3 ms·
> In some sense, this was inevitable when universities opened up to the general population, rather than their original limited participation among the upper cla
by black_puppydog 7y ago
> In some sense, this was inevitable when universities opened up to the general population, rather than their original limited participation among the upper classes and very academically-focused individuals.
1. Personally, I consider that step to be a good one. I'll put that off as poor phrasing, because otherwise I'd have to assume you'd prefer it to have stayed an elite game.
2. I don't see how that was inevitable. The opening-up of education to a broader audience inevitably led to an "intellectually-poor culture"? I don't buy that, there's a bigger story to tell here.
- keiferski 7y agoWell, I would make a distinction between “removing barriers to entry” and “discarding values in order to appeal to the user/customer.” I see the former as a good thing and the latter as a deeply bad one. There’s a difference between allowing anyone qualified to attend your institution _and_ restructuring the values of your institution to match the most lucrative market segment. Universities today are multi-billion dollar organizations that functionally treat students like customers. Ergo you have academic values being slowly replaced by “is this valuable in the marketplace?” Everything is framed in terms of economics because the average person just wants to get a good job. That’s understandable but doesn’t justify eliminating fundamentally important topics like literature or art or philosophy. Thus my decoupling suggestion. > there’s a bigger story here. Of course, but I can’t write a thesis on the past two centuries of western civilization in a HN comment.
- petra 7y agoIf there's demand to studying the humanities, why can't the students pay for it? You can say that the state should subsidize non-wealthy students. But why? shouldn't they, especially, focus on providing for their family, and learn interesting things on the side, like everybody else ?
- black_puppydog 7y agoCould you please phrase more clearly that only rich people should have a right to self expression?
- barry-cotter 7y agoMaking education available to everyone is a good thing. Lowering standards is not. If you go from having 10% of the population go to college to 40% average intellectual engagement probably goes up a little but the quality signal of a Bachelor’s degree becomes diluted to the point of non-existence.