Posted on 03/23/2008 5:31:50 PM PDT by bs9021
College Knowledge Check List
by: Deborah Lambert, March 21, 2008
Longtime radio talk show host Dennis Prager has some advice for aspiring college students and/or their parents.
Before plunking down wads of cash for that life-changing campus experience, you might want to ask a few questions about prospective schools that include the following:
1. “Can one obtain a Bachelor of Arts degree at your college without having to read a single Shakespeare play, one Federalist paper or one book of the Bible?”
2. "Does the college allow military recruiters on its campus?"
3. "What is the ratio of Democrats to Republicans among the professors in the liberal arts departments?”
4. “What are the names of the speakers invited and paid with college funds to speak last year at the college?”
5. "Does the school have same-sex dorms and bathrooms?" This is not your parents’ campus, stressed Prager. Schools no longer function as your family away from home, and their living conditions are worth checking out.
6. "Is Howard Zinn’s A People History of the United States the most widely assigned American history book?" If so, run for the nearest exit, and consider another school.
For more info on this subject...
(Excerpt) Read more at campusreportonline.net ...
Doesn’t that cut out about 98% of the choices?
Link to Prager’s site on the link at campus report doesn’t work.
Good questions!
Screw liberal arts degrees and their schools. A total waste of time. Insist that your kids get a real degree in engineering, business or a REAL science. Seek out the best college for these degrees where they can be affordably admitted. Yeah, expect them to ACTUALLY WORK while in college.
And since they will have to take the liberal arts garbage, just prepare them to tread water in those courses. The marxist BS spewed out is not the ticket to a good job. Heck, look at those loser profs...would your kids want to live their lives of bitterness?
If conservatives make up 40% of the households, why wouldn’t the free market fill the demand by having a ton of conservative colleges?
Regarding No. 1. Most of the nation’s prominent lawyers, judges and some of the politicians have graduated from these kinds of schools-—and look what it has gotten us.
I believe that Texas A&M meets all these criteria. That is why I’ve told my son he can go anywhere he wants... but I’ll pay his way to A&M. And also why, if he goes, he will be fifth generation.
Screw liberal arts degrees and their schools. A total waste of time.
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I have no degree at all but I don’t believe a true liberal arts education would be a waste of time. Going to school for four years to get a liberal arts degree while learning less than used to be taught in high school is a waste of time. When you have graduates with any sort of degree who cannot even name the three branches of government or give a basic outline description of how this nation came into existence then I would say time and money has been wasted on a phony education.
.......I don’t believe a true liberal arts education would be a waste of time. .......
Penguin Classics
Because all the conservatives are working in the real world. Leaving only derelicts to be professors.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach.
33% of the dorms are coed, in many schools all dorms are coed, so at least you can get a same sex dorm room, even though they have coed dorms.
We’ve had few problems with liberal profs. Most of the ones you run into are during the first two years when the general ed classes have to be taken. But if you major in an engineering course, or even if you’re a business major, you’re not going to have to deal with the “liberalism” in your final two years of undergrad study (how do you make calc, physics, accounting, database administration, etc. into a “liberal” platform, it usually doesn’t happen because the subject matter doesn’t lend itself to philosophical interpretation.) The really liberal profs seem to be affiliated with the “liberal arts” majors.
Gig ‘Em Aggies!!!!!
I’m class of ‘84.
I will say that I didn’t read anything listed in the first bullet.
However, I don’t have a Bachelor of Arts; I have a Bachelor of Science degree.
When I was at A&M, I took most of my liberal arts classes at the junior college near my parent’s house during the summer.
I think it was a good idea, and they weren’t very liberal.
For most folks I would think cost of education, location, research areas/academic focus, and graduation rates are more important checklist items.
I am a history professor and one of the major issues in our field is that conservatives have largely abandoned the field of ideas. It is an ideological surrender by the right, not a victory by the left.
It is true that there are still a few of us who try to teach American history as if we were the good guys, but in the history departments of this nation conservatives are vastly outnumbered.
Why is this?
