The Economic Crisis is Higher Education

Parents Forum
41

<p>I actually agree with al--the classes that help a career are writing and speech communication. My husband, who has two degress in Elizabethan literature, has really lousy communication skills in many ways. He pays too much attention to the words and not enough attention to the meta, the nonverbal cues, and the other 90% of the package. I really believe part of his difficulty is the fact that he is so obstinate about the fact that "words matter." Well, yes they do, but the stuff they didn't teach you because you were so busy picking apart Shakespeare matters too.</p>

<p>His education is a good argument for a broad core requirement being the heart of every college education--liberal arts or professional. I went to a state university with a broad core; I learned literature, history, anthropology, and science in addition to my professional degree (I majored in accounting). My husband went to a small, highly regarded liberal arts college that prided itself on its open curriculum and he had very few requirements. He took NO math, no lab science, and no communication or social science classes. I would argue his education was narrower than mine; he was very well prepared to go and get a PhD in literature, but ill-prepared to function in business, which is where he ended up. He had to take a lot of math and accounting classes when he first started out in his career, and eventually got an MBA. </p>

<p>There is no question that a bachelor's degree has an economic value, but is the opportunity cost of an expensive one worth the $125,000 in cost differential? Some of the most expensive schools are rounding to $45,000 a year now--is it worth paying that when you can get the same degree for less than $100,000 at a state college? Many states have small schools in the system that function as a 'public liberal arts college." </p>

<p>I would argue that no bachelor's degree is worth the additional $125,000 that one from a private LAC would cost over one from a public school.</p>

42

<p>Al6200, Well, your world will be rather boring indeed. It is okay if one just wants to be a technicians and spends one's day reading technical manuals. But scientists are driven by intense curiosity, a trait that more often than not leads them to explore areas outside of science, and sometimes even in useless endeavors such as poetry.</p>

<p>I am apalled at how some parents equate education and vocational trainings as one and treating education as a commodity with a price tag.</p>

43

<p>On "education" vs. "vocation": there's a good reason why most of us end up assuming a strong association between the two. The colleges / universities have pitched that idea for years now. Remember "To get a good job, get a good education"? [I'm sure I'm showing my age here.] This campaign goes on and on and on, with different wording but the same message.</p>

<p>Face it, very few families have the resources to spend tens (or hundreds) of thousands on "educating" child, and then tens (or hundreds) of thousands more on providing child with skills to earn a decent living (==> "vocation", at least as the word is being used here). </p>

<p>If colleges and universities came right out and said "You will leave here with a superb education, but with the skills needed to get an entry level job at McDonalds", how many takers do you think they would have?</p>

44

<p>To my mind the true goal of the Humanities is to teach a form of thought that relies on metaphor and inference. I love science and teach courses in which students read Darwin and Einstein, among other thinkers, so I do have due respect for scientific thinking, that is quantifiable and demonstratable results. However I also respect knowledge and wisdom communicated through metaphor and inference. Poetry is one way to train students to think in this alternate way. For most students it is a means of instruction, not the end, in that we English teachers don't expect our students to become ardent readers or writers of poetry. We do, however, expect our students to develop into more profound and subtler thinkers. And they do.</p>

<p>To state the obvious: it's frightening to have nuclear weapons without empathy for their victims or a strong ethical compass to evaluate their use. The Humanities seek to provide empathy and greater wisdom by exploring the thoughts of many great minds.</p>

<p>In a interesting side note: when I was pregnant with my daughter my OB-GYN was concerned that my baby's heartbeat was elevated, as mine was, after a visit to the emergence room in response to random pains, which did not turn iout to be labor pains. However, just the atmosphere of anxiety and concern caused my pulse and blood pressure to increase. My doctor thought the daughter should be delivered early. I explained to him, humorously, that I am a Heisenbergian person, not a Newtonian person. By that I meant that the observations of the hospital staff and not a medical condition were raising my stats. He had never heard of Heisenberg and was unfamiliar with his theories. He petulantly wondered why a Humanities person should be familiar with scientific ideas that he wasn't. I explained to him that I am omni-curious and that knowing the scientific ideas of a historical period is essential</p>

45

<p>To my mind the true goal of the Humanities is to teach a form of thought that relies on metaphor and inference. I love science and teach courses in which students read Darwin and Einstein, among other thinkers, so I do have due respect for scientific thinking, that is thinking that relies on quantifiable and demonstrable results. However, I also respect knowledge and wisdom communicated through metaphor and inference. Poetry is one way to train students to think in this alternate way. For most students it is a means of instruction, not the end, in that we English teachers don't expect our students to become ardent readers or writers of poetry. We do, however, expect our students to develop into more profound and subtler thinkers. And they do.</p>

