Academic Bankruptcy(nytimes.com)
nytimes.com
Academic Bankruptcy
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/15/opinion/15taylor.html?_r=1&src=tptw
8 comments
This is a good response to an article that was on the main page just a day or so ago.
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1603795
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1603795
He says that universities shouldn't be expanding because their job is to educate more people. Come again?
I think the issue is that much of the expansion isn't in educational facilities but in things having to do with prestige or wasteful competition.
It seems like schools are focused more on expanding their brands, and growth than educating.
I think there are certain industries, like health care and education that shouldn't be treated like for-profit ventures. It probably won't sit well with this crowd, but there are some things in life that should supercede wealth acquisition.
I think there are certain industries, like health care and education that shouldn't be treated like for-profit ventures. It probably won't sit well with this crowd, but there are some things in life that should supercede wealth acquisition.
You are right about the profit motive in health care. There are too many negative externalities. We hope that selfless professionalism super cedes insidious profit motives but increasingly this isn't the case. Doctors getting kickbacks to prescribe drugs or fake research are on the rise.
Similarly for education. The for profit schools get their money on the backs of the poor and those who shouldn't be in college. Obviously they don't get all of their money from such people but a large portion of it comes from these people. The profit motive in education is a bad one and should be avoided.
Similarly for education. The for profit schools get their money on the backs of the poor and those who shouldn't be in college. Obviously they don't get all of their money from such people but a large portion of it comes from these people. The profit motive in education is a bad one and should be avoided.
> and education that shouldn't be treated like for-profit ventures
There's an assumption here that for-profit ventures perform worse or serve interests worse than non-profits. In my experience with non-profits, there's lower accountability, higher salaries with less performance, less accomplishing of the organization's objectives, and more corruption and politics. Nonprofits have historically done very poorly at their stated aims, and vastly, vastly underperformed for-profit companies in building up the world. Also, the majority of universities and schools are already set up as non-profits, which might be part of why they're so dysfunctional.
There's an assumption here that for-profit ventures perform worse or serve interests worse than non-profits. In my experience with non-profits, there's lower accountability, higher salaries with less performance, less accomplishing of the organization's objectives, and more corruption and politics. Nonprofits have historically done very poorly at their stated aims, and vastly, vastly underperformed for-profit companies in building up the world. Also, the majority of universities and schools are already set up as non-profits, which might be part of why they're so dysfunctional.
Pretty much everyone who should be going to college is going to college. The market is saturated. The for profit colleges are targeting people, largely, who shouldn't be going to college. They use misleading statistics to dupe unsuspecting people. People who think the college has their interests at heart. This goes on in the non-profit college sector but is much more pernicious and rampant in the for profit sector. Default rates for student loans in the for profit sector are higher than for the non-profits.
Non-profit, mostly, have standards for admission. The for-profits don't. They just want people to spend money. Faculty at for profit colleges get fired if their standards are too high. The for profit system is all about getting students in and making sure they never fail a course. Keep them paying. For profit motive in education as it currently exists is a disaster.
Non-profit, mostly, have standards for admission. The for-profits don't. They just want people to spend money. Faculty at for profit colleges get fired if their standards are too high. The for profit system is all about getting students in and making sure they never fail a course. Keep them paying. For profit motive in education as it currently exists is a disaster.
I don't think you can reduce things to "perform better" or "perform worse". For profit ventures can be many things very well. But one also has to consider what they perform.
For profit education is great for giving a single individual specific skills they need that will make them money.
For profit education is unlikely to be interested in giving a person a "wide liberal arts background". And the thing about a wide background is that isn't worth much to the individual in terms of money. They might look back on their lives as having been richer for it or they might not. But giving a person a wider background is worth more to society as a whole, in everything from life being more interesting to politics being less polarized.
For profit education is great for giving a single individual specific skills they need that will make them money.
For profit education is unlikely to be interested in giving a person a "wide liberal arts background". And the thing about a wide background is that isn't worth much to the individual in terms of money. They might look back on their lives as having been richer for it or they might not. But giving a person a wider background is worth more to society as a whole, in everything from life being more interesting to politics being less polarized.
Why do people down-vote just because they don't agree? Save the down-votes for off-topic or offensive comments.
