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Agreed. I would take this a step further, though. If the degree is simply a means to an end, a credential, a set of skills needed for some job, then I would s

Agreed. I would take this a step further, though. If the degree is simply a means to an end, a credential, a set of skills needed for some job, then I would submit that a live-in university is a grossly inefficient way to transmit those skills, in most cases. Something more akin to community college, or perhaps what Georgia Tech or Coursera, et al. are doing is more appropriate. If, on the other hand, the goal is to sharpen critical thinking, to learn how to solve difficult problems, to become more well-read, to become a writer, to debate ideas, and a host of other less tangible skills, then a university is called for. In either case, what the modern undergraduate university has become accomplishes neither. It is an obscenely expensive, grotesque, hyper-social playground with the occasional cookie-cutter class, with the exception of a smattering of upper-level classes. The university will only survive the next few years is if they return to their more austere roots and shed about 60% of the students and 80% of the staff in the process.

blisterpeanuts 11y ago
Yes, you could hire a few professors, rent a few classrooms with chairs and whiteboards, and you have the essence of a university. No real need for all this bloat. Students could live at home and brown bag it for lunch.
- superuser2 11y ago
  Learning in many fields is social. When you have a sufficiently nerdy student body, the best debates, mind-expanding and perspective-enhancing experiences, friendships, etc. are not in classrooms but in dorm common rooms at 3am. They're spontaneous conversations between people who bumped into each other at a coffee shop outside a reading room, both procrastinating a paper. They're at dinner with your dorm-mates at your table together in the dining hall. Common spaces, and a curated set of people (for intellectual ability, general passion, etc) spending a lot of time in those common spaces, are an incredibly important component of a modern elite education. If lectures are all that matter, just do it on the internet. They aren't.
  - klean92 11y ago
    If that's the real value of college education, it's definitely not worth $40K a year x 4.
    - StillBored 11y ago
      Yah, see hacker spaces, and social dinners....
    - superuser2 11y ago
      Take a look at NPR's "What you'll Actually Pay At 1,550 Colleges" [0]. To pay $40k at a good school you'd have to be pretty wealthy ($110k+ household income). At median income, good but not Ivy League private schools (UChicago, Columbia, CalTech, MIT) are running $8-12k. [0] http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/09/30/444446022/what-youll-actually-pay-at-1-550-colleges?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20150930 http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/09/30/444446022/what-...
  - SilasX 11y ago
    Very true, but the typical college student's experience does not include that.
  - blisterpeanuts 11y ago
    I agree with you but what you've described is a kind of idealized depiction of a college student. In real life, there's a lot of partying that may build certain social skills but doesn't really justify the massive cost. The huge amount of substance abuse and generally immature behavior of my fellow 1st and 2nd year peers was ridiculous, as was their inattention to their studies. It was, for many, nothing but a prolonged adolescence as well as a big waste of time and (parents') money. Grad school was more like a scholarly atmosphere as you described; we'd regularly meet after class at the coffee shop and discuss nearly everything. But we all had our own apartments and private lives.
- sosborn 11y ago
  > Students could live at home The most valuable part of my college education was the experience I got living away from home.
  - StillBored 11y ago
    Which you could have done without the overhead of college. Getting your first job in a town away from your parents would have worked too, and may have actually been a better experience. Maybe, that was your point.
    - calinet6 11y ago
      We neglect to appreciate the effective and intentional system that college is, that forces us to have such a variety of new experiences, most not of our own choosing. It would be a shame if our ability to make wise, independent choices at age 18 was the major determinant for our potential in life. Many would not choose to invest in themselves. The university experience is invaluable. Look at it whole. Don't take it for granted.
calinet6 11y ago
I completely agree with the noble goals you've called out, and I'll add two points: First, when is it truly undesirable to broaden your skills, to develop intangible quality, to improve your abilities as a human being beyond a specific depth? I argue (and I know it's arguable) that it's always a positive. To some degree I think the market agrees with this and, without a clear answer to "what is a good education worth," has overvalued (or rather, overpriced) the unmeasurable intangible results of a college education, which is one of our problems. Second, I completely disagree that the modern undergraduate university accomplishes neither of these things. It is obscenely expensive (needs correction), but it is not "grotesque," it is not "hyper-social" in the derogatory sense (simply diversely social, which is neutral/positive), it is not a "playground" other than the type that nurtures minds and enhances opportunities for learning, it is not "cookie cutter" except in the sense of being an effective and repeatable system. The university deserves to survive, it deserves to flourish, and it is an institution deserving respect for the effect it has had and will continue to have on the rise of civilization and the improvement of society. Because it is both difficult to measure and easy to understand such an enormous impact, universities have become expensive. That is regrettable and needs recalibration from a more powerful entity (public universities have it right, but they rightfully need support from society). But don't think for a second that the castration of the university to an austere intellectualized minority luxury is the way forward for the institution of higher learning or for society itself. As civilization becomes more complex and more difficult to comprehend, we will only need more and better universities, and ones that continue in the tradition of the liberal arts—that we may continue to be human in the face of ever greater inhumanity. Save us all if we are required to measure that.
- jordanpg 11y ago
  I couldn't agree more about the intrinsic or potential value of the idealized university, and I've seen glimpses of that ideal in my small sliver of experience there. I was using hyperbole for rhetorical reasons, but the words were chosen deliberately. Grotesque: college athletics. Hyper-social: the Greek system, "hookup culture". Playground: grade inflation. All egregious, ubiquitous examples. Sure, there are many exceptions, but in my experience at decent to good campuses, these things are dominant influences, if not the definitive ones. This includes most of the great American campuses. (I don't know much about what it's like outside the US.) Universities cannot be serious places if they are filled with unserious people doing unserious things. No institution could.