<p>To state the obvious: it's frightening to have nuclear weapons without empathy for their victims or a strong ethical compass to evaluate their use. The Humanities seek to provide empathy and greater wisdom by exploring the thoughts of many great minds.</p>

<p>In a interesting side note: when I was pregnant with my daughter my OB-GYN was concerned that my baby's heartbeat was elevated, as mine was, after a visit to the emergence room in response to random pains, which did not turn iout to be labor pains. However, the atmosphere of anxiety and concern had caused my pulse and blood pressure to increase. My doctor thought the daughter should be delivered early. I explained to him, humorously, that I am a Heisenbergian person, not a Newtonian person. By that I meant that the observations of the hospital staff, and not a medical condition, were raising my stats. He had never heard of Heisenberg and was unfamiliar with his theories. He petulantly wondered why a Humanities person should be familiar with scientific ideas that he wasn't. I explained to him that I am omni-curious and that knowing the scientific ideas of a historical period is essential to interpreting its literature; an exploation of Heisenberg's ideas was a part of my training.</p>

<p>Happily, Dr. R. understood me and did not deliver my baby. I carried her for six more weeks (until 41 weeks) and she was born perfectly healthy. My gorgeous girl is now raising guys' pulses and blood pressures. (LOL)</p>

46

<p>On writing and communication: Here's my (very humbling) personal experience. I learned to write in HS literature classes. My writing was generally evaluated "excellent". I learned (and used) a whole bag of tricks to make my writing sound "literary" - extensive vocabulary, use of synonyms, metaphor, long complex sentence structures, etc. The lit teachers loved it.</p>

<p>Then I went off to college and studied practically nothing besides science and math (grand 20 hours of non-science courses). Got my PhD, postdoc'ed, settled down in a job as a scientist for a large chemical company. One day my boss called me into his office and said, "We really like your technical work, but you have to work on your writing." </p>

<p>So I went off to a writing class. The instructor didn't know what to do with me, because everything was grammatically correct and well structured, but it just - didn't - communicate. I had an "ahah!" moment when I picked up one of my own old technical documents and found that I had trouble understanding it because of the way in which it was written. Gradually I had to unlearn nearly everything I had learned as a "literary" writer. I had to learn to write short sentences. I had to learn to avoid complicated grammatical constructs. I had to learn to avoid using synonyms. </p>

<p>And you know what? My reports are a whole lot clearer now.</p>

<p>And you know what else? My favorite hobby is reading - literature, thrillers, non-fiction, etc. Not poetry though.</p>

47

<p>
[quote]
I am apalled at how some parents equate education and vocational trainings as one and treating education as a commodity with a price tag.

[/quote]

A college education IS a commodity with a price tag. It's paying for a service from a business. Unless someone is very wealthy they usually need to consider what price they'll pay for what they'll receive. Even if one receives a full-ride scholarship they still usually made the decision based on what service they perceive they'll receive for the price.</p>

<p>And there are too many students graduating with degrees and a set of expectations of their degree being valued highly enough by business that they'll earn a great income that would be well served by considering the practical ramifications of their chosen degree, its cost, and its value.</p>

48

<p>By that token, we are back to square one, since an electrician can clearly earn more than an English major, and the electrician never paid either the $100K for public or the $200K for a private college education. </p>

<p>There are trades that pay well; if people are concerned about vocational potential, there is no reason for them not to enter a trades field and skip college altogether. Many of them will certainly make a decent living.</p>

<p>Many of the degrees that college students pursue, yes, those in the arts and humanities, for example, are not going to yield incomes as high as the electrician's for the first years out, if at all. </p>

<p>Should this be a reason to do away with study of any non technical/economic course of study? What a damn boring world that would be....</p>

49

<p>
[quote]

It wouldn't be such a problem, having so many English classes, if people didn't major in philosophy, women's studies, English, Psychology, etc. Most people don't realize, like you, that these are soft classes, and are meant to supplement a main course of study, and not replace it.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>As a potentialy philosophy or psych major in college, I really disagree with you. Psychology is a very needed degree in a few fields in and of itself. But I would approach those degrees as teaching me to think, then entering business. I am also looking at econ, but they are all 'soft' to some level.</p>

<p>I could do a UG BBA, but I think that I would be much better prepared by taking a wider variety of courses, in addition to finding that self rewarding. I think that this is reinforced by the fact that HYPS are the top schools to go to for UG Business(and Penn, but not my point), and none have BBA programs. There is value to those 'soft' skills.</p>