Here is pg from 911 days ago on why downvoting for disagreement is okay:
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171
He is pondering changes to the voting system, as this issue is discussed every month or so.
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171
He is pondering changes to the voting system, as this issue is discussed every month or so.
Agreed. This is why I think PG should make a change to the voting system to make it so that only admins could ever bring a comment's score below 1. As it is now, I see a lot of users' karma penalized simply because at least one other user disagrees with their comment. Offensive or off-topic, fine. But simple disagreement is not a fair reason. Down-voting a comment from say 8 to 7 because you disagree seems reasonable. But bringing it down from 1 to 0 or worse seems unreasonable and contributes to groupthink and political correctness.
This is a cultural problem, I think, and one that is hard to fix through technical measures.
The root of the problem is that the rating system is programmed as a measure of /comment quality/ while people use it as an "I agree" or "I disagree" which is something different entirely.
We could add a separate counter for "Agree/disagree" and "quality comment" but you'd still need the cultural change. You need your users to value quality comments, even if they disagree with the content of those comments. Looking at an argument you disagree with and seeing it's merits is a hard thing to do yourself; it's a very difficult thing to get other people to do.
If we want to change things, I think a better thing to look at is maybe making who voted publicly viewable? I know I quite often upvote people I argue with (I mean, if your comment is worth responding to, surely it is worth an upvote) and I think if they can see that I upvoted them, it sometimes inspires conversation rather than argument.
The root of the problem is that the rating system is programmed as a measure of /comment quality/ while people use it as an "I agree" or "I disagree" which is something different entirely.
We could add a separate counter for "Agree/disagree" and "quality comment" but you'd still need the cultural change. You need your users to value quality comments, even if they disagree with the content of those comments. Looking at an argument you disagree with and seeing it's merits is a hard thing to do yourself; it's a very difficult thing to get other people to do.
If we want to change things, I think a better thing to look at is maybe making who voted publicly viewable? I know I quite often upvote people I argue with (I mean, if your comment is worth responding to, surely it is worth an upvote) and I think if they can see that I upvoted them, it sometimes inspires conversation rather than argument.
Exactly, downvoting shuts down free debate. It's the opposite of free speech because you're essentially getting punished if not everyone agrees. I don't necessarily agree with every comment, but I'd rather them be made than not. A marketplace of ideas.
It feels that education is next in line for disruption, right after print media.
"College product" is overpriced and is largely sustained by "parent pressure". Parents and society in general do not know yet any acceptable/established alternatives.
My bet is on "open horizontal stack". Right now, every college is a small "vertical stack": its own library, teachers, physical space, etc. I think in the future we will have one national library (e.g. Chegg.com), one network of educational spaces, one network of classes (e.g. SupercoolSchool.com), one employment system for students, one office for transfer of technology, etc.
"College product" is overpriced and is largely sustained by "parent pressure". Parents and society in general do not know yet any acceptable/established alternatives.
My bet is on "open horizontal stack". Right now, every college is a small "vertical stack": its own library, teachers, physical space, etc. I think in the future we will have one national library (e.g. Chegg.com), one network of educational spaces, one network of classes (e.g. SupercoolSchool.com), one employment system for students, one office for transfer of technology, etc.
I feel that your two statements do not agree well with one another. On the one hand, I do agree with you about the eventual future of education.
However, I feel the timeline on that is fairly long, and it doesn't seem likely nothing else will be disrupted before that.
However, I feel the timeline on that is fairly long, and it doesn't seem likely nothing else will be disrupted before that.
Ad_Astra, I agree with you. There are two tracks of innovation for education.
Track 1: Fixing existing system
Track 2: Building new educational stack
There's so much regulation & inertia with Track 1 that I'd lean to Track 2. In fact, I've already started taking a whack at it.
The article seems suggest that academic institutions have over the last twenty years engaged in a scam of massively expanding their physical plant at the expense of students and teaching with the expectation that constantly rising tuitions and endowment investments would pay for it. This what's driven the other end of the "education bubble" and this is what has to stop.
Why the article veers off to combining the Columbia and NYU philosophy departments at the end, I don't know (though I could make, dark, knowing comments out of frustration).