blisterpeanuts 11y ago

Yes, you could hire a few professors, rent a few classrooms with chairs and whiteboards, and you have the essence of a university. No real need for all this bloat. Students could live at home and brown bag it for lunch.

superuser2 11y ago
Learning in many fields is social. When you have a sufficiently nerdy student body, the best debates, mind-expanding and perspective-enhancing experiences, friendships, etc. are not in classrooms but in dorm common rooms at 3am. They're spontaneous conversations between people who bumped into each other at a coffee shop outside a reading room, both procrastinating a paper. They're at dinner with your dorm-mates at your table together in the dining hall. Common spaces, and a curated set of people (for intellectual ability, general passion, etc) spending a lot of time in those common spaces, are an incredibly important component of a modern elite education. If lectures are all that matter, just do it on the internet. They aren't.
- klean92 11y ago
  If that's the real value of college education, it's definitely not worth $40K a year x 4.
  - StillBored 11y ago
    Yah, see hacker spaces, and social dinners....
  - superuser2 11y ago
    Take a look at NPR's "What you'll Actually Pay At 1,550 Colleges" [0]. To pay $40k at a good school you'd have to be pretty wealthy ($110k+ household income). At median income, good but not Ivy League private schools (UChicago, Columbia, CalTech, MIT) are running $8-12k. [0] http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/09/30/444446022/what-youll-actually-pay-at-1-550-colleges?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20150930 http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/09/30/444446022/what-...
- SilasX 11y ago
  Very true, but the typical college student's experience does not include that.
- blisterpeanuts 11y ago
  I agree with you but what you've described is a kind of idealized depiction of a college student. In real life, there's a lot of partying that may build certain social skills but doesn't really justify the massive cost. The huge amount of substance abuse and generally immature behavior of my fellow 1st and 2nd year peers was ridiculous, as was their inattention to their studies. It was, for many, nothing but a prolonged adolescence as well as a big waste of time and (parents') money. Grad school was more like a scholarly atmosphere as you described; we'd regularly meet after class at the coffee shop and discuss nearly everything. But we all had our own apartments and private lives.
sosborn 11y ago
> Students could live at home The most valuable part of my college education was the experience I got living away from home.
- StillBored 11y ago
  Which you could have done without the overhead of college. Getting your first job in a town away from your parents would have worked too, and may have actually been a better experience. Maybe, that was your point.
  - calinet6 11y ago
    We neglect to appreciate the effective and intentional system that college is, that forces us to have such a variety of new experiences, most not of our own choosing. It would be a shame if our ability to make wise, independent choices at age 18 was the major determinant for our potential in life. Many would not choose to invest in themselves. The university experience is invaluable. Look at it whole. Don't take it for granted.

calinet6 11y ago

I completely agree with the noble goals you've called out, and I'll add two points: First, when is it truly undesirable to broaden your skills, to develop intangible quality, to improve your abilities as a human being beyond a specific depth? I argue (and I know it's arguable) that it's always a positive. To some degree I think the market agrees with this and, without a clear answer to "what is a good education worth," has overvalued (or rather, overpriced) the unmeasurable intangible results of a college education, which is one of our problems. Second, I completely disagree that the modern undergraduate university accomplishes neither of these things. It is obscenely expensive (needs correction), but it is not "grotesque," it is not "hyper-social" in the derogatory sense (simply diversely social, which is neutral/positive), it is not a "playground" other than the type that nurtures minds and enhances opportunities for learning, it is not "cookie cutter" except in the sense of being an effective and repeatable system. The university deserves to survive, it deserves to flourish, and it is an institution deserving respect for the effect it has had and will continue to have on the rise of civilization and the improvement of society. Because it is both difficult to measure and easy to understand such an enormous impact, universities have become expensive. That is regrettable and needs recalibration from a more powerful entity (public universities have it right, but they rightfully need support from society). But don't think for a second that the castration of the university to an austere intellectualized minority luxury is the way forward for the institution of higher learning or for society itself. As civilization becomes more complex and more difficult to comprehend, we will only need more and better universities, and ones that continue in the tradition of the liberal arts—that we may continue to be human in the face of ever greater inhumanity. Save us all if we are required to measure that.

jordanpg 11y ago
I couldn't agree more about the intrinsic or potential value of the idealized university, and I've seen glimpses of that ideal in my small sliver of experience there. I was using hyperbole for rhetorical reasons, but the words were chosen deliberately. Grotesque: college athletics. Hyper-social: the Greek system, "hookup culture". Playground: grade inflation. All egregious, ubiquitous examples. Sure, there are many exceptions, but in my experience at decent to good campuses, these things are dominant influences, if not the definitive ones. This includes most of the great American campuses. (I don't know much about what it's like outside the US.) Universities cannot be serious places if they are filled with unserious people doing unserious things. No institution could.