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People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

washingtonpost.com

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Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#181

Post by beezlebroxxxxxx »

httpz wrote: post #57

Going into academia is usually not the best way to maximize your financial earning potential. So usually people who go into academia value pursuit of knowledge over money. Academics tend to raise children with those values.

It's also well known that connections are extremely important for academic positions, especially so in humanities academia where TT positions are so rare and hyper competitive. The name appeal of the Ivy's can have huge sway, and it leads to a flattening of intellectual diversity in scholarship as whole fields are shaped by certain "schools" or movements that are more often just former fellow students mutually citing each other and their former supervisors. A lot of brilliant research gets passed over because it's not coming from the right school.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#182

Post by oneoff786 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #157
Ekaros wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And realistically we are at point where having a degree doesn't make you an "elite" anymore. Not necessarily even having PhD... The value of degrees has also inflated.

> value of degrees has also inflated Nitpick: the degree has inflated. Its value has decreased. If something’s value inflates its price has deflated.

Nope. Value is not a function of cost. Value is just a measure of utility. Not utils per dollar.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#184

Post by sumedh »

abeppu wrote: post #84
frognumber wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been affiliated with MIT in one way or another for more than a quarter-century. What's been astounding is the change in faculty. Historically, MIT faculty were nerds into neat tech problems. New MIT faculty are slick politicians with an increasing sleazy Enron-style vibe. That's true of MIT leadership as well.

Can you elaborate on what "Enron-style vibe" means when describing university faculty?

People who make decisions using powerpoint slides?

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#185

Post by barry-cotter »

carlob wrote: post #161
barry-cotter wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cardinals were very often not actually celibate, just like less promoted priests.

Yeah, those nephew were often illegitimate sons, but that just goes to prove that forced celibacy has never worked.

Depends what you mean by “worked”. It prevented the emergence of priest kings quite well. Not allowing legitimate sons puts a major crimp in anyone’s plans to turn a religious organization’s land into their personal property. See how the Teutonic order turned into Brandenburg upon Protestantisation.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#186

Post by barry-cotter »

roel_v wrote: post #170
barry-cotter wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Real Analysis, Linear Algebra and Calc I-III are not required to get an Economics degree but they will help enormously if you want to go to MIT(number one programme), Harvard (two) or even someplace like Penn(somewhere in the top 20). You do not need to get a Math minor to get an Economics major.

"You do not need to get a Math minor to get an Economics major." That wasn't the claim. The claim was that it's somehow surprising that economics is math heavy. Yes there are 'policy' or 'international business' degrees camouflaging as 'economics' degrees, but how can it be a surprise to any but the most uninformed that 'economics' (at least the prestigious degrees, which are the ones that will produce the majority o…

Economics is very unusual in that even doing extremely well in the undergraduate major is not going to prepare you all that well for graduate study. Knowing things like that is part of the hidden curriculum the article is talking about. See also doing undergraduate research assistantships in other disciplines. The author may not have been as clear as they could have been.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#188

Post by a4a4a4a4 »

sudosysgen wrote: post #61
frognumber wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been affiliated with MIT in one way or another for more than a quarter-century. What's been astounding is the change in faculty. Historically, MIT faculty were nerds into neat tech problems. New MIT faculty are slick politicians with an increasing sleazy Enron-style vibe. That's true of MIT leadership as well.

Do you know of some place where there are still nerds into neat tech problems?

You need to leave the US and look at European Unis. EPFL, ETH Zürich, Delft, TÜ Berlin/Munich.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#189

Post by georgia_peach »

legalcorrection wrote: post #24

Criteria for becoming an academic: - Above-average IQ - Intellectual upbringing - PhD, i.e. spending five years of your life in your mid to late 20s getting your union card - During those five years, at least one of: no other mouths to feed, a working spouse, independent wealth, or well-off parents willing to support you - Willingness to get a PhD for a less than - Left-wing cosmopolitan social and political views

"Intellectual upbringing" is huge: correctly pronouncing the shibboleths, hearing all of the dog-whistles, yet never whistling the wrong one. Saying the right thing, but in the wrong way, has ended many an academic career.

Ex-wife is an English professor. Department-wide "purges" were not unheard of. She was spared, though this was probably because she was a lowly adjunct.

Re: People from elite backgrounds increasingly dominate academia, data shows

#190

Post by georgia_peach »

The one-millionth-and-one article to fan petit bourgeois striver angst over maybe possibly not getting-in on the grift of mainstream academia--like economics. Churchill's famous quote:

If you put two economists in a room, you get two opinions, unless one of them is Lord Keynes, in which case you get three opinions.

If it's a choice between "inequality", or reducing it by minting more parasites, I think I prefer inequality.

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