I'd say that American society ought to take a complete U-turn and start valuing and providing the highest possible quality education to the most and the most qualified citizens, not as good sold to people but as an investment in the whole of society since an educated population is a benefit to everyone, not just the educated.
But that wouldn't fuel another massive ripoff, so it doesn't seem too likely...
Why the article veers off to combining the Columbia and NYU philosophy departments at the end, I don't know (though I could make, dark, knowing comments out of frustration).
I'd say that American society ought to take a complete U-turn and start valuing and providing the highest possible quality education to the most and the most qualified citizens, not as good sold to people but as an investment in the whole of society since an educated population is a benefit to everyone, not just the educated.
But that wouldn't fuel another massive ripoff, so it doesn't seem too likely...
>I'd say that American society ought to take a complete U-turn and start valuing and providing the highest possible quality education to the most and the most qualified citizens, not as good sold to people but as an investment in the whole of society since an educated population is a benefit to everyone, not just the educated.
Nearly everyone I know that I would consider 'the best and brightest' got most of the school they wanted paid for through scholarships. Many of them got housing paid for, too. This is even more true of grad school; it's often said that if you have to pay for your own grad school, you probably don't belong there, but there are a whole lot of programs for qualified people in undergrad, too.
And really, I think if we're talking about 'the good of society' we need to look real hard at what sort of degrees we are paying for.
I'm not one of the "best and the brightest" - I'm not claiming to be some sort of 'john galt' figure, carrying the world on my back, hell, I don't even know if I'm a net positive. but I think I've made some small contributions. Some people, I think, create real value services I provide, services that are quite a lot cheaper than the competition. And the book I wrote, while it's not the best book in the world, is the most up-to-date book on the subject. I mean, I haven't sold that many copies, but we're most of the way through the first printing... it's something.
If after highschool someone told me "Hey, go to school... we'll cover housing, tuition, books, everything" I'd have gone to school and studied history. If I did that, do you think I would have contributed back more or less? Maybe I would have written a book then, too... sort of a "war nerd, only without the wit" or something. I dono. Maybe I would have done something good and important that was enabled by the degree... but my guess is that I wouldn't.
I mean, what actually happened was that my parents said they'd try to help, but I'd have to work to cover a large part of it, and it'd be a hard slog through community college, then through a UC. This was 1997-1998, so obviously, there were huge opportunities available for the taking. Now, you can argue that maybe I should have gone back to school in 2002, but while the boom lasted, working was unquestionably the best decision.
Nearly everyone I know that I would consider 'the best and brightest' got most of the school they wanted paid for through scholarships. Many of them got housing paid for, too. This is even more true of grad school; it's often said that if you have to pay for your own grad school, you probably don't belong there, but there are a whole lot of programs for qualified people in undergrad, too.
And really, I think if we're talking about 'the good of society' we need to look real hard at what sort of degrees we are paying for.
I'm not one of the "best and the brightest" - I'm not claiming to be some sort of 'john galt' figure, carrying the world on my back, hell, I don't even know if I'm a net positive. but I think I've made some small contributions. Some people, I think, create real value services I provide, services that are quite a lot cheaper than the competition. And the book I wrote, while it's not the best book in the world, is the most up-to-date book on the subject. I mean, I haven't sold that many copies, but we're most of the way through the first printing... it's something.
If after highschool someone told me "Hey, go to school... we'll cover housing, tuition, books, everything" I'd have gone to school and studied history. If I did that, do you think I would have contributed back more or less? Maybe I would have written a book then, too... sort of a "war nerd, only without the wit" or something. I dono. Maybe I would have done something good and important that was enabled by the degree... but my guess is that I wouldn't.
I mean, what actually happened was that my parents said they'd try to help, but I'd have to work to cover a large part of it, and it'd be a hard slog through community college, then through a UC. This was 1997-1998, so obviously, there were huge opportunities available for the taking. Now, you can argue that maybe I should have gone back to school in 2002, but while the boom lasted, working was unquestionably the best decision.
I said "to the most and the most qualified citizens"... Perhaps America is doing great for the most qualified. But the education its providing for a wide range of average seems seriously problematic. Also, this country need to provide high quality education - currently, it's mostly providing "high quantity" education.
