Posted on 03/04/2011 7:16:17 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Andy Ferguson, one of America’s most engaging and perspicacious journalists, has not — as André Malraux said of Whittaker Chambers — returned from the hell of college admissions with empty hands. In Crazy U, his chronicle of his son’s senior year of high school — a year of college visiting, applications, essay writing, open-house attending, interviewing, financial-aid seeking, and waiting, waiting, waiting — is by turns hilarious, shrewd, and revealing.
The “crazy” in the book’s title refers to our national obsession with college — a little piece of insanity to which Ferguson is more prone than most. Preoccupied by his son’s prospects of being admitted to a good college, Ferguson devours advice books, college guides, and, in weak moments, websites like College Confidential, prompting this reflection about anonymous-advice websites:
I’d been bewildered by TMI [too much information] before. . . . Before a business trip I’d go online to find a recommendation for a rodent-free hotel or a reliable restaurant. Half a dozen websites would be waiting to help. . . . From them I learned that the local big-chain hotel was in fact a good bargain, with pleasant service and an excellent location, and also a hellhole staffed by human ferrets, with overflowing toilets and untraceable smells that had ruined the honeymoon of vox-12popula and iwantmyrum, who were now exacting their revenge by abusing the hotel on every website they could find.
But along with the confusion and the profusion of contradictory advice he found on the web and elsewhere about getting into college, Ferguson notes the dismaying effects of following the advice. He quotes an expensive “consultant” who advises, “‘Early on in high school your child should find a teacher they like and go that extra mile. They should . . . cultivate that relationship . . . be enthusiastic in class . . . and spend time outside of class with the teacher, if that’s possible.’” The aim, Ferguson summarizes, is to “release” at recommendation time “a gusher of praise.”
In other words, Ferguson interprets, the process “turned them into Eddie Haskell. . . . It guaranteed that teenagers would pursue life with a single ulterior motive. . . . It coated their every undertaking in a thin lacquer of insincerity.”
If the process encourages a certain amount of obsequiousness and even dishonesty in America’s youth, it also elicits more than a dollop of deceit by the colleges themselves. Fixated on their USNews and World Report rankings, colleges “fudge” numbers like the SAT scores of incoming freshmen, the graduation rate, and average class size. Wall Street Journal reporter Steve Stecklow compared the data schools submitted to US News with the data they submitted to bond-rating agencies. “If they lied to a rating agency, they might go to jail; if they lied to US News they might make the Top Twenty. Reviewing credit reports for more than one hundred schools, he caught one in four fudging the numbers.”
The college-admission rigmarole reflects in so many ways the cultural and political preferences of the liberals who run the vast majority of these institutions. A “sample” college essay Ferguson purchased online reflected the fashion:
There was no question our hired hand thought he knew the magic words that would make an admissions committee coo: “I would be proud to work collaboratively with diverse populations to solve problems . . . my readiness for greater challenges in the diverse learning environment . . . my enthusiasm for history, diplomacy and cultural diversity . . .”
Just as gag-inducing is the spiraling cost of this four-year excursion into diversityland. The annual cost of a typical private college went from $3,663 in 1975 to $34,132 in 2009. (Many are above $50,000 now.) Ferguson analyzes it succinctly: “It’s the same problem that afflicts health care [the other sector of the American economy that has seen skyrocketing costs in the past few decades], a large portion of the people consuming the services aren’t paying for the service out of their own pocket. The costs are picked up by third parties.” No one has the incentive to cut costs.
But even paring away the layers of folly that surround the quest for college does not, in the end, disillusion Ferguson. A year’s research and experience has revealed that the application process is needlessly complicated and stressful; that college admission is marred by many injustices; that college itself is perhaps a “bubble” investment that has been way oversold; and that the costs are completely unrelated to the value of the product.
But when his son is accepted at the school of his choice, Ferguson and his wife rejoice. They’ve drunk deeply of the Kool-Aid. We all have. But after reading this hugely entertaining book, we at least see it more clearly.
— Mona Charen is a nationally syndicated columnist
If most of these document endorsed over educated individuals received a modicum of education at most of these institutions, the US would be ahead of the game. Unfortunately, most get asswipe degrees good for nothing but taking up space on a wall.
Worse still, is the money being thrown down a rat hole bringing up to a minimum standard those who could not even function at a college level in the first place. Then armed with their sociology, women studies, african studies, and political science degrees, off they go on a mission to extort income from an economy which needs them as much as a bull needs teats.
Good article but misses a MAJOR point.
A huge number of people graduate every year with degrees in subjects that are virtually WORTHLESS. There are an incredible number of degrees available in subjects for which the graduates have virtually NO chance of working in that field.
Yet every year billions of dollars are spend obtaining such degrees.
(Hint: Almost any degree than ends with the word “Studies.” Virtually no demand exists, and no chance of ever using it except to teach other people seeking a similar degree).
After 3 semesters of the crap, he's switching to computer science.
The American university cabal is the biggest sham ever perpetrated on a country. Fumigate the universities.
We NOT all have!
See also:
Women's Studies
Minorities Studies
Social Studies
and my favorite
Interpersonal Relationships Studies
The want ads are virtually crammed with companies desperate for people with these degrees. And of course India and China are shaking in their boots that we will conquer the world market in “Social Studies.”
(Massive sarcasm off)
I think thats what he realized, luckily in time to switch to something more useful.
You have nailed the growing problem in America re the university/college system pushing worthless degrees:
“A huge number of people graduate every year with degrees in subjects that are virtually WORTHLESS. There are an incredible number of degrees available in subjects for which the graduates have virtually NO chance of working in that field.
