I don' t know about all that. They still do have practical use. College graduates demonstrate the ability to "grind" through something. Even if it's just meaningless courses, with a sprinkle of actual useful ones in between. Graduates also know how to formulate sentences (don't discount this until you seen some reports-spellcheck can't fix all), and have abstract thinking. There are many people that didn't finish school, and are above average intelligence, but that isn't the norm. You would be surprised at how many people, cannot write a proper sentence these days. It's astonishing.