IE, yes perhaps an excess of history PhDs might not be a useful thing to produce. But a base-line knowledge, of say, history, economics, mathematics or etc. among a large percentage of the population is a crucial good - for society, for me. I want an informed electorate, I want a population less likely to fall for bogus scams, I want "line workers" qualified to step into other positions, etc...
IE, yes perhaps an excess of history PhDs might not be a useful thing to produce. But a base-line knowledge, of say, history, economics, mathematics or etc. among a large percentage of the population is a crucial good - for society, for me. I want an informed electorate, I want a population less likely to fall for bogus scams, I want "line workers" qualified to step into other positions, etc...
> this country need to provide high quality education - currently, it's mostly providing "high quantity" education.
how do you propose to raise the quality while also raising the quantity?
Right now, it seems, the major differentiators between the 'quality' schools and the not-so-good schools is exclusivity. If you go to a top school, you can be assured that nearly all your peers passed through a very stringent filter, and the same with your lecturers. (though, my understanding is that you are unlikely to actually have much two-way interaction with your lecturer.) If you get into a top school, you know that if you screw off too much, they kick you out.
We already have a system of 'community colleges' that will let anyone in and are almost free. These schools are judged "not very good" not really because of the quality of their instruction, but because of the lack of a filter. Anyone can pay a couple bucks and show up at a community college. I've taken a few classes myself. The thing is, most people just aren't serious. Take a math class? most of the students will drop out before the class finishes. Community college is full of people like me who put their career ahead of formal education.
Yeah, you could change that a little by providing reduced-cost housing, but I think you'd still have a whole lot of people who just aren't that serious, or who see better opportunities elsewhere.
how do you propose to raise the quality while also raising the quantity?
Right now, it seems, the major differentiators between the 'quality' schools and the not-so-good schools is exclusivity. If you go to a top school, you can be assured that nearly all your peers passed through a very stringent filter, and the same with your lecturers. (though, my understanding is that you are unlikely to actually have much two-way interaction with your lecturer.) If you get into a top school, you know that if you screw off too much, they kick you out.
We already have a system of 'community colleges' that will let anyone in and are almost free. These schools are judged "not very good" not really because of the quality of their instruction, but because of the lack of a filter. Anyone can pay a couple bucks and show up at a community college. I've taken a few classes myself. The thing is, most people just aren't serious. Take a math class? most of the students will drop out before the class finishes. Community college is full of people like me who put their career ahead of formal education.
Yeah, you could change that a little by providing reduced-cost housing, but I think you'd still have a whole lot of people who just aren't that serious, or who see better opportunities elsewhere.
It was interesting that the author was the chairman of the religion department at Columbia. If ever there was a college curriculum that was not worth having a student spending many thousands of dollars and four years or more of one's life "studying" it would be that.
Given that religion both has been and continues to be one of the bigger driving forces behind just about every major event in human history, I'd say that understanding it is paramount to any serious analysis of, not only history, but any number of current events.
So read some books about religion from a local public library for free. No need to spend 4 years and $40,000.
When someone gets a college degree in Electrical Engineering I think the goal is not really to learn electrical engineering or electronics -- again you can learn those things faster and cheaper on your own -- the goal really is to get a document whereby an institution declares you are fit to enter the electrical engineering field as a working professional. If you get a degree in Religion, what "field" are you certified to work in? The religion field? The priesthood? Professorship of religion? Do we honestly need more of those and/or to the extent we do could it not be done cheaper and faster, outside a university? Perhaps done by a church-related organization?
Also, though I agree that religion is influencing some things, I don't think religion really "drives" most of anything that's really important anymore, like inventions and innovation, like building things, like creating new products and services, developing new technologies. The vast majority of that activity is totally perpendicular to religion. If anything, one of the biggest areas where I see religion making an impact is as an anti-science, pro-superstition, anti-education, anti-progress force, especially in areas of medicine and biology. But you could easily never take a class or read a book on religion and go on to become an excellent businessman, scientist, engineer, inventor, programmer, musician, etc. And still read or talk or think about religion, in your free time, whenever you felt like it. And again, for free.
