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College has been oversold

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Re: College has been oversold

#131

Post by jseliger »

RoastBeats wrote: post #22

As a college-level instructor (with a PhD in those -- gasp -- liberal arts), might I suggest two things? First, the critical thinking I learned reading poetry better prepared me for business management, web development, and entrepreneurship than any of my Chemistry courses (I was also a Chemistry minor in Undergrad). I'd be happy to go into the details, but this doesn't seem like the forum for that explanation. And s…

As a college level instructor, albeit of the grad student variety, I'd tend to agree and wrote a post on the grade inflation issue: http://jseliger.com/2011/04/02/grade-inflation-what-grade-in... . Basically, almost no one has an incentive at the institutional level. Professors are mostly rewarded for publishing; deans and other administrators for keeping students happy or at least not complaining; students and parents want high marks; and employers might want lower grade inflation but have little leverage.

So we get grade inflation. There are virtually zero rewards and many, substantial costs for me as an individual to reduce grade inflation in the classes I teach, and that's true of virtually everyone else.

Re: College has been oversold

#132

Post by jseliger »

rlovelett wrote: post #45
RoastBeats wrote: post #22

As a college-level instructor (with a PhD in those -- gasp -- liberal arts), might I suggest two things? First, the critical thinking I learned reading poetry better prepared me for business management, web development, and entrepreneurship than any of my Chemistry courses (I was also a Chemistry minor in Undergrad). I'd be happy to go into the details, but this doesn't seem like the forum for that explanation. And s…

I understand your premise and don't have any rebuttal to it that would include facts and/or figures. But one thought did pop into my mind when reading your comment. I wonder if your feeling is a prevailing thought/sentiment among liberal arts professors. And if it is then why don't you and your ilk just give out more B's and C's? So what if they cry? If you think they deserve the B or C then that is the grade. But wh…

I understand your premise and don't have any rebuttal to it that would include facts and/or figures. But one thought did pop into my mind when reading your comment.

See the books Academically Adrift, Beer and Circus, The Marketplace of Ideas, and, to a lesser extent, the post I wrote above. Grade inflation is sufficiently well documented that most academics now take it for granted, especially because they see it in action.

Re: College has been oversold

#133

Post by matwood »

joshklein wrote: post #27

I have a similar conclusion but slightly different reasoning. And I want to defend liberal arts majors a bit, since I'm one of them. To me, the problem is that most people don't view college as an investment in their future, but rather as a temporary place to delay choices. Certainly, it is positioned as an investment by educators, and it is probably true for science & engineering degrees, but do students approach it…

And I want to defend liberal arts majors a bit, since I'm one of them.

I agree with you with a slight change. I went to a public liberal arts college and received a BS in Computer Science. I ended up having many hard math and science courses along with courses in philosophy, religion, and chamber music. Overall, I think I received the best of both worlds.

Re: College has been oversold

#134

Post by edderly »

[deleted] wrote: post #109
joshklein wrote: post #27

I have a similar conclusion but slightly different reasoning. And I want to defend liberal arts majors a bit, since I'm one of them. To me, the problem is that most people don't view college as an investment in their future, but rather as a temporary place to delay choices. Certainly, it is positioned as an investment by educators, and it is probably true for science & engineering degrees, but do students approach it…

[deleted]

I agree and disagree. If you take a historical perspective of the role of universities with respect to corporate employment a university education was just needed to validate whether someone was of 'high calibre'.

In the past anecdotally at least in the City of London 'well rounded' individuals were preferred for high finance i.e. you might be better off studying Classics at Oxbridge than pure math. Today this is probably less true as computerization and trading systems have come to the fore.

However, I would be very surprised that in your case you didn't have all of those skills mentioned in place before going to university. Is it likely they got some enhancement? It certainly wouldn't do any harm studying anything in a good department.

I don't see any tangible evidence that 'soft skills' are manufactured out of liberal studies and I find it a baffling conclusion that there even would be an automatic superiority of these skills versus a 'high calibre' person studying engineering.

