Education Reformer Mark Chelgren Got “Degree” from Sizzler

This Iowa state senator -- Mark Chelgren -- believes that liberal professors are ruining the minds of college students and he intends to do something about it. He introduced a bill that would require faculty members to declare their political affiliations. Then, if there were too many of one affiliation (read as: liberal or democrat) the school would have to refrain from hiring any more until some kind of ideological stasis was achieved. Yeah, it's super dumb. But, hey, at least Mr. Chelgren has a college degree in business, right?

Not quite. Although his bio on the Iowa Republicans website boasted a "degree in business management from Forbco Management school", it turned out to be far from a Wharton education. It turns out that Forbco is actually a company that used to run a Sizzler franchise where Chelgren used to work.  As Mr. Chelgren explains:

“I spent six months in order to be promoted from associate manager to assistant manager when I was 19. I had to take their school and their classes and they gave me their degree—as they termed it—and I have used that terminology."

So, in reality, Chelgren's "degree" is actually a training certificate from a chain restaurant. I guess working in a "steakhouse" is sort of like working in the "statehouse"?

Not everybody who got a fancy college degree is a genius and there are plenty of people who went no higher than grade 12 who are smarter than I am. But you would hope that someone who's so sure about how to reform education would know the difference between an actual degree and a program to teach you how to keep the cottage cheese from slopping over into the kidney beans at the salad bar.

Uh-uh.

Chelgren claimed yesterday that he didn't really think there was much difference between a "degree" and a "certificate".

This is good to know. It will come in handy if I ever decide to run for elected office in Iowa. You see, I once got a certificate for completing a CPR course at the YMCA. I can put down that I'm a doctor, right? I got a participation certificate for my 8th grade science fair project. That makes me an astro-physicist!

But, let's look on the bright side. A training certificate from Sizzler still means more than a "degree" from Trump University!