The long, Gramscian march through the institutions has nearly arrived at its terminus:
An unprecedented study that followed several thousand undergraduates through four years of college found that large numbers didn’t learn the critical thinking, complex reasoning and written communication skills that are widely assumed to be at the core of a college education.
Many of the students graduated without knowing how to sift fact from opinion, make a clear written argument or objectively review conflicting reports of a situation or event, according to New York University sociologist Richard Arum, lead author of the study. The students, for example, couldn’t determine the cause of an increase in neighborhood crime or how best to respond without being swayed by emotional testimony and political spin.
Credentialed, but not educated, deeply in debt and unemployable, surrounded by affluence but unable to participate in it, full of self-esteem but burdened by resentments.
Ripe pickings.
I see your point. There just aren’t that many openings for punditry on NBC’s various networks.
Tragic waste of potentially adequate second class minds.
+1
The “critical thinking” they are learning and mastering is an equivocation: it’s navigating the tenets of “Critical Theory”, which just means critical of America, capitalism, white culture, Christianity, tradition etc…
I just wish I was being clever…
Thus it MUST be feelings-based since that nonsensical crap can’t be justified by reason-
This is the direct result of all the draft dodgers hiding in the Universities during Nam to stay draft-ineligible. They got doctorate degrees, became professors, and set about rebuilding the university in their military- and America-hating cowardly images.
Whatever vision you have of the leftist depravity of the modern American university I guarantee you it’s ten times worse in reality-
Not.EVEN.close., Dave. You need a FAR larger exponent.
This is exactly the demographic, the situation, that America’s Socialists and their enablers in education have been working towards. A generation of “victims” ripe for manipulation and revolution.
There is a bitter crop about to be harvested from these evil seeds.
+ infinity
Bullseye!
What? Their liberal-arts education “didn’t [teach] . . . critical thinking, complex reasoning”? Hmmm – might there be a correlation with the numbers of young university grads who think “liberal” or are on the Democrat side of the aisle? Certainly it would speak to a lot of the behavior aimed at preventing campus speakers from the right of center from addressing the institutions of “higher learning.”
And these results surprise anyone because???….No worries because the liberal elite idjits who failed to educate these wastlings are TENURED FOR LIFE and in the case of public institutions, will be living off the taxpayer for life with a better standard of living than 95% of the rest of the population……
Talk about a crime…..the feckless bastards fought performance based evaluations for teachers as they knew this was the results they were producing…..
Speaking as a recent (2009) graduate: there is a lot more to blame than the liberal-arts education provided by Vietnam-era draft dodgers.
Shift in values with the oncoming of the social-networking age is a huge issue, in my mind. It is a lot easier to post or tweet a single, 160 character sentence that explains what you are doing and how you feel than it is to introduce, support and close your argument. Not saying that computers and telecommunications are the downfall of society. Just that a resource exploited by misguided heathens will be the downfall of modern empires.
You can pick out a single group/scapegoat for the failure of universities to educate (the hippie professors), but it takes a village to raise an idiot — I think that’s the saying. IDK chk wiki 4 da answr. K THX BAI.
As a recent grad, CitadelGrad: What do you suppose was the average cost of the education for the group to which the study refers? Parents, and students, paying for that should take critical note.
I’m shocked (and really surprised) that I understand that last sentence of yours, being 59 and all. But here’s my take on your comment: Simply put – if the schools, beginning with the lower grades, don’t demand excellence through hard work and study, and apparently many of them don’t, the end product suffers. No, it’s not all teachers who were hippies from the 60′s. But there has been a sea-shift in mindset and understanding of what and how they are teaching and the results of it, obviously, throughout the community of educators – and parents, too. Guess we need more parents that tend toward the “Chinese Mother” than what they are today.
SteveC,
I definitely agree with you that the study is worthy of the investor’s time and scrutiny. I would be wary, Heaven forbid I had any offspring, of sending them to a college where the return on investment is as low as the study suggests (in state ~10K per year, out of state ~25-30K, both for a state school for a kid who has learned a great deal about last minute powerpoint and the finer qualities of Nattie Light).
But hey, man, D is for Degree! Where’s the kegger tonight! Don’t forget to twitter it and make a facebook album of the new frat guy doing a kegstand!
