student contribution from summer work that is built into my financial aid package.

Meanwhile, the snowflakes over at DePaul University have banned conservative activist Ben Shapiro from speaking on campus. Our advice: get those kids working at McDonald's.