Think I'm tough on academia? Read Tony Grafton:
… traditional subjects and methods seem to retain their educational value. Nowadays the liberal arts attract a far smaller proportion of students than they did two generations ago. Still, those majoring in liberal arts fields—humanities and social sciences, natural sciences and mathematics—outperformed those studying business, communications, and other new, practical majors on the CLA…
Our great, democratic university system has become a pillar of social stability—a broken community many of whose members drift through, learning little, only to return to the economic and social box that they were born into…
But those already born into the wealthy and professional classes benefit disproportionately from the best educations. Acquire any sort of college education, and you’ll make more money than you would have if you didn’t. But don’t expect you’ll make what you would have if you had studied applied math at Stanford…
Americans, as Malcolm Harris recently pointed out, now owe almost a trillion dollars in student loans, more than they owe in credit card debt. Student debt, he explained, “is an exceptionally punishing kind to have. Not only is it inescapable through bankruptcy, but student loans have no expiration date and collectors can garnish wages, social security payments, and even unemployment benefits.”…
Still, the dark hordes of forgotten students who leave the university as Napoleon’s army left Russia, uninspired by their courses, wounded in many cases by what they experience as their own failures, weighed down by their debts, need to be seen and heard. Perhaps some of those who write seriously about universities could stop worrying so much about who gets into Harvard, Yale, and Princeton and start worrying about the much larger numbers who don’t make it through Illinois and West Virginia, Vermont and Texas.
Apt. 11d 
“Still, those majoring in liberal arts fields—humanities and social sciences, natural sciences and mathematics—outperformed those studying business, communications, and other new, practical majors on the CLA…”
I would submit that the reason for this is because people who want a “practical” major aren’t looking for anything but the fastest means to a job. They want job training, not education. People in liberal arts majors want to learn.
Therefore, a test that measures how much students have learned, like the CLA, will demonstrate that people who went to college to learn will have succeeded.
A lot of it comes from educating students about college and the future *before* they go to college.
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“They want job training, not education.”
Wendy — Have you ever met a Communications major? Was your first impression, “Only in it for a quick buck”?
Perhaps some of those who write seriously about universities could stop worrying so much about who gets into Harvard, Yale, and Princeton and start worrying about the much larger numbers who don’t make it through Illinois and West Virginia, Vermont and Texas.
This, I agree with. The four year graduation rates at Fairleigh Dickinson and Montclair State are both in the 30% range. If you drop out of either, and can’t find a job, it really doesn’t matter if you are $20K in debt or $65K in debt, because you can’t pay back either one.
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Have you ever met a Communications major?
Those I met seemed to be those whose went to college in order to fulfill social or athletic goals.
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“If you drop out of either, and can’t find a job, it really doesn’t matter if you are $20K in debt or $65K in debt, because you can’t pay back either one.”
Ihere’s a substantial difference between $20k and $65k in debt. Namely, $45k.
For comparison, the average 401(k) account had $50k left in it after the unpleasantness of 2008. (It’s back up to around $70k right now.)
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Instapundit published a link to this ringing defense of ‘…studies’ majors: http://dukechronicle.com/article/my-major-real-too-ok
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Have you ever met a Communications major? Was your first impression, “Only in it for a quick buck”?
Hm. Not here, as we don’t have a Communications major (no majors in the liberal arts here, really–we just started one in a social sciences type of field). A friend of mine has a PhD in Communications and in the last few years was hired to set up a new program for communications majors in Southern California. The idea was that they would go into PR or stuff like that, and it was an online program, mainly. It’s actually been a few years since I talked to my friend, so I don’t know how it’s going.
Oh, I’m just realizing that one of our new hires got his PhD in Communications. Not a Top 20 school. However, I do suspect he will jump ship eventually.
That said, there is a wide range between “In it to learn” vs. “In it for a quick buck.” Seeing a major as job training isn’t necessarily about a quick buck. It’s seeing that a program can give you contacts and specifics related to the field you want to go into. Are the hospitality students here in the major for a quick buck? I don’t think so. They want to be trained for this kind of job because they see it as their future. They don’t want to mess with stuff like writing about Herman Melville or learning about the Middle Ages because it’s not directly relevant to their needs. They take classes in business accounting and food service and ecotourism.
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MA in communications here and from a top school – USC Annenberg. Definitely not in in it for purely “social or athletic” goals. And I am still waiting for my quick buck.
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It’s a good article, but I don’t know what Reagan has to do with anything. Perhaps Prof. Grafton could learn to write with a little more focus and analytic clarity. Omit unnecessary words, and all that stuff. (Then again, he might not fit in at NYR if he went too far in that direction.)
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I would argue that natural sciences or mathematics are inherently more “practical” majors than communications.
I work in communications now, but I never once, in my life, took a communications course. (I was an International Econ major.)
I think that anyone with enthusiasm and basic skills can learn to do communications work on-the-job. Math and science – now, that takes studying and specific expertise!
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Dr. Crazy http://reassignedtime.wordpress.com/2011/11/05/the-epic-fail-or-failure-as-the-ultimate-four-letter-word/ and Notorious PhD http://girlscholar.blogspot.com/2011/11/whats-matter-with-higher-ed.html have written fab commentaries on the topic – with Foucault too!
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Ack. You evil temptress, Sandra. Giving me great blog fodder, when I really need to do other stuff. Bad girl!
Dr. Crazy takes this too personally. Her particular university might be cheap and give out a lot of grants, but overall, nationwide, the average debt loan per student is $25,000. The total is $1 trillion dollars. So, even if her college lets students out on the low end of the debt scale, most colleges aren’t.
She also poo-poos the problem of student dropout rate. I did research on this topic years ago. Should I talk about it? Yes, drop outs are part of the price of increasing the number of kids in college, but when you combine high debt burden + drop outs, then you have big problems. Kids ends up with 2 years of college and debt. Without a BA, they can’t get that office management job and can’t pay off the loans. College made their lives worse.
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“Yes, drop outs are part of the price of increasing the number of kids in college, but when you combine high debt burden + drop outs, then you have big problems.”
Yes, indeed.
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NYU sticks in my craw as an example of an elite university, one that I even think offers a good and unique education that joined the student loan exploitation in order to improve its bottom line.
I got chided for complaining about not being willing to pay sticker price for NYU, Tufts, Vanderbilt, Lewis and Clark, . . . . But, that’s not what I said. I said I don’t think you should go into significant debt to pay for those schools. If you can afford to pay for them, I think each of them can offer unique experiences that might have real value to any particular student.
The problem is when they exploit their students in ways that the students can’t recover from. And, in particular, there’s the exploitation of student debt, and it’s different treatment in bankruptcy law. Then, we’re not talking about students making individual decisions, but taxpayers becoming complicit in the exploitation of the students.
If I were in charge, I would do everything I could to cut off student loans to schools with significant default rate — and I do not understand why not-for-profits should be exempt. I’m guessing, too, that the rate at which they schools get cutoff should be significantly less than the 30% or whatever is being currently bandied about, only for for-profits.
Yes, that will cut some students off, but the solution to that problem is investing more in pre-college education and community colleges.
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Student loans really helps you to get your higher education. One of the best benefit of it is the fact that multiple loans can be melted down into one master loan. This saves frustration, reduces the risk of missing a payment and actually improves your credit score. And it reduces your monthly payment.
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