Though this Lawrence Taylor business move isn't a good example to use to make this point, I do get where you're coming from and I agree totally. Traditional education isn't really the end all be all today that it used to be in the past. People have literally started YouTube channels with no prior marketing education or experience or any kind of filming education or experience and have become overnight sensations. People who've never gone to broadcasting school or ever worked in radio have started podcasts and now have popular and prominent followings. Folks who have ZERO education or background in real estate are becoming financially free getting into real estate investing using YouTube videos as their educational instruction. So you're absolutely right, in today's technological society, it is DEFINITELY not necessary for the traditional 4yr college degree to become a success anymore.
I would argue that Black folks not getting ahead in the civil rights era due to lack of education isn't really the reason why we didn't get further. I think Black people fought so long and so hard, that when the Civil Rights Act came about, they fell for the okie doke thinking legislation was going to save them. That's not an education thing, that's more naivete. Not realizing, that just because you're making segregation and racism in effect, illegal, isn't going to change white people's minds and hearts. Additionally, I think Malcolm X said something like "We were fighting for a seat on the bus when we should have bought the depot." That too hurt Black America. We settled. We shouldn't have rested on our laurels. We should have moved on to the next item in the agenda but, it's like we took what we were given and let ourselves go.