<p>I have seen and heard allegations that the school's changing/diversifying student body has given it a more pre-professional culture. How true is this?</p>
<p>I can’t give a comparison to previous years, but I have been caught off guard and disappointed by the pre-professionalism. It sure seems that every other first-year wants to work at Goldman Sachs when they graduate, which is not what I expected when I enrolled.</p>
<p>^This was somewhat true in my time, and in my days the majority of students who applied were admitted, there wasn’t much marketing, yada yada.</p>
<p>Once upon a time I wanted to be a scholar in a narrow field in the humanities (ha!) but I learned the hard way that academia isn’t necessarily more “pure” or “noble” than other professions… Perhaps less so. There’s a lot of posturing, rat-racing, and false pride even in the ivory tower.</p>
<p>I imagine (hope?) you meet Econ and premed types like hjl’s son-- people who want to have their cake intellectually and eat it too professionally.</p>
<p>“I imagine (hope?) you meet Econ and premed types like hjl’s son-- people who want to have their cake intellectually and eat it too professionally.”</p>
<p>I think you just solved life.</p>
<p>“academia isn’t necessarily more “pure” or “noble” than other professions”</p>
<p>That is probably very true. The only time where academics is pure I think is when people pursue it in their leisure time for no profit. So in that sense, the purest academics are little children at home furiously taking apart their parent’s household items during playtime, “studying” them to see how they worked. Hopefully in Uchicago, I’d imagine many people would discuss things like Oedipus, String Theory, World War 2 etc outside of class just for fun. </p>
<p>I think money is the ultimate corrupter of the ‘purity’ of things. As uchicagoalumna said, many people by nature prefer to experience life intellectually, but due to the existence of money, go through it pre-professionally.</p>
<p>^^ I think you’re a bit too young to understand this, but I think what you’re saying is a good example of uchicagoalumna’s criticism of academia. Personally, I think such idealism is good at your age, but once you get a little older, you start to see that it’s a bit over the top.</p>
<p>It’s natural for people to think that their own professions are the best. Scientists think science is more important than anything else, artists think art is the most meaningful thing in existence, etc. Academia is no different. People in academia in general think that the pursuit of knowledge is the most noble, pure goal in all of existence. But it doesn’t stop there - many in academia also disparage those who go out into the real world. Steve Jobs? Bill Gates? Psshh. Nothing compared to us truth-seekers. Warren Buffett? For all his supposed intelligence, he could probably never make it in academia. Economists and doctors are hacks, lawyers and businessmen are corrupt money-seekers.</p>
<p>Such attitudes get annoying very quickly. When people start criticizing philanthropists who go out into the world to try to make the world a better place (through a variety of means, pursuits connected to money such as venture capitalism being one of them), while they themselves simply sit back in their ivory towers, criticizing everything practical for their impurity, well… that’s simply wrong. ESPECIALLY when people like Bill Gates are saving millions of people from AIDS, and philanthropists like Warren Buffett are pledging to give 99% of their wealth to charity.</p>
<p>There’s a place in the world for everyone’s ideals, and I think the most important thing is for people to embrace their passions and not let greed itself get in the way of pursuing those passions. And just because some people are pre-professional does not mean that they’re greedy; many try to make a difference in the world through law, medicine, business, technology, etc. Disparaging such people because their professions get paid more is incredibly silly in my opinion. (Also, a bit of ethos: I used to be an extremely idealistic, academic personality. I only went astray when I got sick of the hubris of many of the so-called intellectuals at Chicago. I’m still hardly what you would call pre-professional, and my job is in government. My intellectual interests I handle on the side, and often alone.)</p>
<p>In any case, with respect to the question of the OP:</p>
<p>Yes, Chicago is becoming a bit more pre-professional, but it is still not nearly as pre-professional as the Ivy Leagues. The incredible number of academics and intellectuals at Chicago is part of the reason I now want little to do with it.</p>
