Can the Current Universities Be Saved?
Townhall,
by
Victor Davis Hanson
Original Article
Posted By: 4250Luis,
5/3/2024 7:33:26 AM
Elite higher education in America -- long unquestioned as globally preeminent -- is facing a perfect storm.
Fewer applicants, higher costs, impoverished students, collapsing standards, and increasingly politicized and mediocre faculty reflect a collapse of the university system. The country is waking up to the reality that a bachelor's degree no longer equates with graduates being broadly educated and analytical. Just as often, they are stereotyped as pampered, largely ignorant, and gratuitously opinionated.
No wonder polls show a drastic loss of public respect for higher education and, specifically, a growing lack of confidence in the professoriate.
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Reply 1 - Posted by:
franq 5/3/2024 7:51:40 AM (No. 1711027)
They did it to themselves.
24 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
avital2 5/3/2024 7:52:51 AM (No. 1711028)
conservatives abandoned this world - and we are reaping what was sown. do read/listen to Ruth Wisse. i think the best thing is to work on getting balance in schools where we can and building up parallel institutions.
9 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
Bur Oak 5/3/2024 8:14:08 AM (No. 1711040)
The current university system should not be saved and government funding of education and the US Department of Education should be eliminated. Funding means control by the government.
32 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
Dodge Boy 5/3/2024 8:18:45 AM (No. 1711044)
FTA - "A degree from Columbia no longer guarantees either maturity or preeminent knowledge but is just as likely a warning to employers of a noisy, poorly educated graduate more eager to complain to Human Resources than to enhance a company's productivity."
It is hard to imagine that college graduates such as these will become future corporate leaders, lawyers, and elected government officials. Indeed, the college system is in a world of hurt.
31 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
hershey 5/3/2024 8:28:04 AM (No. 1711046)
Sorry, they are going down and they did it to themselves...
15 people like this.
I believe that the collapse of the "elite universities" that have been providing all presidential candidates in both parties is a good thing!
21 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
Italiano 5/3/2024 8:35:07 AM (No. 1711049)
Hopefully not.
6 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
red1066 5/3/2024 8:37:51 AM (No. 1711050)
Do the current universities NEED to be saved?
12 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
Highlander 5/3/2024 8:47:45 AM (No. 1711058)
This applies to my two sons: “ All these realities explain why teenagers increasingly opt for trade schools, vocational education, and community colleges. They prefer to enter the work force largely debt-free and in demand as skilled, sought-after tradespeople.” Amen!
26 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
udanja99 5/3/2024 9:08:37 AM (No. 1711073)
Why bother? Go to trade school and get training for a career which will always be in demand.
19 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
seamusm 5/3/2024 9:24:49 AM (No. 1711082)
A batchelor's degree once signified assurance of analytic and communication skills to employers and was worth the debt in that lifetime earnings were more than careers without those credentials. But now other than STEM degrees that is no longer true. Virtually every other degree incurs debt which cannot be paid back by the jobs in those fields. High school counselors pushing average or even mediocre students into college has been a disaster and schools which encourage troubled kids into trades makes those paths difficult even for those who don't have behavioral problems.
14 people like this.
Remember this: The top 10% of students in India and in China outnumber ALL of US university students. Let that sink in.
10 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
erod111 5/3/2024 11:26:54 AM (No. 1711189)
These broken down institutions were once hallowed as oases of learning. Only the best of the best could merit associating with other highly intelligent individuals engaged in true open debate. Somehow, the majority of these institutions and their charges became too intelligent by half, unable to see the forest for the trees. The cancer has reached the fourth stage. Time to let them go into history. Nothing last forever.
3 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
MickTurn 5/3/2024 11:42:24 AM (No. 1711208)
I have long said there is a simple solution.
1. Confiscate all of their Endowments and use it to pay off student loans.
2. Force all universities to have a 50% balanced Faculty/Administration with Libs and Conservatives (NO RINO's)
3. Cut off ALL Grants for studies until the University proves it's not Marxist!
That's for starters...more to come!
4 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
Talk2 5/3/2024 11:53:56 AM (No. 1711231)
I taught at a university and can say from personal experience there is no more "rank happy" group in the world. It's like watching a bunch of inbreds trying to "one up" each other. Add that to a Marxist "mean girl" mentality of far too many faculty and you have the disaster that universities have become.
4 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
DiegoDude 5/3/2024 12:08:27 PM (No. 1711245)
Do we want to "save" them? I say let the collapse, take their "endowments"(slush funds) and pay the students who couldn't attend classes, graduate etc.
4 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
snakeoil 5/3/2024 12:24:49 PM (No. 1711251)
VDH hints at one of the main problems in higher education. Student admissions from Americans are rejected while they actively recruits students from Merde Holes. Part of the reason is economic. Out of State students have to pay more tuition. Part of it is to be Ultra Woke. I have known many people from the Middle East. Some are fine people. Some aren't. Many, if not most, are taught from birth that the USA and Israel are The Great Satan. It's akin to recruiting cannibals and finding out when they get here that they aren't interested in science, math, philosophy, literature, etc. All they want to know is where is Biden's uncle.
3 people like this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
thomthomp 5/3/2024 1:36:10 PM (No. 1711301)
A better question, IMO, Is SHOULD the current universities be saved. I vote NO.
3 people like this.
Reply 19 - Posted by:
DVC 5/3/2024 4:00:59 PM (No. 1711370)
Not sure it would be worth the trouble. Perhaps by viciously pruning ALL of the "liberal arts" to ZERO, and any "studies" departments made ILLEGAL, like "black studies" or "women's studies", etc.
Keeping the engineering, accounting and some of the hard sciences like chemistry and phyics, and biology...if they can define a man and woman correctly. Too much of the rest is fully infiltrated and HARMFUL, and damaging rather than useful.
3 people like this.
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