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This "job-ready" talk is a classic example of technology developing a life of its own (in the widest sense of the word "technology"), corrupting education speci

This "job-ready" talk is a classic example of technology developing a life of its own (in the widest sense of the word "technology"), corrupting education specifically to suit its own needs of self-replication. [1] The lede is a bit buried (and the financial restructuring "very complicated"), but here's the key insight to how Australia's implementing this: The reforms redistribute these subsidies and changes the amount of funding that different subjects receive. For subjects like law and the humanities, the increase in student fees exceeds the decrease in government subsidies, meaning universities end up with higher fees overall. This is not the case in “job-ready subjects”, where universities are forced to absorb a shortfall since the government subsidies do not offset the drop in student fees. This, higher education professionals argue, means lower per-capita student funding that will not give universities the resources they need to produce more ‘job-ready’ graduates – and could even back-fire. I personally concur with this: “I think the idea that you can persuade the student who is interested in philosophy to go and become an engineer is just not how this is going to work,” says Joel Barnes, a public history researcher at University of Technology Sydney. Of course, spending any time around a college undergraduate quickly shows you that most students take awhile to understand what their "philosophy" is. This, in my opinion, is the strength of America's (higher) education system - it is so flexible that one can decide to switch to philosophy/programming halfway through their training, once they discover that really is what they liked to do all along but had just never tried it. This Australian system would, instead, lock you into a cheaper major regardless of how miserable you are. Sounds to me like a recipe for a lot of incompetent engineers. 1 - https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2019/08/rotten-stem-how-technology-corrupts-education/ https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2019/08/rotten-stem-how-t...

