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Why? The article clearly objects to mindless growth. It talks about measuring growth and the effects of growth, over-filled classrooms, student stress, stretch

Why? The article clearly objects to mindless growth. It talks about measuring growth and the effects of growth, over-filled classrooms, student stress, stretched resources and the strain on teaching staff. But _nowhere_ do I see a single word on _why_ growth is desirable? It just doesn't get discussed. It's so baked into the assumptions behind the article that in fact the word "why" does not even appear in the text. This is an ivy-league university falling into the tragic abyss of modern unreason - the reckless pathology of blind management.

voidfunc 5y ago
Money.
- nonrandomstring 5y ago
  > Money. Well no. In this case the universal answer fails. > Yale Provost Ben Polak told the Washington Post, "At no point in the expansion did we think we'd do it to raise money for the university. This is about access." That's Yale. But the the article properly deals with the simple tradeoff between "access" and quality at Columbia. It's a bad deal. Nobody benefits. > President Bollinger in an interview says, "We have to have growth as the institution evolves." No we do not! This a bare, unqualified, ideologically rooted and - in the current milieu - frankly insane statement. Give me a single good reason why, when all factors considered growth leads to poorer student and staff experiences, we "have to have" it?
  - voidfunc 5y ago
    Growth increases alumni network. Bigger alumni network increases chance you have more big fish who donate more. It's all money regardless of what they say.
sdenton4 5y ago
Educational institutions are the rocks on which the endless waves of ignorance crash and are broken. Educational capactiy thus needs to grow with the overall population. And if you don't grow the elite schools - or build new elite schools - you lock the society into oligarchy, as the relative size of the 'elite' grows smaller and smaller, educating the Sackler children while locking out increasing proportions of talented kids from less advantaged class backgrounds.
- nonrandomstring 5y ago
  As other commetators have pointed out, US population is pretty much flat (currently 0.57%).
- ciphol 5y ago
  There is plenty of education already. It's just not Ivy League education. I don't see why we need to increase Ivy League enrollment at the expense of other schools, since the Ivy League is mostly a positional good (it marks you as more qualified than other people, so if more people enjoy it then it loses its value).
ramraj07 5y ago
Isn’t this the failing of all of economics? Everyone modeling anything always assumes Constant growth is the only acceptable way of survival with very little proof. Often with a very bad underlying assumption that we don’t live in a zero sum game (which we clearly do).
wolverine876 5y ago
> But _nowhere_ do I see a single word on _why_ growth is desirable? Isn't that at the top of the article?

voidfunc 5y ago

Money.

nonrandomstring 5y ago
> Money. Well no. In this case the universal answer fails. > Yale Provost Ben Polak told the Washington Post, "At no point in the expansion did we think we'd do it to raise money for the university. This is about access." That's Yale. But the the article properly deals with the simple tradeoff between "access" and quality at Columbia. It's a bad deal. Nobody benefits. > President Bollinger in an interview says, "We have to have growth as the institution evolves." No we do not! This a bare, unqualified, ideologically rooted and - in the current milieu - frankly insane statement. Give me a single good reason why, when all factors considered growth leads to poorer student and staff experiences, we "have to have" it?
- voidfunc 5y ago
  Growth increases alumni network. Bigger alumni network increases chance you have more big fish who donate more. It's all money regardless of what they say.

sdenton4 5y ago

Educational institutions are the rocks on which the endless waves of ignorance crash and are broken. Educational capactiy thus needs to grow with the overall population. And if you don't grow the elite schools - or build new elite schools - you lock the society into oligarchy, as the relative size of the 'elite' grows smaller and smaller, educating the Sackler children while locking out increasing proportions of talented kids from less advantaged class backgrounds.

nonrandomstring 5y ago
As other commetators have pointed out, US population is pretty much flat (currently 0.57%).
ciphol 5y ago
There is plenty of education already. It's just not Ivy League education. I don't see why we need to increase Ivy League enrollment at the expense of other schools, since the Ivy League is mostly a positional good (it marks you as more qualified than other people, so if more people enjoy it then it loses its value).

ramraj07 5y ago

Isn’t this the failing of all of economics? Everyone modeling anything always assumes Constant growth is the only acceptable way of survival with very little proof. Often with a very bad underlying assumption that we don’t live in a zero sum game (which we clearly do).

wolverine876 5y ago

> But _nowhere_ do I see a single word on _why_ growth is desirable? Isn't that at the top of the article?