I think many of the posts here will surely illustrate the problem. A sizable portion of people who claim to be “conservative” actually denigrate traditional fields like history and instead urge their children to enter more lucrative fields. For them college is nothing more than a job training program or a very expensive vocational school. They don’t view college as a discussion of great ideas, or a rumination on what Russell Kirk once called “the permanent things”. For the short sighted among us a college course in American History, Philosophy, Literature etc. is a “total waste of time”. If it doesn’t make enough money to buy the big McMansion and new car then it is meaningless.
This leaves entire swaths of the university staffed by foaming at the mouth liberals. So do keep this anti-intellectual current in mind when we complain about how so many the social science professors are raving liberals. We only have ourselves and our so-called conservative allies to blame.
Good post, thanks.
Fully agreed.
In our increasingly technical world, it boggles the mind that anyone would get a four-year liberal arts degree unless they had one of the following planned:
1. Going on to law school or similar advanced education.
2. Going on to graduate school, with the intention of teaching in the liberal arts field (eg, english lit, art history, etc).
3. Planning on marrying someone with a ‘real’ degree in engineering, medicine, science, etc.
Almost any other plan for the future doesn’t need a liberal arts degree and in fact, a liberal arts degree is simply a way of extending one’s childhood.
I graduated from engineering school in the early 80’s. I quite distinctly remember the liberal arts majors at SUNY partying every weekend (and most nights), chasing tail, etc with wild abandon while I was sweating convolution integrals, linear algebra, circuit analysis, fields and wave and similar coursework with zero power to amuse and attract the chicks.
Come last semester tho... heh heh. Suddenly women figured out who was going to be employed after the four year vacation, and it wasn’t the cool poet with the dreamy, far-away look. It was the nerdy engineer who not only had a job offer, he had multiple job offers! And not for chump wages, but pretty darn good money. Back in ‘84, starting salaries for EE’s was in the high 20’s.
The best job offers for liberal arts types I heard was about $19K.
Revenge was.... sweet.
Best senior-year pickup line I heard from an engineer at a party:
“Hey baby... how would you like to be able to eat every day after graduation?”
OK, let’s discuss this a bit.
Let’s break down the choices here:
I love history. Study history on my own, for my own edification. No one has ever had to “make” me study history. I’ve always loved history and how knowing something about it helps explain what is occurring today. Teaching history doesn’t require a student be pursuing liberal arts degree.
But let’s think about the choice you’re laying out here:
I got a BS in engineering, and I retired by the time I was 40.
You’re telling me that I should have gotten a liberal arts BA, then gotten on the PhD track, piling up more student debt, then having to put up with the tenure BS in a university (while being a conservative - boy I’m really liking my chances here), to hold down a job where I might have been in a non-stop conflict with the lunatic liberals in a university.
Let’s think about where I’d be at age 40 in your plan: A job where I’m going to be miserable, ostracized by my co-workers (and likely the administration) and get paid rather poorly for putting up with this.
Oh yea, sign me *right* up for that.
Here’s a little nugget for you: In Silicon Valley, we called stock options “F... You” money. Because after you reached a certain amount, and some idiot was telling you what to do, you realized that you didn’t need to put up with their crap any more. You told them what to do, in graphic detail, you packed your desk, and you walked out, a free man.
Today, I’m a free man. No one tells me what to do. That’s what is lucrative, not the money.
And part of what I do with my time is pursue “the permanent things,” to the great consternation of liberals who have confounded indoctrination with education in the American academy. If nothing else, it leaves them gob-smacked and wondering just what they taught in my engineering school.
First, I wouldn’t presume to tell you what to do with your life, I’m merely suggesting that attitudes like yours, which view “engineering, science and medicine” as the only “real” degrees available at a university are at the root of the problem of the liberal domination of the university, especially the social sciences.
If conservatives constantly tell their children that the only “real” degrees are in engineering, science and medicine, then how can we be surprised when the liberals take over every other department on campus?
A hypothetical for discussion: a bright young man is struggling.
His head tells him to go into engineering, makes some money. His heart is pulling him into the ministry, serve the community and spread the message of Jesus Christ.
Torn between getting a “real” degree in a “real” subject like Engineering or getting a degree in Religious Studies, this young fellow has some serious choices to make.
If the young man follows his heart he will study religion and work in the ministry, earning next to nothing. He will be poor and in your analysis “a loser”.