pankajdoharey 6y ago
I think it actually might work, if enough number of people who think they are interested in Philosophy go ahead and study Engineering, every now and then you might have enough engineers to fulfil the demand. In software this is a recurring trend people from all walks of life with different professional backgrounds musicians, artists , lawyers regularly produce great software. And I think this is how things are in real life, explicit specialisation is a mistake, we need people with diverse backgrounds who can think laterally, such engineers will enrich the engineering experience, we need all kinds of people not just straight A math students. Because different people also bring along different ways of thinking and different ways of problem solving. After all Philosophy is as much as intellectual pursuit as engineering if no less. Though I am kind of a semi socialist in for education, I would prefer Education to be free for all as long as you can qualify the entrance you should be free to pursue anything. I believe job market will eventually dictate what people study, if there are no jobs for humanities people in the market people might stop studying those things.
Khaine 6y ago
The thing to remember is that in Australia the Federal Government provides interest free loans [1] to students to fund their studies. The government also subsidises university studies. In the past the government has reduced the subsidy for law and engineering on the basis that people who did these courses would earn more, and therefore should pay more. Now they have flipped that to drive students into in demand careers, as there is a shortage. This doesn't mean that humanities aren't important, but that since the government subsidies university courses, they are going to invest in whats most important for the country. These loans are then automatically taken out of your salary based on earning a certain amount. [1] https://www.studyassist.gov.au/help-loans/fee-help https://www.studyassist.gov.au/help-loans/fee-help
- triceratops 6y ago
  > Now they have flipped that to drive students into in demand careers, as there is a shortage. If those careers were in-demand, shouldn't the wages on offer be enough to drive students into those careers?
  - pb7 6y ago
    You’re giving 18 year olds too much credit. Ask the average college student what job they’re planning on getting with their degree and how much it pays and they won’t be able to tell you.
    - dasudasu 6y ago
      As an easy counter-example, there was a decent drop in people getting CS degrees following the dot-com bubble implosion and pervasive rumors of offshoring thereafter. Correspondingly, there was an uptick while the bubble was forming.
    - triceratops 6y ago
      College students may not know precise numbers. But they're sharp enough to work out "barista with an art degree" makes less than "banker with a finance degree". And if they don't already know "art degree = low-paying career" we're failing them before they ever reach college.
reticulous 6y ago
That's a funny sentence to read as someone who started as a philosophy major and is now an engineering manager.
throwaway69123 6y ago
When the tax payer is footing the majority of the cost of these degrees this sort of attitude is very relevant.
- ACow_Adonis 6y ago
  Well we've got to be a bit careful when we use the term 'cost' here. Cost inputs to produce law/economics/philosophy are sweet F all compared to some of the inputs required to produce science/medicine/etc. And then we've got the university internal-cross-subsidisation structure between degrees, as well as the full-fee paying structures for immigrants/externals. The 'price' of the degree is not based on cost/demand, but essentially by government decree of which fee structure it sits in. I got my economics and arts degrees when they were in the lowest and medium bands (IIRC), and now they're in the highest bands, and its not because of the cost of supply...its because government policy is trying to use 'regulated price' as an attempt to bend applicants to particular areas it desires. Add on our HECS system (whereby graduates pay back their student loans via our tax system upon employment) and suddenly the simple idea of tax payer covering the cost of these degrees becomes incredibly murky...
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
ponsin 6y ago
You may not be able to convince someone who is interested in philosophy to study engineering (although I personally know several people, myself included, who are interested in both philosophy and engineering) but if they lack the funding to support themselves during the bachelor's degree them I doubt tht they have enough funding to support themselves after the degree. They should be encouraged to pursue a professional that can support them financially first. That can be engineering, as you quoted, but also most of STEM and most technical subjects (plumber, electrician). What really bothers me about the quote is that it sounds like "someone who is interested in going on cruises won't like studying anything practical so the taxpayers should subsidize a 4 year around the world cruise for them"
- tropdrop 6y ago
  You're equating philosophy with "going on cruises?" Unfortunate. How strange that in this very thread we are engaging in a dialogue fashioned in the method of someone who "liked going on cruises" 2400 years ago.
ggggtez 6y ago
I'm all for education, but I don't think it's quite that simple. Why should we value a degree in philosophy the same as a degree in the sciences? And there is an undercurrent in your post which seems to say that Philosophers are dumber than engineers ("recipe for a lot of incompetent engineers"). I don't think you'd ever hear someone say the opposite: that if an engineer studied the humanities for 4 years instead that that would be the recipe for "incompetent philosophers". I think it subtly undermines your suggestion that both degrees are equally worthwhile.
- tropdrop 6y ago
  Actually, my statement was value neutral - at least in the scope of its paragraph. All I am saying is that someone trained to do X while hating X is bound to hate their job. Hating one's job means you are not incentivized to perform it well - ergo, to an external eye, "incompetent." But incompetence is a lot harder to catch without something like a failed bridge collapsing. I would not reverse my position with your counterexample - to make it perfectly analogous, it would mean that someone who wanted to be an engineer is forced to study philosophy instead, all while wanting to come back to engineering. I would argue that this person is likely to publish some very mediocre papers, then will be very unlikely to get tenure, and will certainly not become the next Jean Baudrillard. So yes, they would make an incompetent philosopher, and they would likely be pushed out of the academic community given the publish-or-perish model.
  - ggggtez 6y ago
    This argument doesn't seem consistent with the idea that college should not be just a path for job readiness. If the purpose of a philosophy degree is to create philosophers, then we rightly should be subsidizing the education of those degrees which society demands (engineers/nurses/tech/etc). You need to take an entirely different argument to say that society should subsidize philosophers despite the market demand. The argument exists, and many people have made it. I personally do believe that higher education is good for society as a whole. So why not let those people who are getting an education for the purpose of simply being educated (rather than obtaining a job) be encouraged to learn a way of looking at the world through the lens of science? Just like philosophers, there is no guarantee they will actually do anything with such a degree. But the scientific lens that they learn will affect the way they understand the world around them, and that can surely be a good thing.
justnotworthit 6y ago
This is the interesting part to me: > the increase in student fees exceeds the decrease in government subsidies, meaning universities end up with higher fees overall. Does this mean Aus .gov not only decides subsidies but prices of degree? On top of that, you have .edus going after foreign student tuition (which is or isn't price controlled?). It's like they can't decide what to control and what to fix so they fix everything.
sershe 6y ago
Oh but it totally will works. Economic incentives change decisions at the margins... sure, many won't switch from philosophy to engineering, but faced with increased costs (for example), many will. My mom back (in the USSR, a slightly different system where the number of spots + level of desirability, rather than the cost, determined how hard it was to get a particular degree) wanted to be an archaeologist, but the competition to get into the relevant school was too high, so upon failing to get in she chose to not wait another year and have another shot, and instead became an electrical engineer (also a BS/MS position). Nothing would have prevented the Soviet planners from creating more spots to train archaeologists at the expense of electrical engineers. If the banks in the US flat out refused to provide loans for degrees in say literature, much fewer people would get these degrees.