Chillens do not go to college anymore for the degree or higher learning. They value something else: four years of partying without parental supervision. At least 4 years, new trends are for 5-6 years to complete an undergraduate degree. They go to school to party, and “find their direction” and hope that last minute cramming and cheating for that 3.5 average will get them the interview to the job they will not hold for longer than a year. It’s about the now: the status, the money, the fun, the booze, the drugs, the things done under the cover of night.
You want to blame education, fine. I understand. Teachers have been hiding behind their polite, bedside manner and positive reinforcement for years. The politicians who have set these “standards” ought to be held responsible as well. The parent(s) or guardians who let the nonsense go on ought to be culpable. And we might as well blame big corporations for fueling the desire to have bachelor’s degrees when most people can do most menial tasks without British Literature II or underwater basketweaving.
I might have gone about this the wrong way, though. We can always point fingers. What are you going to do about it? A professor of mine told me that they expect a huge shortage of professors and “educators” in the next 15 years because the baby-boomers are retiring. If you are concerned about these chillens not getting their $10K worth of tuition back in higher learning, why don’t you become a part of it and guide America’s future in the direction you believe it should take? Pass on your wealth of accumulated knowledge to the next generation?
-CG
So true; regardless of the medium, sounds bite explanations rule in our short attention span society.
In my humble opinion, just as I was required to take many liberal arts courses as part of my engineering undergraduate education, and am happy to have done so by-the-way, so too should the humanities types have to suffer the slings and arrows of higher mathematics.
It helps exercise the reasoning sections of the gray matter between the ears, and, the certainty of the results discourages the intellectual soft bigotry of relying on, “what’s right for me!”.
In short, the “trophy’s” are worth more when not everybody gets one; or as my father always said, “if it was easy, everyone would be doing it…”
Just wait until these marching morons grasp hold the levers of power over the next two decades. Those who fashioned this poison will be around to reap their reward — and they are not going to like it.
Ahh, you guys all worry too much. After all, the schools, athletic fields, and parents have assured all these little heathens CANNOT LOSE. After all, everyone gets a first place trophy, score isn’t actually kept, and parents will always give them whatever they want, won’t they? (really heavy sarcasm)
Besides, they might not know anything, but they can kick the ass of the entire world in Halo and Grand Turismo 5, so what’s to worry?
I weep.
Sometimes it helps to read the linked article in its entirety.
As an Applied Arts and Sciences Bachelor (Speech Communication) I was always astounded at the knuckleheads in the major, who were SHOCKED at how much logic, and critical thinking was involved in the supposed easy degree. Many ended up dropping out of “Classical Rhetorical Theory,” “Argumentation,” “Persuasion,” and “Leadership and Communication”. The fact that we were required to read, Plato, Machiavelli, Aristotle, Homer, and etal, as well as not just understand but practice syllogistic debate was extremely frustrating to the “Sosch’s”! Discerning fact from opinion was mandatory! And reading 40 pages? In a week? Oh for Pete Sake! We were required to WRITE 40 pages in a week!
Of course them were 1989 dollars at work!
And that’s what makes me want to question the colleges they chose and the methodology for “critical thinking.”
Reading the article, it seems all they significantly did was look at classes that were purely reading and writing based. How does one quantify the number of pages read for a hard science class? A lab course? Spending hours working on something for the Design-Build-Fly or Formula SAE? Sure, none of these count towards “pages read” or “pages written” but there was more critical thinking in the design of a wing segment for a 40lb RC airplane then in the entirety of a sociology or poly sci class.
Seems to me like it was another GIGO study that will serve only to bludgeon colleges to starve hard science and engineering degrees for the promotion of soft sciences and humanities.
I’ve seen a good many of those traditional Liberal Arts types. The average Engineering, or hard science major can easily make mince meat of them. There you are right or you die. Liberal Arts is still a touchy feely place.
Ace of Spades has a different (and very interesting) take on this: http://ace.mu.nu/archives/310893.php
Two 18 year olds just came to visit for a week. We gave them they keys to one of our cars and told them to go exploring. We had visions of them taking off for Oregon, or at Least Big Bear or the desert.