50

<p>UC_Dad, "A college education IS a commodity with a price tag. It's paying for a service from a business". Education is not a finished product that you can purchase. It is an opportunity for which the outcome is dependent on the student, much of it on the student's innate ability to excel. </p>

<p>How useful is an undergraduate degree in humanity? I know of at least one person who was a philosophy major but went to graduate shcool to obtain PhD's in math and biology. I can assure you that such graudate disciplines are doable with most undergraduate degrees. This person did okay and was able to send an offspring to Amherst paying full cost. Other examples include Law and Medicine, where plenty of them have such undergraduate background.</p>

51

<p>Allmusic:</p>

<p>I think I must not have been clear on my point. I'm simply saying that one should consider the practical ramifications of their college and major choice. If one decides that they want to for example, pursue the study of ancient dead languages, then they should just clearly understand the employment opportunities directly related to that career and they should consider whether paying $180K for this degree at a mid-range private is worth it versus at a respected $60K public. Ditto with many other majors. </p>

<p>I'm saying that the idea that pursue whatever you want wherever you want regardless of cost is impractical for most.</p>

52

<p>
[quote]
...who was a philosophy major but went to graduate shcool to obtain PhD's in math and biology.

[/quote]

My concern is the number of people who'll stop at a BA and expect that the degree will be highly marketable when many times it's not. Many of those pursuing a grad degree are now obtaining the more 'vocational' practical education they'll need (doctor, lawyer, professor, specialized knowledge in a particular field, etc.).</p>

53

<p>If someone has the resources to get multiple degrees, then fine- go for all the market-unfriendly majors you want. But many students have one shot- say a trust fund- and they have to think about what they might do if their degree does not lead to a job that fits their needs and desires. They don't have the resources to go back to school later.</p>

<p>I'm thinking of a friend of mine who, after having gone to college way back when, ended up going to school to be a court reporter! She wanted something to supplement their family income that would have flexible hours and allow her to work out of her house. Her degree did not permit that.</p>

54

<p>
[quote]
How useful is an undergraduate degree in humanity? I know of at least one person who was a philosophy major but went to graduate shcool to obtain PhD's in math and biology. I can assure you that such graudate disciplines are doable with most undergraduate degrees. This person did okay and was able to send an offspring to Amherst paying full cost. Other examples include Law and Medicine, where plenty of them have such undergraduate background.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>With due respect, I think this is missing a big point. Anybody who can get a degree in philosophy and go on to get the PhDs you mentioned will almost certainly benefit from higher education. It may even be, in fact probably very much is, worthwhile for him to leverage himself significantly to do so. </p>

<p>There is an assumption a lot of people have in our society that more schooling is a good thing, no matter what the cost. But is this really right for a student who goes a low-tier school and gets no or little financial aid beyond a lot of loans? What if he/she really has never been academically motivated in the first place? What if, when he or she finishes, he/she finds himself/hself in competition with smart high school grads for jobs? Or with people from colleges who are much smarter and better prepared on the other hand? Or what if he or she is really smart but got very little education in high school?</p>

<p>For someone who's in a "higher echelon" of smarts and achievement, it becomes increasingly likely the smarter he/she is and the better school he/she attends that getting the schooling will be worth it even if they are really, really leveraged. The benefits of education accrue much more strongly to someone who is smart and motivated; the rich get richer.</p>

<p>Education at a university or a college is absolutely a commodity. The decision to choose one path or another had better consider the costs and the benefits. This may not be so apparent for really wealthy people or perhaps extremely talented people, but for the average (or below) in both categories (wealth and smarts), they'd be stupid not to question whether the guy selling them a spot at some liberal arts or technical college is going to give them a degree that will help them. Having said that, the benefits of schooling can often not be looked at in economic terms. But the value or attainment of the non-economic benefits should not always be assumed to be the same for everyone. </p>

<p>I worked for a time with a biotech training program that took people of 6th-9th grade achievement, sometimes with criminal records, and put them through the paces of courses that would prepare them to go to community colleges and get a certificate in biotech. These people proved their commitment through this program by the time they completed (several were dropped) and they got internships and then reasonably well-paying jobs in biotech companies or government labs where they would essentially be technicians. Was this too little education or just enough? Genentech would hire some of them and said for the jobs they wanted these folks in that they had higher retention with the certificate holders than with college students who always wanted just to pass through these tech type positions on to a PhD or med school or something else. Apparently it was just the right amount of education for employers.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Should this be a reason to do away with study of any non technical/economic course of study? What a damn boring world that would be....