pankajdoharey 6y ago

I think it actually might work, if enough number of people who think they are interested in Philosophy go ahead and study Engineering, every now and then you might have enough engineers to fulfil the demand. In software this is a recurring trend people from all walks of life with different professional backgrounds musicians, artists , lawyers regularly produce great software. And I think this is how things are in real life, explicit specialisation is a mistake, we need people with diverse backgrounds who can think laterally, such engineers will enrich the engineering experience, we need all kinds of people not just straight A math students. Because different people also bring along different ways of thinking and different ways of problem solving. After all Philosophy is as much as intellectual pursuit as engineering if no less. Though I am kind of a semi socialist in for education, I would prefer Education to be free for all as long as you can qualify the entrance you should be free to pursue anything. I believe job market will eventually dictate what people study, if there are no jobs for humanities people in the market people might stop studying those things.

Khaine 6y ago

The thing to remember is that in Australia the Federal Government provides interest free loans [1] to students to fund their studies. The government also subsidises university studies. In the past the government has reduced the subsidy for law and engineering on the basis that people who did these courses would earn more, and therefore should pay more. Now they have flipped that to drive students into in demand careers, as there is a shortage. This doesn't mean that humanities aren't important, but that since the government subsidies university courses, they are going to invest in whats most important for the country. These loans are then automatically taken out of your salary based on earning a certain amount. [1] https://www.studyassist.gov.au/help-loans/fee-help https://www.studyassist.gov.au/help-loans/fee-help

triceratops 6y ago
> Now they have flipped that to drive students into in demand careers, as there is a shortage. If those careers were in-demand, shouldn't the wages on offer be enough to drive students into those careers?
- pb7 6y ago
  You’re giving 18 year olds too much credit. Ask the average college student what job they’re planning on getting with their degree and how much it pays and they won’t be able to tell you.
  - dasudasu 6y ago
    As an easy counter-example, there was a decent drop in people getting CS degrees following the dot-com bubble implosion and pervasive rumors of offshoring thereafter. Correspondingly, there was an uptick while the bubble was forming.
  - triceratops 6y ago
    College students may not know precise numbers. But they're sharp enough to work out "barista with an art degree" makes less than "banker with a finance degree". And if they don't already know "art degree = low-paying career" we're failing them before they ever reach college.

reticulous 6y ago

That's a funny sentence to read as someone who started as a philosophy major and is now an engineering manager.

throwaway69123 6y ago

When the tax payer is footing the majority of the cost of these degrees this sort of attitude is very relevant.

ACow_Adonis 6y ago
Well we've got to be a bit careful when we use the term 'cost' here. Cost inputs to produce law/economics/philosophy are sweet F all compared to some of the inputs required to produce science/medicine/etc. And then we've got the university internal-cross-subsidisation structure between degrees, as well as the full-fee paying structures for immigrants/externals. The 'price' of the degree is not based on cost/demand, but essentially by government decree of which fee structure it sits in. I got my economics and arts degrees when they were in the lowest and medium bands (IIRC), and now they're in the highest bands, and its not because of the cost of supply...its because government policy is trying to use 'regulated price' as an attempt to bend applicants to particular areas it desires. Add on our HECS system (whereby graduates pay back their student loans via our tax system upon employment) and suddenly the simple idea of tax payer covering the cost of these degrees becomes incredibly murky...

