What is as large as US investment in Iraq and Afghanistan?

[Fake Boris]

The solution is to put an end to the ambivalent function of universities.

1) Make professional and technical schools completely oriented towards market needs, and involve businesses as much as possible in the determination of the curriculum.

2) Isolate universities from market forces and make them institutions dedicated to the free and disinterested pursuit of knowledge with 100% public funding, and a constitutional requirement to release any intellectual property generated by research in open form.

How would that look like?

- Attending university classes is 100% free for anyone who has completed a professional degree
- Grading is provided on an informational basis only
- Promotions in status and titles (e.g. from student to Ph. D. candidate to professor to researcher) are granted on anonymous peer reviewed exams that people can choose to take at any time, after attending any number of courses they wish.
- Any research and publications are released in the public domain

[C0ckney]

Is the graduate barista life true across all courses, or just certain courses. For example, I would think it more true for arts than sciences. People need to be smarter over their choice of course and make sure it is better suited to future demands in the workplace.

i don't disagree with that, but the problem is, in my opinion, far wider than some 18 year olds making poor choices.

[The Mad Monk]

It's like I told a friend years ago: "Of course there's jobs open for English majors! I see one every time I get a cup of coffee."

[Dauphin]

i don't disagree with that, but the problem is, in my opinion, far wider than some 18 year olds making poor choices.

It is, but they are the ones who control their life decisions.

[Sava]

It's like I told a friend years ago: "Of course there's jobs open for English majors! I see one every time I get a cup of coffee."

Is there any evidence to suggest more people are getting "useless" degrees?

I mean, HA HA that stupid english major. That joke solves all of our education problems... because it's just stupid kids getting stupid degrees. Nope. No problems at all... nothing a little personal responsibility and guidance counselor can't fix

[C0ckney]

It is, but they are the ones who control their life decisions.

but not the environment and context in which those decisions are made.

[Fake Boris]

And how do they "free ride"?

Universities (including the "private" ones) depend largely on public subsidies. In times of perpetual budgetary crisis (artificially caused by the monetary system, but that is another story) they have to seek funding from private sources. What they do then is they sellout to private interests at a fraction of the investment required to build equivalent infrastructure from scratch with private money. Universities call this "partnerships", but what they're really doing is that they're using students and facilities for corporate research, effectively hijacking public funds.

Dealing with these "partnerships" requires more "management", which they pay for by cutting down on costs and quality of undergraduate education to hire managers, whom are described in newspeak as working on the "efficiency" of the education. This results in devalued undergraduate degrees, which students need to compensate for by pursuing higher education, increasing the university revenues through tuition while making themselves available as cheap labor for the hijacked research projects.

[The Mad Monk]

There is plenty of evidence; unfortunately, I lost track of a nicely put together package of it when an associate ragequit another forum we were both at and took his posts with him.

He was a professor and his points were basically:

Many college departments get funding according to majors and grad students they enroll

If funding is cut, staff positions may be cut, so many professors actively recruit for fear of their own jobs

In the humanities, especially, most jobs are in academia, so...

There is a glut of humanities students hoping for academic careers because of the rosy pictures painted by professors desperately trying to keep enrollment up to save their own jobs.

[pchang]

At US universities, supply and demand control how hard it is to get into a particular university and a particular major. We need to start imposing some external forces on the supply side. Do we need more engineers? Start expanding the engineering faculty. Do we need less English majors? Start firing English faculty.

[Fake Boris]

There is plenty of evidence; unfortunately, I lost track of a nicely put together package of it when an associate ragequit another forum we were both at and took his posts with him.

He was a professor and his points were basically:

Many college departments get funding according to majors and grad students they enroll

If funding is cut, staff positions may be cut, so many professors actively recruit for fear of their own jobs

In the humanities, especially, most jobs are in academia, so...

There is a glut of humanities students hoping for academic careers because of the rosy pictures painted by professors desperately trying to keep enrollment up to save their own jobs.

From what I've seen, this is correct. It's an unfortunate side effect of high tuition. The higher the tuition, the more colleges' funding depend on enrolment.

The obvious solution is 100% public funding on a fixed envelope basis. Also see #16.

[The Mad Monk]

Many humanities majors essentially end up as victims of fraud, perpetrated by their own universities.

[AAAAAAAAH!]

Who is a "university elite"?

Can you provide an example?

Textbook publishers...?

[The Mad Monk]

The Disposable Academic

...Academics tend to regard asking whether a PhD is worthwhile as analogous to wondering whether there is too much art or culture in the world. They believe that knowledge spills from universities into society, making it more productive and healthier. That may well be true; but doing a PhD may still be a bad choice for an individual.

The interests of academics and universities on the one hand and PhD students on the other are not well aligned. The more bright students stay at universities, the better it is for academics. Postgraduate students bring in grants and beef up their supervisors' publication records. Academics pick bright undergraduate students and groom them as potential graduate students. It isn't in their interests to turn the smart kids away, at least at the beginning. One female student spoke of being told of glowing opportunities at the outset, but after seven years of hard slog she was fobbed off with a joke about finding a rich husband.

Monica Harris, a professor of psychology at the University of Kentucky, is a rare exception. She believes that too many PhDs are being produced, and has stopped admitting them. But such unilateral academic birth control is rare. One Ivy-League president, asked recently about PhD oversupply, said that if the top universities cut back others will step in to offer them instead...

[OneFootInTheGrave]

The way I see it from the outside - the problem is an unlimited supply of money - ie loans, for higher education through the intermediary, ie the student. Who would not want to be paid better on the back of government backed loans? The issue is that the intermediary can be squeezed dry (similar to health services - there is no price which is "too high", so as long as some deal can be made - it will be done) to get the coveted title without which there is no chance at all for a middle class job.

To make it even worse, they will have to compete for many of those jobs with international people where getting the education was free, or at least very cheap in comparison, where those people will want to work for lower rates (in the US or otherwise) while they are saddled with a debt burden for foreseeable future.

The solution is present in continental Europe - for the most part publicly funded institutions, which exist together with privately funded ones. There will be some central rationing of resources like for national healthcare systems, but a large population of people who want to study will be supported by the system ( 80% + ) and selection for access will be based on previous results. For the rest the gap can be filled by private institutions.

That to me looks like a sustainable solution which primarily takes intellectual ability into the account and not financial ability for majority, however the US will not go there ( ever? ) and current issue of 1.2tn worth of outstanding student loans will probably be resolved through an increased number of defaults.

Reading some articles, are defaults on student debt even possible and if you default on it how does it affect your credit rating, are you out of the system for next 10 years? (ie unable to buy a house, get credit otherwise, unable to rent)

[pchang]

Many humanities majors essentially end up as victims of fraud, perpetrated by their own universities.

Not just humanities majors. Take a look at the ads on daytime TV for AA degrees at for profit private schools. There is not that great a need for more criminal investigative techs (think CSI).