RESTAURANT MANAGEMENT 101

I'm sure that you knew that already, right?  Here's the long answer.  

Restaurant management cannot be taught in the classroom.  You can learn how to calculate food cost, usage per $1000, pars, labor laws and most of the other "brainy" things that go into managing restaurants.  Restaurant management is learned every day on the floor in your store.  Experience teaches managers in the food industry.  Every situation that you deal with is one more thing you know how to anticipate and deal with next time.  

So what do you gain with a degree?  A head start.

Having a degree gets learning the "brainy" things out of the way so you can focus on managing the operations of your restaurant with the comfort that you know these things.  Knowing how to calculate food cost and creating order forms will prevent you from making some of the rookie mistakes that many managers make.

What else do you get with a degree?  A better gig!

If I'm interviewing two people with the same level of experience for a management position, and one of them has a degree and the other doesn't, the one with the degree will get the job.  It also looks great on a resume, and increases your chances of landing interviews.

A restaurant management degree isn't necessarily required to land a great manager job.  You must weigh the pros and cons of the time spent in college.  If you feel that the experience you can gain during that time period will be greater than a degree, that might be your path.  If you can figure out how to manage both career and college, you're on the fast track to success!