When someone gets a college degree in Electrical Engineering I think the goal is not really to learn electrical engineering or electronics -- again you can learn those things faster and cheaper on your own -- the goal really is to get a document whereby an institution declares you are fit to enter the electrical engineering field as a working professional. If you get a degree in Religion, what "field" are you certified to work in? The religion field? The priesthood? Professorship of religion? Do we honestly need more of those and/or to the extent we do could it not be done cheaper and faster, outside a university? Perhaps done by a church-related organization?
Also, though I agree that religion is influencing some things, I don't think religion really "drives" most of anything that's really important anymore, like inventions and innovation, like building things, like creating new products and services, developing new technologies. The vast majority of that activity is totally perpendicular to religion. If anything, one of the biggest areas where I see religion making an impact is as an anti-science, pro-superstition, anti-education, anti-progress force, especially in areas of medicine and biology. But you could easily never take a class or read a book on religion and go on to become an excellent businessman, scientist, engineer, inventor, programmer, musician, etc. And still read or talk or think about religion, in your free time, whenever you felt like it. And again, for free.
This falls back to the discussion on what the role of a University education is. Personally I fundamentally disagree that Universities should be relegated to glorified career training and certification bodies. Why should universities deal with certifying that someone is "fit to enter the electrical engineering field as a working professional". Couldn't that be done cheaper and faster by some sort of professional society of electrical engineers?
A degree should be seen as a certification of knowledge, not a certification you are qualified to work in a certain field. There is nothing inherently wrong with going to university for love of learning and knowledge without focusing on what job it will lead to.
But you could easily never take a class or read a book on religion and go on to become an excellent businessman, scientist, engineer, inventor, programmer, musician, etc. And still read or talk or think about religion, in your free time, whenever you felt like it. And again, for free.
You can replace "religion" in the above statement with just about any other university subject and the statement will still be true. I'm not arguing that religion is necessary or important for everyone to study, just that it is a valid field of academic inquiry and study and as such very much belongs in a university setting.
A degree should be seen as a certification of knowledge, not a certification you are qualified to work in a certain field. There is nothing inherently wrong with going to university for love of learning and knowledge without focusing on what job it will lead to.
But you could easily never take a class or read a book on religion and go on to become an excellent businessman, scientist, engineer, inventor, programmer, musician, etc. And still read or talk or think about religion, in your free time, whenever you felt like it. And again, for free.
You can replace "religion" in the above statement with just about any other university subject and the statement will still be true. I'm not arguing that religion is necessary or important for everyone to study, just that it is a valid field of academic inquiry and study and as such very much belongs in a university setting.
I think education system should ideally create employers instead of employees.
First, writers who go on about the how high tuition, but don't investigate how much people actually pay can never be trusted. The only figures to contemplate are average and median tuition actually payed. The stated tuitions are simply the maximum; it is true that Trustees have spiked the maximum in the last 20 yrs, figuring, why not make Saudi princes pay as much as possible. This is not inflation, but a policy change that affects a vanishing minority of students. Any writer who doesn't make this plain is either stupid or dishonest, and my advice is, stop reading as soon as he or she pulls this stunt.
(I realized how much fraud there is in journalism on these themes, when I looked into in-state tuition at my old school, College Park, and was startled to see it is the same, after indexing for inflation, as it was in the late 70's. Admittedly Maryland is a fairly well-heeled state, most state schools have been savaged by legislatures in the last 23 years.)
Presumably the Times pays him because they like what he says; clearly there is no fact checker. In one of his earlier [diatribes](http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2010/7/19/what-if-colle...) the claim was let pass that the average 'full professor' makes $12,198,578 / 30 = $406,619.26 per annum. He also suggests that it is typical to spend 5 years as an associate professor, then 30 as a full professor. The data on a large state university are before me: these are the numbers for the humanities faculty:
His claim about full professors would suggest that there should be something like six full professors for every associate prof; in fact, there is less than one. (That the number of untenured assistant professors approaches the same figure though this status lasts only ~7 years; this suggests well over half of them will soon be in real estate at age circa 40 -- shows how savage and efficient a market Universities constitute....)
For all I know, the Universities should all be drowned at sea, but we'll never know if we are given out and out liars like Prof. Taylor to read.