Earlier quoted context omitted.
Somewhat different take. The student debt problem is not really related to the college format. The format existed in earlier decades, exists in other countries and exists in K-12 education without runaway costs and student debt. It's mostly a matter of policy. The US' method to expand third level education to most of the population was by government backed and/or subsidized loans, without price controls. This caused…
> At least, these tend to be real subjects that students are actually interested in. I don't think that whether real students are interested in a topic is related to how well that choice of study does for them in the real world. International relations, anthropology, women's studies, psychology, etc., are all real subjects that students are actually interested in. Some small fraction of the people who study them actu…
You are drawing a line that is convenient to your argument.
I have an engineering degree, and worked for a bunch of years in my discipline. As part of the degree, I had to take 3 calculus courses and one differential equations course. Never needed them on the job. I took 2 circuits courses, 3 electronics courses, 2 communications courses, 2 E&M courses, 1 control theory course, and 1 microcontrollers course - all part of my major. About half were mandatory (not electives). Of these, only 2 courses were relevant for my job. I could have done it as effectively as I did without taking all those other courses.
Amongst engineers, my engineering experience is not an outlier. My experience is the norm. Even while I was in college that was the feedback I would get from people in industry: Most of the engineering courses are useless for your job, and getting the degree is merely a formality and not much of an indicator of knowledge/expertise. The whole "a degree shows you can commit to something for a dedicated amount of time" is mostly a post hoc justification.
Your argument that a "small fraction" of people who study them actually go on to use them applies very well to engineering degrees. I suspect they would apply equally well to CS degrees as well. I mean, I'm the perfect example. I took very little CS in school, but make a living as a SW professional.
Most people I know who got math degrees (but not a PhD) use almost none of it in their jobs - even the technical jobs. Ditto for physics. Should we do away with these as well?
In general, look at all the people who have a BS degree in something other than CS and are working in the SW industry. Look at their degrees. While engineers like me often actually do go on to become engineers, for probably all other majors (math, physics, literature, philosophy, etc) you'll find they rarely get a job in their discipline.
I've lived in countries where those subjects are usually not offered in universities. It really sucks. You usually end up with 2 scenarios:
A class full of people who don't care about the subject but are taking it because society has deemed that what they are interested in is not to be taught in universities. This often results in a lowering of the standards to appease them (who are often in the majority). Indeed, many math majors in the US complain about this - calculus, diff eq and linear algebra are usually taught to cater to engineers, and not math majors.
Or you'll get the other extreme, where the standards are made unnecessarily tight to keep those people out, but in effect also then prevent decent students who are interested in the topic from studying it.