This is a re-post:
James Twitchell on Higher Ed, Inc:
"Counting everything but its huge endowment holdings, Higher Ed, Inc., is a $250 to $270 billion business—bigger than religion, much bigger than art. And though no one in the business will openly admit it, getting into college is a cinch. The problem, of course, is that too many students want to get into the same handful of nameplate colleges, making it seem that the entire market is tight. It most certainly is not. Here’s the crucial statistic: There are about 2,500 four-year colleges in this country, and only about 100 of them refuse more applicants than they accept. Most schools accept 80 percent or more of those who apply. It’s the rare student who can’t get in somewhere. "
Another excerpt:
"At the turn of the 20th century, one percent of high school graduates attended college; that figure is now close to 70 percent. This is an industry that produces a yearly revenue flow more than six times the revenue generated by the steel industry. Woe to the state without a special funding program (with the word merit in it) that assures middle-class kids who graduate in the upper half of their high school class a pass to State U. College has become what high school used to be, and thanks to grade inflation, it’s almost impossible to flunk out."
I guess it's true what employers in the business world have been complaining about - that a degree from a non-elite college is roughly equivalent to a high-school diploma, unless you do a rigorous major like physics or computer science. What Twitchell's piece adds to the discussion is the role of economics in the degradation of the degree. The saddest thing of all is that people are getting scammed by this selling of credentials that used to mean something. Read here.
Also - Name that campus in the photo. First correct emailed answer wins a Maggie's Farm tractor t-shirt, when they come in.
--------- A posting on Maggie's Farm raises a disquieting question: Are parents getting their money's worth by mortgaging their financial futures to send their kids to college? This posting and the linked report are must-reads. A related aspect of higher education, suggested by one sentence in the posting, deserves mention as a source of light on the precipitous decline in morality that has been so painfully evident in corporate management and political…
Tracked: Apr 21, 21:11
Mostly pre-posting this weekend, because your editor will be in cow-land and happily without modern conveniences.Dr. Bliss on Do Americans expect too much from marriage?Fish Chowda' and Fish FumetAlmost Everything about ConcreteDoes a college degree mean
Tracked: Aug 07, 05:34