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

ponsin 6y ago

You may not be able to convince someone who is interested in philosophy to study engineering (although I personally know several people, myself included, who are interested in both philosophy and engineering) but if they lack the funding to support themselves during the bachelor's degree them I doubt tht they have enough funding to support themselves after the degree. They should be encouraged to pursue a professional that can support them financially first. That can be engineering, as you quoted, but also most of STEM and most technical subjects (plumber, electrician). What really bothers me about the quote is that it sounds like "someone who is interested in going on cruises won't like studying anything practical so the taxpayers should subsidize a 4 year around the world cruise for them"

tropdrop 6y ago
You're equating philosophy with "going on cruises?" Unfortunate. How strange that in this very thread we are engaging in a dialogue fashioned in the method of someone who "liked going on cruises" 2400 years ago.

ggggtez 6y ago

I'm all for education, but I don't think it's quite that simple. Why should we value a degree in philosophy the same as a degree in the sciences? And there is an undercurrent in your post which seems to say that Philosophers are dumber than engineers ("recipe for a lot of incompetent engineers"). I don't think you'd ever hear someone say the opposite: that if an engineer studied the humanities for 4 years instead that that would be the recipe for "incompetent philosophers". I think it subtly undermines your suggestion that both degrees are equally worthwhile.

tropdrop 6y ago
Actually, my statement was value neutral - at least in the scope of its paragraph. All I am saying is that someone trained to do X while hating X is bound to hate their job. Hating one's job means you are not incentivized to perform it well - ergo, to an external eye, "incompetent." But incompetence is a lot harder to catch without something like a failed bridge collapsing. I would not reverse my position with your counterexample - to make it perfectly analogous, it would mean that someone who wanted to be an engineer is forced to study philosophy instead, all while wanting to come back to engineering. I would argue that this person is likely to publish some very mediocre papers, then will be very unlikely to get tenure, and will certainly not become the next Jean Baudrillard. So yes, they would make an incompetent philosopher, and they would likely be pushed out of the academic community given the publish-or-perish model.
- ggggtez 6y ago
  This argument doesn't seem consistent with the idea that college should not be just a path for job readiness. If the purpose of a philosophy degree is to create philosophers, then we rightly should be subsidizing the education of those degrees which society demands (engineers/nurses/tech/etc). You need to take an entirely different argument to say that society should subsidize philosophers despite the market demand. The argument exists, and many people have made it. I personally do believe that higher education is good for society as a whole. So why not let those people who are getting an education for the purpose of simply being educated (rather than obtaining a job) be encouraged to learn a way of looking at the world through the lens of science? Just like philosophers, there is no guarantee they will actually do anything with such a degree. But the scientific lens that they learn will affect the way they understand the world around them, and that can surely be a good thing.

justnotworthit 6y ago

This is the interesting part to me: > the increase in student fees exceeds the decrease in government subsidies, meaning universities end up with higher fees overall. Does this mean Aus .gov not only decides subsidies but prices of degree? On top of that, you have .edus going after foreign student tuition (which is or isn't price controlled?). It's like they can't decide what to control and what to fix so they fix everything.

sershe 6y ago

Oh but it totally will works. Economic incentives change decisions at the margins... sure, many won't switch from philosophy to engineering, but faced with increased costs (for example), many will. My mom back (in the USSR, a slightly different system where the number of spots + level of desirability, rather than the cost, determined how hard it was to get a particular degree) wanted to be an archaeologist, but the competition to get into the relevant school was too high, so upon failing to get in she chose to not wait another year and have another shot, and instead became an electrical engineer (also a BS/MS position). Nothing would have prevented the Soviet planners from creating more spots to train archaeologists at the expense of electrical engineers. If the banks in the US flat out refused to provide loans for degrees in say literature, much fewer people would get these degrees.