If he follows his head he will get a degree in Electrical Engineering, become a real bigshot and make more money than anyone posting on Freerepublic.
In a purely financial calculation the Engineering degree is an obvious choice. But as you have discovered by now, there is more to life than money. Money is important, but it is not the sole determiner of happiness and fulfillment. People are motivated by many things other than money, and that is why the streets are not teeming with prostitutes. Many folks do a given job because they love it and they would continue to do that job even if they could afford to retire at 40. They don’t view their work as a misery to be endured until they can cash in stock options and tell people “f*** you”.
So should conservatives tell young men and women in university that they are idiots if they study “nonsense” like religion, history, literature, etc?
If we do that as conservatives, we surrender the university to the left.
And then your children will have to sit through another four years of mindless left-wing propaganda in two thirds of their courses while they pursue a “real” degree.
And the beat goes on.
I enjoyed your post and your perspective.
Our advice, concerning education if one felt “called” to the ministry, was for the student to first get a secular degree that he could fall back on and use to support his family in the future, then seek graduate work in theology.
I know several men in the ministry now who used their secular degree in order to allow them to be “tent makers”, like Paul. Especially in church planting, the church often can’t afford to support a pastor until it grows a little, and having a way to earn a living, apart from the pastorate, has helped these men and their churches when they first started.
It seems that high schools, colleges and universities used to exist to educate, now they are vocational training schools. Those who denigrate liberal arts fail to understand the difference between education and training. The founding fathers were educated men, computer science graduates are trained men. When there are no more truly educated men we will understand the real meaning of Hell on Earth.
My husband just sold a ton of his stock options at the all-time high just before it started to fall.
He sold at that time because he would have enough money to quit at anytime.
He can’t retire yet because we have 3 kids that are all going to private school and one has special needs, but we have enough money to survive for a long time without income.
My son is starting high school, and he says he wants to be a lawyer. However, my son is gifted in math. I’ve told him that he should get his undergraduate degree in engineering. That way, he’ll always have a job, and he can still get his law degree if he wants to.
Why would you say that computer science men are “trained” men?
For one thing, most of our friends with engineers tend to be the type that educate ourselves. We actually read lots of books, and typically are fairly knowledgeable about politics and other subjects.
Just look at the fact, that I am posting on Free Republic. My old college classmates with liberal arts degrees tend to be teachers in elementary schools, and they don’t know as much about politics as I do.
My very gifted 13 year old son is interested in going into engineering. With math, science, and technical subjects you really need to have practice and someone to look at your work to make sure you are doing it correctly.
My also likes history. He reads the history books, and he comprehends them easily. He doesn’t really need anyone to teach him the things that he reads in those books because he gets it.
This statement really made me mad.
I think H*** on Earth is when there are no more engineers to build the things that everyone likes.
You need engineers to design houses, buildings, roads, bridges, computers, cars, electrical systems, etc.
You need scientists to find cures to diseases, find sources of fuel, etc.
Who do you think designed the Pyramids???? It wasn’t a history scholar.
It’s also a little more complicated than training. Engineers and scientist have to think and design and figure out problems. College gives opportunities for engineers and scienetist to think and design in a safe environment. You wouldn’t want a high school computer hacker to work on a missle defense system because they haven’t been taught the different elements of safe design, and most of us engineers make mistakes with our early systems.
Our pastor was a real estate agent while he started building our church. He made money and built his church. The church started in his home. Finally, it got big enough to support him financially.
Have you been watching the John Adams series on HBO?
It’s very interesting. One thing that I think should be noted is that many of our founding fathers had alternative means to survive. Many of them had farms and they worked on them.
John Adams had a family farm, and his wife and kids ran it while he was helping to found our nation. Of course, he also had a law degree, and then he became President of our country.
I think those of us with engineering/science backgrounds are very practical. We think you always need to have a way of supporting your family and that comes first.
If you don’t want to have a family, then you can do other things. Also, you can do things after your children are grown.
My husband wants to retire when he is 50. One of the things he has talked about is going back to college. He won’t be sacrificing family life at that point.