Nope. The never got up before noon, they never went to bed before midnight. They spent several days scouring the web for tattoo designs, the spent $250 and $450 respectively and half a day decorating themselves. One day was Stars Wars Day, and they watched all the movies in a DVD collection while perfect SoCal weather prevailed instead of snow and ice on the East Coast where they live.
We drove them to LA to visit an apparently well respected music school on Hollywood Blvd. It had all the atmosphere of a Federal prison, and the students (and most of the faculty) had about as much charm as inmates…except these folks were mostly high on something (and it wasn’t music). The ‘tour’ started 30 minutes late and was ‘directed’ by a bimbo who’s only credentials were big tits and a husband who was part of a name band. She encouraged the people in the tour group to opt for the associates program because the bachelor program was “really, really hard and not worth it.”
I asked at one point if the guys had considered a stint in the military. One said no, “I have a soft gooey inside.” The other said his mother would be so worried he’d get hurt she’d kill him. Neither would qualify in any case, because of their weight, and one had so many holes filled with metal I’m surprised airport security scanners would let him pass, never mind a recruiter. Both live at home. One is doing okay in junior college, the other couldn’t get in because his basic math skills (plusing and minusing, as he called it) were inadequate.
When they left they’d seen the inside of our house, the inside of a tattoo parlor, a stretch of I-5 and the music prison. Period. Oh, and also Venice Beach. No interest in Mt. Palomar observatory, a tour of a Navy ship, a day at the beach, soaring, sailing, Wild Animal park or Zoo. Tried to start several conversations on topics such as where they’d most like to travel if money was no object, or what common belief or law they think is stupid. I pointed out Jupiter and Orion one night and the asked if I’d heard that all the constellations have to be changed or astrology would be wrong.
My wife and I are still troubling over whether we should have read them the riot act, nevermind respect for their parents, the limitations of a week’s re-education, and so forth.
Didn’t do anything to make me more positive about the future of our country even if they are honest, good-hearted, drug-free guys from strong middle-class families with hard working parents.
I say bring back the draft and give these guys some discipline, self-respect, skills, and a world view. But, yeah, I know, that’s only us old farts that think that would do any good.
Next time unplug the ethernet cable from the cable modem and the video cable from the DVD player. Slap hands every time they reach to fix it.
[slap forehead] Shees, why didn’t I think of that! [/slap forehead]
Oh wait, then I couldn’t spend all day online!
In one of my grad school classes, one of the :ahem: younger students asked the instructor if he’d be keeping us until 10:00 (the class ran 7-10). The instructor, a sitting judge, said that a college education is one of the few places where consumers are willing to accept less than they’re paying for.
As we were walking out of class, a couple of the students were muttering about how he hadn’t answered the question.
Bob Reed…”just as I was required to take many liberal arts courses as part of my engineering undergraduate education, and am happy to have done so by-the-way, so too should the humanities types have to suffer the slings and arrows of higher mathematics.”
60 years ago, C P Snow (in his lecture The Two Cultures) observed that people would think a scientist uncultured if he’d never read any of Shakespeare’s play–but would consider it just fine for an English professor to be unaware of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. (A cynic might suggest that we’ve fixed that problem: we’re now graudating plenty of people who are familiar with *neither* Shakespeare *nor* the Second Law)
More recently, the management consultant Michael Hammer argued that aspiring executives should have a double undergraduate major: a tough traditional humanity combined with a scientific or engineering program. Theology and mechanical engineering, for example, even if the student’s ultimate career would have nothing to do with either field. Link.
I’m constantly amazed at the number of people who take opinion pieces from major news as fact that have a college education. Some even take the words of Rush, Beck, Obama, and Pellosi as fact as well. I feel pretty blessed to have been raised in an environment where critical thinking, questioning authority, checking the facts yourself was encouraged. Fact.
[poking fun]
What was the environmental climate with regard to spelling and grammar?
[/poking fun]
Well, Sarge, my mother, the english major. would have gotten out a red pen and returned that post to me.
Now do you people understand why I drink so much? I want to be numb when they come for me, numb, I tell you.
Sometimes I think I’d like to have some HE and a deadman switch, but that would be against the law, so I would never do that. Honest!
