Although UNC has tried to maintain an image of running squeaky clean sports programs that ensure student-athletes a high quality education, for decades it has actually been recruiting players who shouldn’t have gotten out of high school, then ushering them through a “curriculum” consisting largely of easy courses with negligible educational value.
The U.S. (make that the world) is on the brink of the greatest educational change since Gutenberg invented printing. That is the argument Kevin Carey presents in his new book The End of College.
All that the favorable job statistics for college graduates tell us is that having a degree positions you better in the job market compared with people who do not have those credentials. Many employers who need workers for jobs that require only basic abilities and a decent attitude now screen out people who don’t have college degrees. Companies looking to hire for positions such as sales supervisor and rental car agent, for instance, often state that they’ll only consider applicants who’ve graduated from college. What they studied or how well they did is largely beside the point.
When we speak about “academic freedom” what, exactly, do we mean? How far should academic freedom extend? How do we know when someone claiming it has actually abused it?
Veteran Washington Post columnist Jay Mathews writes mostly about K-12 education, but he is also interested in the results for students after they’ve graduated and enrolled in college. He’s also a self-professed college football freak, looking forward to the first-ever playoff series for the national title.
Perhaps you have noticed that many jobs requiring only basic skills and a cooperative attitude are now walled off to Americans who don’t possess a college degree.
The mania for college credentials hampers upward mobility for individuals without a college degree. They are confined to the shrinking and mostly low-pay segment of the labor market where educational credentials still don’t matter. (As I argued here, that explains much of the earnings gap between workers with and without college degrees.)
At the end of October, the Department of Education released its much-awaited "gainful employment" rule. It is supposed to fix (or at least lessen) the problem that many students who pursue vocational training with federal student aid money wind up without a job that pays well enough for them to cover their loans.
For all of the words devoted to our student loan mess (or "crisis" or "bubble"), little has been written on its origins. We know that student loan debt now exceeds $1 trillion and that many young Americans are struggling with a heavy burden, but how things got that way is largely a mystery.
With most academic fields, we know what they are about. Political science teaches about political systems and their workings; philosophy about how people have thought on questions such as ethics; literature courses have students read and contemplate worthwhile books.
The John W. Pope Center for Higher Education Policy has released its biennial report on the University of North Carolina system, “The State of the State University 2015: Critical Facts about the University of North Carolina System.”