Unless I am mistaken, Derek Thompson, the author of the short article, does not once mention Cardinal Newman's The Idea of a University[0]. Really, that's a sha

Unless I am mistaken, Derek Thompson, the author of the short article, does not once mention Cardinal Newman's The Idea of a University[0]. Really, that's a shame as it's one of the foundations of how we view universities and, honestly, I don't think much has changed since then 1852 in those respects. The good cardinal lays out his vision about a university, quite secularly for the time period, and spells out 'what a university is for' very explicitly: Intellectual development, formation of character, unity of knowledge, freedom of inquiry, and life preparation. I don't think even some 170 years later that things have changed all that much for us in respect to those overarching goals. Though it is The Atlantic, a rage bait magazine for nearly a century, it doe make the point that the admin of many universities is just too much. That higher education has become a make work program of sorts, fueled by the government's goal of more college grads and a lot of debt. I'd say returning to the ideas outlined by Newman would be a great start to burning off the admin bloat. [0]https://www.newmanreader.org/works/idea/ https://www.newmanreader.org/works/idea/