<p>“The incredible number of academics and intellectuals at Chicago is part of the reason I now want little to do with it.”</p>
<p>Phuriku, do you mean this number of academics at UChicago has turned you off to academia as a job, or to UChicago altogether?</p>
<p>If we don’t have academics and intellectuals in the academy, where will we have them? It’s a dirty job, but somebody’s got to do it.</p>
<p>Seriously (and as a lapsed academic who left college teaching and the Humanities in '79 for an MBA and the dark side), I remember decrying the hypocrisy - faculty meetings in particular were redolent with it - but this is pervasive, both throughout academia and in the world outside, including the non-profit world. So, I think we need to be dealing in relativity, not absolutism. Now, shootastar:</p>
<p>Speaking anecdotally, but as an involved parent of a current student with a very wide and diverse set of friends and acquaintances, there’s more pre-professionalism at Chicago than I would have expected, and probably more than was the case in years past, though I don’t have the knowledge base to support this impression. Btw, one of the reasons my son chose, and I heartily endorsed, UChicago was for its relative lack of pre-professional tenor compared to his Ivy and such like alternatives. </p>
<p>I also remember how much I, as a callow college student in the '60s, despised (professionally, not personally) those of my classmates pointed towards med, law, or (horror of horrors) business school. Plumbers and mechanics not worthy to wear the high mantle of a liberally and well educated person. I guess the myopia of youth (I would have called it idealism back then) blinded me to the day-to-day reality of what the world would be like without doctors, inhabited solely by Ph.D.s.</p>
<p>But back to Shootastar’s question (re. which I will resist inferring a value judgement wrt pre-professionalism): my ungrounded sense is that at UChicago it is pre-professionalism with an asterisk. That is, many of these pre-professionals still believe in the life of the mind and pursue it with energy and passion, even as they position themselves for their main chance in law, business, or medicine. I suspect (and again, an ungrounded opinion) the UC pre-profs are less pre-proffy, or at least more life-of-mindey, on average than their counterparts at other schools.</p>
<p>So, in our relativistic world, and being pragmatic (unless you want a world where everyone has a doctorate and no one can invent, produce, and supply the iMac I’m writing this on), and assuming you’re asking the question because the degree of pre-professionalism in one direction or the other matters to you, do you prefer a place of asterisked pre-professionalism or do you want yours pure and unabashed. Personal choice.</p>
<p>As a Ph.D. and MBA who started her career in the research wing of the high tech industry and later turned to the dark side (businesss) and a parent who encouraged her son to go to U Chicago as a full pay student when he had an option of being a full ride and a member of exclusive honor college at a well respected university - all because of the vaunted U Chicago’s reputation as a place for the life of the mind ideal, I will first state my position and enumerate the reasons later.</p>
<p>I welcome an increasing tenor of pre-professionalism at U Chicago. Sound paradoxical? Well, not to me. Here are my thoughts.</p>
<p>I truly believe the world would be a better place if more politicians, bankers, doctors, lawyers, and engineers had a life of the mind undergraduate education. We might have avoided a president who did not understand a basic history 101 axiom that would have alerted him that US soldiers would not have been welcome beyond the day 3 after their dictator fell in Middle East with a long memory of crusaders and their rampage. </p>
<p>My son never had a plan (and still does not have it) to enter graduate school(in the academic field, not professional) after college. He always wanted to join the business world. This was all the more reason for him to immerse himself in the life of the mind environment during the crucial formative years of his life. that was my reasoning in encouraging him to pick U Chicago - because he might not get that kind of intense exposure later.</p>
<p>And, at the risk of sounding too cocky, I would say this: I was absolutely right. He drank up the essence of what U Chicago had to offer. He still wants to be part of the business world, but his ambition has been infused with a finer understanding of the world he lives in, a better appreciation of a success in far less materialistic and conventional manner, and a measure of empathy and understanding of those who are not like him in terms of opportunity, privilege, and ability.</p>
