Article The decline of the public university

[C C]

https://ajbenjaminjrbeta.blogspot.com/20...rsity.html

EXCERPTS: I'm going to point you to an article by Lisa Corrigan who writes about the recent "restructuring" of West Virginia University, and what it means for the rest of us who work in public colleges and universities, whether flagship institutions, or regional colleges and universities (like me).

[...] What I suspect will happen is what Dr. Corrigan says quite bluntly: we will end up with a two-tiered higher education situation where the privileged will have more opportunities to enrich themselves intellectually, and the rest of our students, especially in rural public universities will just have to get used to fewer options. After all, workforce development is the big buzzword these days. We'll also see a future in which institutions operate with fewer full-time faculty, with the ensuing decline in quality that comes with understaffed programs... (MORE - missing details)

[Yazata]

https://ajbenjaminjrbeta.blogspot.com/20...rsity.html

EXCERPTS: [...] What I suspect will happen is what Dr. Corrigan says quite bluntly: we will end up with a two-tiered higher education situation

We have had a two-tier system for decades. It's nothing new. The connected kids go to Stanford or Yale, then they move effortlessly to running government departments or corporate executive suites. It's like a conveyor belt to the top. It's no different elsewhere, just think Oxford and how many of its graduates fill high positions in Whitehall and the London banks.

Examples include that Harvard-educated woman at Anheiser Busch who made one of the biggest bone-head marketing blunders in US business history turning Bud Light into tranny-fluid, or silver-spoon Sam Bankman-Fried who would never have been able to create his billion-dollar crypto scam if it weren't for his parents' (both Stanford law professors) political connections and networking. Everyone at the top vouched for him and recommended him, because they knew his parents. It opens lots of doors.

where the privileged will have more opportunities to enrich themselves intellectually

I'm not sure what that means. Is studying undergraduate chemistry at a state college less intellectually enriching than studying it at the undergraduate level at a prestige university? Are there two different chemistrys? It's true that the prestige universities far excel at the doctoral-research level, but I don't think that's what the author is talking about here.

and the rest of our students, especially in rural public universities will just have to get used to fewer options. After all, workforce development is the big buzzword these days.

Maybe that's it. The less prestigious state colleges often emphasize job skills that are in demand, not major subjects what are trendy with a certain kind of professor. So they are less apt to offer gender-studies majors and things like that. That's not to say that the more job-oriented subjects that they teach aren't intellectually enriching.

One thing that watching Starbase build spaceships has taught me is to have much more respect for trades like welding, iron work, industrial plumbing and operating cranes than I once had. These trades are fascinating and demanding both intellectually and physically, and are arts in their own right. They rarely require college degrees but are none the less for that.

We'll also see a future in which institutions operate with fewer full-time faculty, with the ensuing decline in quality that comes with understaffed programs...

And there it is. Whenever professors talk about the sad state of higher education, sooner or later it always turns to their own faculty labor issues.

[Syne]

Meh, AI will displace those professors soon enough.