Higher Education is being erased. Does it matter?

[Coventina]

I was just forwarded my college system's strategic plan.

It has the following VERY troubling aspects:

1. Different tuition rates for different disciplines. ("In-demand" degrees will be favorably subsidized, while others will see cost increases.)
2. Private sector management of our venues. (This will seriously impact Fine and Performing Arts disciplines)
3. Private sector input on courses and credentials. (Basically means that they get to outsource their job training to us).
4. No more use of the terms "Community College". We are to be known as "vocational" and "technical" only.

Higher Ed is no longer about learning to be an educated person by developing intellectual curiosity.

It's only making Joe six-pack into Joe 12-pack.

Ultimately, dumber citizens.....

[TwilightZone]

1. Some universities have had different tuition rates for different disciplines for a long time.

I attended University of Minnesota in the 1980s. They already had different rates for different programs then, even within the same division, mine being IT. I went to a CC in the 90s in another state and they did there, as well. It's probably more common than one might think.

It sounds like they're becoming a facility intended mostly for job placement. If that's the case, #2 and #3 are pretty much in line with #4. That would also explain why they would subsidize in-demand programs.

[bucolic_frolic]

2. I always say

if you don't know US history, some European history, reading and writing, and some political philosophy, you don't know much.

But everything is so specialized today. You can't know everything. Education is moving toward skills. Skills matter, and community colleges meet the needs of local companies with skills they need and often teach because the execs teach there on the side.

[HighFired49]

13. Exactly

A well rounded education helps make a well rounded person. Life is too complicated to only focus on a certain set of skills. How is a person to know who to support and vote for if they don't know World History, Government, Sociology, Language skills, etc. A narrow education often turns out just a narrowly trained individual. I hear from our politicians that they want an education system that turns out people ready to join the work force. The way they say it makes it sound like "we just want a lot of good little worker bees who will be compliant and work to make the owners rich." I just wasn't raised to be a good little worker. I was raised to have higher dreams and be creative, not just someone with skills. Don't get me wrong, skills are good, but where is the room for dreams and creativity? I liked the old system of a well rounded Bachelor's degree with some specific major classes, and then a more focused graduate education. Skills were reserved for Vo-tech. Sounds to me like politicians and executives don't really want well rounded/educated people, just compliant workers. Sad.

[WarGamer]

3. Are those all bad?

For example... in Southern California, AMGEN gives input into the Bio-Med courses so that they can hire people straight out of college... doesn't seem like a bad thing.

[ret5hd]

4. i would say "Joe 3-Pack".

[FalloutShelter]

5. Any aspiration to ' The life of the mind'

Is being erased. Not where the money is. Then there is the cultural apocalypse looming from AI.

[walkingman]

6. I think it does matter. I think it is quite obvious in our society.

I got my undergrad right out of HS and got a graduate degree about 22 years later in order to qualify for a promotion. The difference in degree of difficulty was night and day - especially when it came to any kind of research. It appeared to me that all you had to do was attend class to pass - not like the old days of anxiously waiting to see your grades posted in the hallway to see how you did like in the old days. ☮

[no_hypocrisy]

7. I believe it does.

I graduated from a private college that used to to based upon the "classics" and liberal arts.

Without worrying about which career I would be trained for, I enrolled in German, Italian, Spanish, European Civilization, Art History, D.H. Lawrence, Logic, Photography, and a plethora of music courses for my major.

I was given syllabi for each course with the understanding that my responsibilities were due no later than the date given and a lost syllabus would not be replaced. I was expected to prepare for class and to actively participate.

I presented both a music recital AND an 82-page (typed!) thesis with a defense before half a dozen faculty.

Graduation was not a given. You had to earn it.

But perhaps most importantly, I learned to think. I mean think rationally and critically.

All the majors were exacting and that includes religion.

When we left, we were imbued with the Latin phrase noblesse oblige because in fact, we were now privileged with education denied to many.

I hate the idea of colleges being transformed into training schools. You may learn a skill, but you will lack understanding in so many things from history to politics to psychology and more. You will have been denied your full potential.

[limbicnuminousity]

8. Profiteering corrupts higher ed.

Anecdote 1. I held a research position in a plastic surgery department which made it necessary to attend departmental meetings with cosmetic surgeons. In one of the more striking meetings, a few younger surgeons commented on the fact that opiod prescriptions are verboten with the uni/hospital administration. The other surgeons shrugged. One laughingly commented on the possibility of medical marijuana being used as a treatment for surgical pain and was greeted by derisive laughter from the rest of the surgeons. They know that patients often receive inadequate treatment for pain management and they basically don't care. It's not their problem. They clock in at a median salary of $600k/year. Why should they care if some middle income earner suffers needless pain, right?

Anecdote 2. My research focused on the genetic basis for certain birth defects, early-onset breast cancer, and treatment-resistant MS. It wasn't earthshaking work but it was solid and identified several viable candidates for therapeutic intervention. The department chair's main criticism was that we needed to make commercial products. Not therapies or cures or diagnostic testing. Products. Barring products, his next best idea was creating an online lecture series for streaming on youtube. Maybe I could talk about DNA in the videos, he suggested. The department chair, for what it's worth, is a recipient of the presidential Medal of Science.

Academic research at institutes of higher learning, particularly at medical universities, is broken. Corporate interests corrupt the process.

[MsLeopard]

9. It's horrifying

I shudder thinking of the ramifications from the attitudes described in your anecdotes, but thank you for sharing them. Everyone needs to know how things work in end stage capitalism. I’m curious - who awarded the presidential Medal of Science to your department chair?

[limbicnuminousity]

11. Small correction

The department chair didn't receive the Medal of Science, it was the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers. Based on timing, it was awarded by W.

[Quakerfriend]

10. Yes, the corruption in teaching hospital started

@ early 198Os and was well underway by 1996.
MDs with greatest minds were saying, “ I certainly didn’t think I could get rich being in academic medicine.” Then they learned that they could line their pockets- Name themselves as the primary investigator as they partnered with pushy, greedy drug companies and bingo the $ flowed.
The NIH funded their study and the drug company
Incentivized them with $ per patient straight into their pocket.

I watched it with disgust.

[et tu]

12. academia is not what it used to be

and the arts are usually the first to go but if there is an art program
when there is a commencement or big meeting. always the 'suits' want
students' art works to be displayed. culture on demand, quaint~