<p>He visited his friends in Princeton, and reported to me the following “I noticed how my friends, who were more or less like him at highschool got caught up in the prestige competition - judging each other on the perceived status and future earning power. I am glad I am at Chicago not at Princeton. Given how competitive in nature I am, I would have excelled in that competition by outcompeting anyone in that game. That’s not how I want to live”.</p>
<p>If he becomes successful, his subordinates in the organization he is leading will benefit from the fact that he attended U Chicago. I have seen enough carnage wrecked by abusive executives with nothing but their raw ambition to guide their actions. </p>
<p>Going back to the OP’s concern: don’t worry. A good portion of those kids who claim to be pre-professional will change their mind, and even the hard core pre-professional kids (like my son) will drink some of the life of the mind mantra cool aid 
and reform.</p>
<p>I think U Chicago has that effect. I don’t think there is any other institution among tippy top elite colleges/universities that is quite like U Chicago in terms of culture and emphasis on intellectual pursuit and I am very happy that my son is benefiting from that singular experience. He completely agrees with me.</p>
<p>So, as long as the college keeps its tradition (no sacrificing the core, and no turning the college into the athletic power house with all the resulting good and BAD), you are not going to have to deal with the majority of students who believe in dog it dog, scorch the earth ambition games. Meanwhile, you will have friends who will go to all diverse places in the society and become role models and success. It’s good to have powerful friends 
in many different fields.</p>
<p>PS: regarding academia - no such thing as an ivory tower. I completely agree with other sentiments here. It’s not utopia, NOT EVEN close. In many cases, what goes on in academia is EVEN WORSE than what you see in the business world. It’s another story, and I won’t go into that.</p>
<p>For those who have an idealistic view of academia … don’t. It’s easily as cutthroat and political as any of the more “professional” fields, if not more so, and it is easy to get absolutely devoured by your academic peers. I guarantee you that all professors you meet in college will have at least one horror story about academia and what goes on behind the scenes, and if you hang around the grad students long enough, you’ll get to hear some of the juicy gossip. There are some truly nasty academics out there; pray you never meet them.</p>
<p>Thanks for your thoughtful post, hyeonjlee. As a parent of a D considering Chicago, I found it very helpful!</p>
<p>Yes, if your question is pertaining to the ‘intellectual atmosphere’ on campus, I don’t think it’s fair for people to assess ‘intellectualism’ by the number of graduates going to academia versus professional career fields. All of the criticism that I’ve read about Chicago since applying has pertained to the fact that it doesn’t prepare students enough for professional fields. Hence the atmosphere on the Chicago Careers program, the alumni career network; (and maybe in some ways) initiatives such as the policy institute and the rejuvenated arts program.</p>
<p>So if you’re asking, “Hey do students still care about learning? Is it unintellectual?” I can resoundingly answer that campus life has been filled with the intellectualism that the admissions booklets speak of. I can’t speak for everyone else’s experience e.g. DoinSchool’s but I can tell you that in my past 2+ years here, I have learned so much in terms of how to think. My friends and I enjoy arguing the particulars of Kant’s system; how certain mathematical structures behave given certain assumptions. Even in learning things at Booth, you find yourself applying the economics concepts that you learned in Econ class—where does this company lie on the cost curve? What does that mean in terms of its optimization behavior? How would this company behave if it were in a duopoly? How is China’s and the US’ foreign policy relationship understood in terms of a realist framework? And when I say ‘enjoy’ doing all of this, I mean screaming across the Quads, whispering furiously in the A-Level, discussing late at night in our rooms. </p>
