It was her appreciation that impressed me. She was one of the early migrants to Glasgow. She had fled a war zone with her four children. She’d been assigned a flat in a high rise in Easterhouse. She spoke about it as a dream come true. To her it was a palace.

She recounted with delight the security of having her own front door; the ability to walk from room to room without let or hindrance; the freedom to speak her thoughts without fear and, above all, the opportunity to educate her children. In time one of them became a medical student.

I thought how spoilt we have become; how much we take for granted.

Liz Cameron, Glasgow’s new executive member for education, detects in migrant children the same passion for education evident in Scottish working class communities when she was growing up. She said: "I think to a certain extent we have lost that in Scotland." If she is correct it’s a loss that must be stemmed.

For generations, working people valued learning for its own sake. They also saw it as a ladder to a better standard of living and less arduous way of life.

It still is. However, for sections of the population, it’s a hard sell despite the clear economic advantages to be as well-educated as possible. Job seekers without a degree are reckoned to earn £12,000 a year less than graduates on average. That could add up to £500,000 over a working life. I know it’s not necessarily easy for graduates to find a job; in London the market is at its most competitive with 35 chasing every vacancy. Eventually the vast majority find their place.

So why are the Scottish working classes less convinced than their forebears about the value of education to their children? Why are the children less avid about learning?

I think I can see why. The way ahead is much broader now and more blurred. Careers that denoted respectability and security a generation or so ago are past their sell by date.

Follow the late William McIlvanney into teaching and you may discover why one million teaching days were lost to sickness in the past three years in Scotland, 343,000 in 2015 alone, a sizeable proportion due to stress. Could this be a knock on effect of a drop in teacher numbers of 4,383 teachers since 2007 (when the SNP came into power)?

Try following McIlvanney into novel writing and a young person will soon discover that half of today’s authors barely earn enough in royalties to pay tax.

There’s hot competition for careers in law and medicine but both demand a long training with financial consequences. Although university tuition is free of charge, maintaining a child at university is costly.

Yes, there are good degrees to be taken in the sciences, engineering and the arts. But for a family with no history or understanding of the professions, it might appear expensive and the route forward not guaranteed. Like me, they will know successful plumbers who far out-earn the average teacher or accountant.

And then there are the young people themselves. Who are their role models? To whom do they look for inspiration?

Mhairi Black should be an exemplar. The SNP MP whose maiden speech in the Commons went viral also achieved a first-class honours degree in politics from Glasgow University. She is a true local hero.

Who else is a torch bearer for education? In our celebrity culture a look at the leading lights demonstrates how confusing the message is.

Brian May of Queen has a PhD in astrophysics, film-star Gerard Butler has a law degree from Glasgow and Rowan Atkinson graduated from Newcastle University with a degree in electrical engineering. The American actor James Franco is a PhD student in English at Yale. But none of them shouts about their educational qualifications.

On the other hand, education can seem to be irrelevant where success is concerned. Take Strictly Come Dancing. The programme has 12 million viewers. It goes from success to success yet the impressive skills displayed, from the presenters to the judges and contestants, have no connection with academia.

The same goes for Dragons’ Den. Peter Jones CBE, whose estimated wealth is £475 million, ended his formal education with his schooldays.

Lord Sugar, star of The Apprentice, left school at 16. As well as a seat in the House of Lords his fortune is estimated at £1 billion. How much does it matter that he has a regular wrestling match with English grammar?

His aide Karen Brady, now a baroness, went into work from school.

Look around our celebrity studded environment and where are the highly educated that are role models for the young. I don’t see many on Master Chef. They’re not on X Factor or The Voice. They don’t score goals on Match of the Day nor do many star in the Olympics. They don’t lead lives illuminated by flash bulbs on red carpets. Kim Kardashian does.

The message sent out to youth and to young parents alike is that what matters in today’s world is passion, determination, talent and luck. Time and again we hear contestants asked: how much does winning mean to you? How hungry are you for the prize?

It’s the same question Liz Cameron asks of children and their parents; only hers is about education. Migrant children are passionate about learning. Their enthusiasm and commitment raise standards in our schools. And, do you know what – despite all the anecdotal evidence from television and popular culture – their approach is the intelligent one.

For every entrepreneur or entertainer who made a million there must be tens of thousands who simply dreamed and failed.

And that’s the difference with education. It levels the playing field and makes everyone a winner because it enhances our lives whether we are rich or poor. It allows us to read, comprehend, communicate in our own and other languages and to calculate. It helps us to achieve and – even when we have forgotten the detail – it protects us from false gods.

I don’t exaggerate when I say that, if I had to choose between a stash of cash and an education, I’d pick the latter every time.

Scots have a history of packing up their erudition and selling their skills around the world. Now the world is beginning to beat a path to Scotland. It’s a flow that looks likely to increase. The migrants are bringing their children and that admirable desire for education.

Once they acquire it, they will join the higher earners across that widening economic gap. And if our own children are not alongside them we will have no one to blame but ourselves. We are extraordinarily fortunate in having schools and universities open to all. If we don’t ensure that our children too reap their benefits, how stupid will we be?