Yet every year billions of dollars are spend obtaining such degrees.
(Hint: Almost any degree than ends with the word “Studies.” Virtually no demand exists, and no chance of ever using it except to teach other people seeking a similar degree).”
Decades ago one of our younger relatives coined the phrase “Instant Unemployment Degrees or IUD’s”. He graduated with a degree in hard engineering/hard science combined with business and had all types of job offers during a bad recession.
We knew a lot of young people getting their bachelor or master’s degrees and couldn’t find a job even at a fast food business. Their degrees were worthless, and they usually had zero work experience of any type. Mom and Dad often sprung for a semester or year in Europe instead of saying “Get a job to pay for your fun expenses in school!”
In the past two decades, we have seen the cost of college skyrocket and the IUDs increase in number and scope. As you noted, the code word is “studies”. Any so called degree in “studies” is totally worthless unless you get hired by a governmental agency or become a professor and con innocents into taking the worthless “studies” you are pushing.
Another serious factor being swept under the carpet is payback of student loans for an IUD. Our younger relatives, those with jobs, say that $100k to 200+K in educational loans is fairly standard among their peers.
The financial meltdown in many cases has stopped any payment by their parents. So these young people are strapped with two bad problems, an IUD and a huge loan for that IUD.
A couple our age had traveled to the MidEast last year, and they predicted the revolt in Egypt after spending a week in Egypt. They said that there were millions of young adults with worthless degrees, who were unemployed or minimally employed.
This couple and many of our younger relatives and friends feel that we could headed in the same path. They feel the revolt of the government drones in Wisconsin and other states is a realization by the union drones, that their government/taxpayer pay checks/benefits is all they can ever hope for. No business can afford them with their lack of talent and a worthwhile education.
and no chance of ever using it except to teach other people seeking a similar degree...”
When the music stops, you better make sure you have a chair!
and no chance of ever using it except to teach other people seeking a similar degree...”
When the music stops, you better make sure you have a chair!
the main purpose of college at this point is to keep young adults from entering the full-time labor force for as long as possible (which suits the goals of organized labor and the Obama Administration on many different levels)
So much of the “clout” in a College or University is driven by numbers. If you were to look at a pie chart of a breakdown of a University in the 1950’s, you would find a rather large slice representing the “hard” subjects. In many Universities of that time the “studies” slice would have been very small.
The Viet Nam war sent a huge number of people rushing to college simply to avoid the draft. Since they were only there as a hide out, they took the easiest subjects. Thus the “studies” side of things grew exponentially.
The result is entrenchment of these subjects as power players in the College and University system. They continue to claim resources based on the percentage of students they have, thus encouraging them to perpetuate themselves - whether there is any reason to or not!
So a diploma goes for about $130k now. That's a lot of dough for wall art.
Many things factor in - the biggest is a huge lie perpetrated on students for a couple of decades now: “You need a college education to be successful”.
This plugs nicely into the whole “I deserve it” mentality that so many now feel - that the world owes them something just because they are drawing breath. A college education automatically makes one over-qualified to cook in a restaurant, work on a farm, work in a chicken plant, be a sanitation worker, do landscaping, roof houses, general carpentry, road crews, and so many other jobs. WE now must “import” labor because many Americans believe such jobs are below them. Even those who didn’t actually finish or even attend any college classes fall into this.
One of the best retail managers I ever knew had “only” a high-school diploma. Some of the very worst managers I have known - had college degrees, even graduate degrees.
Not every student, even if they can “achieve” a GPA of over 2.0 (or 2.5 here in Arkansas) needs to go to college... yet we have a Lottery here in Arkansas now to give pretty much any high school graduate who could get a 2.5 in high school, $5K per year with no strings attached. This of course drives up the price tag for higher education. All the while, students (as someone else posted) continue to “earn” degrees worth less than the paper they are printed on - no use in the real world.
I was at a baby shower where there were a lot of “public educators” and said something to the effect that “college isn’t for everyone” -
you should have heard the gasps of astonishment - I had uttered a blasphemy as far as they were concerned.
Don't get me started on that topic!
I can name Company Presidents, Engineers, and Inventors that typify that statement to the extreme. One of the best aircraft engineers I ever met was a high school dropout. And the absolute WORST, MOST INCOMPETENT, person I have ever worked for had a wall covered in degrees (or as we used to say, “at least he didn't let a good education go to his head.”)
Colleges responded by lowering admissions standards. This, coupled with high schools socially promoting students who weren't qualified to graduate, caused colleges to begin accepting students who spent the first year taking remedial classes until they dropped out.
A few years ago, I was having lunch with some co-workers who were talking about their high school seniors navigating the college admissions process. They were lamenting how their "A" students couldn't get into the schools they wanted because of the competition. One said that a college admissions officer confided to her that her daughter should pursue her first year at a junior college and then transfer to the school in her second year, because many of the minority slots that they were required to hold aside would open up when the students drop out, and that the schools would be desparate to attract second year students to fill the gap.
-PJ
“Wall Street Journal reporter Steve Stecklow compared the data schools submitted to US News with the data they submitted to bond-rating agencies. “If they lied to a rating agency, they might go to jail; if they lied to US News they might make the Top Twenty. Reviewing credit reports for more than one hundred schools, he caught one in four fudging the numbers.”
How many bond-rating agency personnel have gone to jail lately? The one’s that stuck triple A ratings on garbage during the past three years?
That's when Americans will be looking for work on drilling rigs off the coast of Africa or helping to build skyscrapers in Qatar.
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