Re: College has been oversold

#135

Post by [deleted] »

philwelch wrote: post #130
[deleted] wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

Case in point, Andrew Mason, CEO of Groupon, what did he study? Oh yeah, he studied Music at Northwestern... I'm curious: where did Mr. Ponzi get his degree? Yes, it's pretty obvious that if you get into a name-brand university and manage to teach yourself marketable skills on the side, you can be pretty successful. What if you don't get into a name-brand university? You're screwed for life and your best shot at succ…

[deleted]

Re: College has been oversold

#136

Post by pnathan »

maratd wrote: post #38
joshklein wrote: post #27

I have a similar conclusion but slightly different reasoning. And I want to defend liberal arts majors a bit, since I'm one of them. To me, the problem is that most people don't view college as an investment in their future, but rather as a temporary place to delay choices. Certainly, it is positioned as an investment by educators, and it is probably true for science & engineering degrees, but do students approach it…

> Really, it's a cultural problem. No, it's an economic one. > I have a liberal arts degree from an "elite private university". Ok. Let's make the assumption that you're at least moderately intelligent and would be able to get a job for 40K from the bat. 40K * 4 = 160K College tuition is 40K itself at an "elite private university". Then you add living expenses, books, food, etc. and you have another 25K. That's 65K.…

> The kids get that. That's why they don't go to class.

Baloney. They don't go to class because they are hung over, or because a new movie came out, or because they want to play video games, or because they just don't feel like going. A very few don't go because they are sick or have actual life issues beyond being unmotivated.

They are - as a rule of thumb, say, about 98% of the time - not sipping wine and discussing complex and nuanced issues.

Re: College has been oversold

#137

Post by [deleted] »

edderly wrote: post #134
[deleted] wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[deleted]

I agree and disagree. If you take a historical perspective of the role of universities with respect to corporate employment a university education was just needed to validate whether someone was of 'high calibre'. In the past anecdotally at least in the City of London 'well rounded' individuals were preferred for high finance i.e. you might be better off studying Classics at Oxbridge than pure math. Today this is pro…

[deleted]

Re: College has been oversold

#138

Post by jlangenauer »

JamesPeterson wrote: post #78

Here in Australia, liberal arts majors are subsidized less than STEM majors. We also have a largely subsidized public university system in general - we have just one private university (but many private colleges). As an example of what this means, the University of Queensland located down the road from me is often ranked in the top 50 worldwide. Science courses at UQ are about half the cost of liberal arts majors. I…

When did that happen? When I did my degree (mechanical engineering at UQ, as it happens) there were 3 HECS bands - liberal arts was the cheapest, engineering/science/business was the middle band, and law/medicine was the highest.

I understood that the difference in bands was due to the difference in earning potential of the graduates.

Re: College has been oversold

#139

Post by matwood »

Eeko wrote: post #52
nobody31 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Half a mil to learn about Poetry Writing. Sorry, but that's just silly. Half a mil so that when you apply for a job at $MEGA-CORP or in government the hirer says "Oh you went to %SCHOOL%, same as me" welcome to our management fast-track program, followed by promotion and VP-dom. As opposed to "Oh you got a CS degree", well programmers get to sit in this cubicle and get paid $50k until we outsource the whole thing to…

> Half a mil so that when you apply for a job at $MEGA-CORP or in government the hirer says "Oh you went to %SCHOOL%, same as me" welcome to our management fast-track program, followed by promotion and VP-dom. Do companies really work that way? I think trying to max-out your competitiveness and money-making skills by hiring the right guys would make more sense than hiring via secluded grapevine.

Yes and no. You have to remember a lot of jobs in $MEGA-CORP don't need much more than a warm body that can open a spreadsheet and mail it out. I deal with these idiots everyday and they often have titles of Project Manager, although I've recently been dealing with ones that have VP titles. The thing is, even in a giant company there are very few people pushing the boulder forward so to speak. So when hiring for non-boulder pushing position it's easy to hire someone with the right credentials because even if they are not the greatest hire ever they can still do the simple job they are given.

Re: College has been oversold

#140

Post by venturebros »

I don't get why we as a society push so many kids into college telling them it's the only way to get a good job then laugh at them when they graduate because they got a degree in under water basket weaving.

They call it further education and not job training for a reason. College was never meant to train a person for a specific field but to make a person a more well rounded individual which would appeal to an employer.

It's no longer being sold that way yet it's still being ran that way which is why we are seeing a huge issue. For profits are taking advantage of people because they appear to offer the job training you would not get at a regular 4 year. Also thousands of recent graduates who are now working at places like wal-mart and the like are scratching their heads because truthfully they were lied to.

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