I never said there was no need for engineers etc. What I am trying to put across is that technical knowledge (and I have spent most of my working life as a technician) is not the same thing as education. Education is about learning how to live a good life and enjoy it. Technical training is about how to make a living. Engineering, computer science etc. is great for making a living, I wish I had had the benefit of a degree in electronics rather than just a certificate from a U.S.Navy school but making a life is what is learned in the liberal arts courses which are so scorned by so many on this forum. Ideally a person would be both educated and trained but the emphasis now seems to be on making a living. Look at what goes on around us, we have fantastic new technology but are you pleased with the culture we are developing? I certainly am not.
My personal belief is that college should be about making a living, period.
Before college is a whole different arena. I am a strong proponent of exposes children to art, music, literature, history up until college. I absolutely hate when schools drop art & music from their curriculum.
I think that children do not know if they will be good in those areas or will develop a love for those topics, so I think children need a broad education in their younger years.
However, once a child has grown up and moved into college, then I think they have to be thinking about making a living. By college, most people know what they are good at, and what they are interested in.
College is too expensive to be thinking about enjoying life, it’s about working hard to be able to take care of oneself afterward.
Training to me is when you show someone how to do something. Teaching is about showing a person how to think. College should show a person how to think and solve problems.
Here’s another option to run by him as well (and I’m NOT saying what you’ve suggested would not be a strong career option):
Engineering BS, then go get a MBA.
Either way, a lawyer or MBA with an engineering undergrad would be one of the strongest degree combo’s in the job market. A lawyer with a BS Eng would be really strong in patent, intellectual property and contract issues, and the MBA would likely be fought over by any number of hedge funds and private equity groups.
Those of use who denigrate liberal arts have seen tons of liberal arts majors who know less coming out of a liberal arts program than they did going in.
Too many liberal arts programs are now simply indoctrination camps and have nothing in common with a classical liberal arts education.
Let’s put it this way: you want to see an ugly sight? Put me, a retired engineer/farmer up against any (and I do many any) current liberal arts graduate of any Ivy-league university on the background, foundations and events of our Founding Fathers. These kids know nothing about Mill, Locke, Fletcher, the Scottish Enlightenment, etc.
Nothing that is, that isn’t spouted through a post-modernist deconstruction of grievance politics of women, minorities and marxists.
Debating these kids today on subjects such as these is like shooting fish in a five gallon bucket.
Twice.
With a 12 gauge.
Utterly pathetic. These kids should at lease sue their school administrations for simple fraud, because they’re not getting the education for which they’ve paid most handsomely.
I would posit to you that the reason for the decline of American culture is not technicians and engineers lacking a background in things of permanent importance.
It is more the fault of liberal arts majors and their ideals that there is no absolute truth, that post-modernism is a valid substitute for critical thinking, that morality is an outmoded concept, etc.
They don’t teach that stuff in engineering schools.
They do teach it in liberal arts colleges.
Want an example? OK, here’s a nice, clear example. I see no shortage of pundits, liberal arts majors all, who are arguing that Spitzer’s behavior is not the concern of the taxpayers.
My engineering background informs me that if I’m paying a man to do job “X” and he is screwing around on the job (literally), I can fire his butt out the door, post haste, and I don’t have to listen to any excuses for the behavior.
I’ve thought about that also. I think he needs to get the solid education for his BS. During his years in college, he can figure out what he really wants to do. He’ll be exposed to a lot more things in college, and I think he’ll be able to figure out if he wants to further his education.
Heck, I knew plenty of engineering students that went on to become medical doctors.
My personal belief is that college should be about making a living, period.
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Then why not simply call them trade schools?
All the more reason we need liberal arts education starting in grade school as it used to. We just need to can most of the current crop of teachers and start over. We need leaders who realize that knuckling under to PC garbage is going to destroy this country. If such leaders can be found in the engineering profession I am all for it.
I don’t believe the foul teachings you mention came from an understanding of Shakespeare, Plato, Aristotle, The Holy Bible and truthful versions of History, I believe they come from other sources. Somewhere along the way it became “cool” to swallow all this garbage and call anyone who is in touch with reality a “right wing extremist”. I am with Huey Lewis, “Its Hip To Be Square”.
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