Comments on: College: Big Name or Generic Brand

By: MInTheGap

MInTheGap — Sat, 12 Aug 2006 01:07:17 +0000

And these elected officials that are going to mandate college education will just go one step further while causing us to pay more money out of our pockets!

By: Chris Naron

Chris Naron — Fri, 11 Aug 2006 20:32:27 +0000

It means that colleges and universities are rotting at both ends. Technical training brings in the mercenary student bent on learning only that which will get him a job. On the other end, you have the liberal arts student who wants to bask in what passes for free thoguht these days. Put the two together on a the campus and you have a hopelessly watered down system where the “real” learning occurs on the job and in post graduate work. In a sense, undergrad work is a mere weeding process, which is what high school used to be.

By: MInTheGap

MInTheGap — Fri, 11 Aug 2006 12:09:52 +0000

I’m certain that having multiple subjects– producing a well round individual– is a good thing. That being said, it turns out that those that want a specific set of knowledge end up learning a majority of their work post-graduate or through self-teaching.

Is it possible that college education has just moved further out? What I mean is that it now takes a Masters Degree to learn what used to take a Bachelors?

By: Chris Naron

Chris Naron — Fri, 11 Aug 2006 04:27:14 +0000

This is a debate I’ve had several times on my blog. I contend that the emphasis on technical training at universities along with the dilution of the liberal arts into social critical theory programs in disguise has led to largely worthless degrees. If you can get the technical training elsewhere without taking History, why wouldn’t you? And if none of what they’re teaching you in liberal arts is truth, why bother learning any of it?

Universities should be producing scholars not employees. If you haven’t read it yet, get a copy of Allan Bloom’s The Closing of the American Mind.