RE: There is really no excuse for a school like NYU to be charging $200,000 for a bachelor’s degree in women’s studies or art history. It’s even more inexcusable for NYU to be letting people borrow to finance that overpriced degree.
Well, as I see it, the DEMAND side exists, therefore the SUPPLY side provides. NYU would not bother hiring teachers to teach these flak courses if students did not bother to enroll, BUT THEY DO.
Which means that NYU finds it WORTH offering these courses.
These students must be really STUPID or must have really rich parents.
I went to college (night school) while working full time and had three kids at home. I went on the GI Bill so there were no student loans. I am glad I put the effort in, not just for a sheepskin to hang on the wall, but also because I feel educated, not smarter. The most important class one can take is ENGL101. If you can’t write well, you’ll never advance in your chosen field. One will never get promoted solely if one knows who Iago is, what the Swidden Technique is, the role the trilobite plays in geology, when to use the subjunctive in French or who painted The Birth of Venus. One can never tell when these subjects will arise in a saloon, and being able to prove your point intelligently could avoid a nasty bar fight. Of course, nowadays, everyone has Google on one’s cellphone, so maybe it wasn’t worth it after all.