[/quote]
</p>

<p>For some people, though, study aside from the straightforwardly practical is boring or at least is not motivating. I am not one of those, but I don't presume to speak for the whole of people learning and considering their education options. Indeed, I am intrigued, though don't necessarily need to find that my plumber has read all Joyce or studied electrical engineering in college.</p>

55

<p>Bedhead, "What if he/she really has never been academically motivated in the first place?". You are now defending your position with students who should not have enrolled in a college in the first place.</p>

<p>There is nothing wrong with average or less than genius students wanting to attend a college. To have our citizens better educated is always beneficial. The problem lies in our failure to provide such. Attending post secondary schools is virtually free of costs for students in almost all technologically advanced countries except here in the US. </p>

<p>I don't see how your example of Genentech's hiring practice is relevant. Such companies need "human robots" in developmental phases similar to assembly line workers in Detroit. I would think that it is paramount for persons in such jobs to have a better understanding of what is meant by being a human. I can't think of a better start than having a liberal arts education.</p>

56

<p>I don't need my plumber to have read James Joyce either, and in fact, if you read my prior post, you will see that I am of the mindset that the tradespeople do just fine economically and vocationally, without the cost of a college education. Clearly, a college education is not a ticket to the economic good life, as there are plenty of people who seem to do quite well financially without a degree. </p>

<p>There are other reasons to obtain a college degree that believing that it will translate to big bucks. And since said college degree is a costly undertaking to achieve, it certainly behooves people to look at the child they've got and decide how much they are willing to invest in the proposition (I happen to think college isn't for everyone).</p>

57

<p>I don't think there is anything wrong if some parents and their kids look at college as an investment with a pay-off at the end. Lots of people are really practical like that. Some people really have to be conscious of the impact of their financial choices because of other pressures and obligations. I'd guess that most people assume that earning degrees is about making yourself eligible for employment in some way.</p>

<p>I think that if you are assuming debt to pay your way, the economic practicalities are very important. A state college might certainly be a better choice for a student who is cash poor, has insufficient aid, and prefers a less marketable major.</p>

<p>However, if someone really desires to attend a particular LAC and chooses it even in the face of future economic ramifications (tons of loans), that is the student's free choice. Who are we to say that the person is making a poor decision?</p>

<p>On a side note, I have taken some classes at a CSU (state university). These intro classes were taught by full professors and not by TAs. I have heard that a lot of the same classes at UCs are taught by TAs. Considering that UCs are supposed to be "better," I find that interesting.</p>

58

<p>If they can afford it, any high school graduate can get into college SOMEWHERE, regardless of their GPA, class rank or SAT scores. If that's the case, then why should a bachelor's degree from a less-selective university be viewed any more favorably than a high school diploma, other than that the degree holder was willing to defer his/her entry into the job market for four years? </p>

<p>Decades ago, when only a small portion of high school graduates advanced to college, a bachelor's degree was much more important in the job market. Now that going to college is an expectation for most high school graduates, and there's a college for everybody, why should a college degree be a big deal?</p>

<p>The only college degrees that seem to make a significant difference are those from more highly selective universities, both because of the positive perception of alumni from those schools (the "wow" factor), and, more significantly, the enhanced ability of alumni from those universities to gain entry into prestigious graduate degree programs.</p>

<p>I've heard it said that the college degree is the new high school diploma. If that's true, then maybe a degree from a highly-selective university is the new "college degree."</p>

59

<p>Allmusic, Would you argue that high school may not be for everyone as well? It wasn't that long ago when high school was optional. </p>

<p>While I may or may not care whether my plumber can talk about Leopold Bloom, I would think that able to talk about Locke, Tocqueville, Jefferson or Kant, just to list a few, is meaningful in a democratic society where his vote counts as much as mine.</p>

60

<p>Some kids need that grade 13 or 14. At some no-name universities, kids are taking pre-calculus as a Sophomore (I know one). Many students finished that course as Freshmen or Sophomores in high school. But there may still be merit to finishing that course in grade 14.</p>

<p>This is why I think it is dumb to pretend all high schools or colleges are the same, all students are capable of the same things, or even that the end result of a college degree is the same. Many different permutations....</p>

<p>On edit, for Padad...I think it would be great if that were possible. However, I don't think every individual is capable of reading, understanding, and subsequently talking about Locke or Kant...and yes, these individuals still get to vote in spite of that. Democracy is comprised of people of varying intellects, but that doesn't mean that voting is dependent upon IQ score. However, understanding Joyce and Kant may be.</p>