<p>Will people end up at Goldman Sachs? Sure. And despite Greg Smith’s scathing letter, I’m sure ambitious people who go to ambitious schools and associate with other ambitious people will end up at places like Goldman. And McKinsey. At the same time there are plenty of students who end up at the best of the best graduate programs: the UChicagos, the Harvards, the Berkeleys. At the end of the day no matter how you cut it, ambitious and intelligent people will end up at the places we socially esteem as ‘where the brightest belong.’ There’s a reason someone with John List’s pedigree surprises us. Even the most academically savvy, anti-pre professional person does not enter first year saying “I want to go to the University of Wyoming to get a PhD in economics.” So yes, all intelligent and intellectual people follow in some part what the social impetus drives at—the prizes and accolades we deem to be ‘successful’. Heck, how many wonderful, amazing high school intellectuals are willing to go all out and attend Deep Springs? And even if they do, the question is silly. It’s like playing ‘intellectual’ hipster chicken with other people. I’m “more anti-sell out than you are.”</p>
<p>Let’s be serious. It can be argued that banks such as Goldman Sachs have anti-intellectuals. Heck the entire culture can be drunken, testosterone-filled, ego-driven and greedy. But at the end of the day Goldman is still one of the top-notch investment banks. They exist because people demand their services. They exist because they are good at what they do. I assure you Jan Hatzius is more intellectual than you or me. I assure you all of the first-year analysts at Goldman’s funds understand the academics of modern portfolio theory and the efficient market hypothesis and consumption smoothing and liquidity effects at the zero lower bound. And at the end of the day if you go to the recruiting events at the UofC, the banks, the consulting firms, the companies all pitch the same thing: “This is an intellectual experience. Yes you make money, yes you meet the executives of the company you are working with but at the end of the day, this is an intellectual experience. As an investment banking analyst/consultant/whatever you learn SO MUCH in your FIRST TWO YEARS.” And there’s a reason for this. Perhaps not exclusive to the UofC, HR departments in these huge multinational conglomerates understand that intellectualism is important to your average 22-year-old who doesn’t want to be stuck crunching excel spreadsheets at 2 am on a Sunday night so that the associates have something to present on Monday. So even if that’s what you end up doing, it’s certainly not what people highlight.</p>
<p>So to answer your question: there is without a doubt a strong sense of intellectualism on campus. Always has been, and seeing the fact that at the UofC the brightest and most motivated are coming in; I am wholly confident that there will continue to be.</p>
<p>I also realize that perhaps I interpreted OP’s post as being sacredness of academia vs. Profanity of the “dark” professions, but perhaps I overstretched. Perhaps OP is also asking whether kids are comfortably clueless here professionally. That answer, I think, is yes and no. </p>
<p>There have been dramatic increases in students coming to CAPS (career services) [CAPS</a> attendance continues to soar as pilot program succeeds – The Chicago Maroon](<a href=“Saul Bellow, dead at 89 – Chicago Maroon”>Saul Bellow, dead at 89 – Chicago Maroon) though this alone tells us very little about what those conversations look like. Are the professionally undecided kids coming in for resume building tips and suggestions on applying to Metcalfs, or are more Econ-meds one-upping? When I was an undergrad I had friends who didn’t dare step foot in CAPS out of foolish willfulness-- as a result they stumbled a bit after graduation but eventually found productive professional homes, even in the 08-09 job market.</p>
<p>Also, to give some more backing for the OP, I was your all-purpose liberal arts kid. I majored in English lit but took extensive courseowrk in religious studies, history, and sociology. I am employed in a non-academic, no-grad-degree necessary field.</p>
<p>I’m extraordinarily ambitious professionally, but that ambition is expressed a little differently because of my industry. My profession is narrow enough and my interests in the field are broad enough that I know the major figures in my field personally and have gone out to drinks with most of them. And most of them are liberal arts types, who fell in love with the industry the way I did. A lot of these people go above and beyond the job requirements, volunteering to contribute to blogs, providing critiques, speaking (for no money and no desire for paid consulting) at industry conferences.</p>
<p>This is just to add some food for thought for a high school student who may reason that professional ambition is divorced from genuine passion.</p>