I have now read some of the comments above. FuzzyB hast recht. I have read some of which she linked, am encouraged, and will now read the rest.
Fliterman, it’s instructive to include the whole paragraph that you excerpted:
I will give long odds that when you use the phrase “liberal arts” to most people, mathematics and the natural sciences (e.g., biology, chemistry, physics) are not included in what comes to their mind. Those would be viewed as a technical education, like engineering. Heck, by that definition (which I do not challenge) I have liberal arts degrees (B.S., Biology and M.S., Biochemistry).
No, what’s going on is that over the last 20 years people have been getting degrees in majors such as “African-American Studies” and “Women’s Issues and Religious Studies”. Not to mention:
Pause for irony, wherein majors in education show the least gains in learning and majors in communications show the least gains in such things as writing skills.
There are complaints that students may be having problems because they have to take time to work. Oh how sad. So did I, and I managed to get through the Institute, which I propose was a bit more difficult than your average liberal arts school. I’d be interested to know what the average amount of time students had to work 20 years ago, which is not mentioned by the proponents of this theory.
I would guess that students majoring in those areas that are showing the least gains in learning critical thinking, complex reasoning and writing skills are not gaining these skills because they are either not valued, not required or both in those areas. At least, not as taught by these schools.
That’s why I always use the statement “hard sciences” when I deal with these issues. I don’t think the hard sciences should be included with Liberal Arts anymore. The hard sciences are not an “art.”
+ infinity
And the shame is that, by and large, across our nation, the public school system is rife with these under-achievers, who majored in the various “victimhood-group-studies” and such, who are teachers and administrators.
They are the ones on board with the Bill Ayers ideal of what public school cirriculum should look like, and are stressing revisionist history, social justice, identity politics, and transnational multi-culturalism over the basics of reading, writing, and mathematics.
When combined with fitting the course content to the abilities of the low achievers, at the expense of the average and above average, so that everyone can feel good about themselves, it’s no wonder American kids rank where they do vis-a-vis the rest of the world in terms of academic prowess.
Thank God my kids got engineering degrees. Sure, they got fed their share of leftist bull$h!t, but they also learned that it doesn’t matter if 8 black lesbian engineers put the bridge up and all the materials were bought from female/minority owned vendors. If the steel isn’t the right grade the bridge will fall down. There ARE such things as absolute truths and right and wrong. It’s NOT all relative, and bad things happen when you ignore that.
forgive me, couldn’t resist: One day an 85-year-old man is taking a stroll around his hometown, which he has lived in for his whole life. As he sees the landmarks, homes, and streets from his youth, he starts reminiscing….
“I remember building that house over there when I was 25. But people won’t call you ‘the house builder’ if you do that. No, no they don’t!”
“I remember building that tavern that I still lounge at when I was 30. If you do that people won’t call you ‘the tavern builder’ either. They sure won’t!”
“I remember helping build that bridge when I was 35. I worked hard on that. But people won’t call you ‘the bridge builder’ if you do that here. No, no, they don’t!”
“But blank one blank…….”
Scary on so many levels.
The money wasted by parents and taxpayers.
The ignorance that appears permanent.
Worse, many of these dolts will end up as lawyers, politicians and journalists.
And, we are depending on them to pay enough into Social Security to keep the system solvent.
Of course I agree with almost all here who decry the current sad state of affairs/academic trend lines, but I’ll add one LOL vignette from my undergrad days 45+ yrs ago. I had a younger fraternity brother whose unfailing rule was: on the first class meeting of the semester if the professor lectured for the full hour and also announced a required term-paper, he immediately dropped the class. LOL!!
And where is he now, VX?
Last I heard 40 yrs ago circa 1974/5 he was selling chain-saws in Marshall TX. LOL!
Thinking along different lines here. Though we’ve got our share of what the “unprecedented study” findings report, we’ve also got a good number of great kids who worked hard for meaningful degrees. If they managed to find a way to have fun while they were at it, more power to them.
My first-born graduates in May with a Maritime Engineering Technology degree from Texas A&M (yeah, I’m a proud pappa). My niece graduated Summa Cum Laude in Maritime Biology and is nearing completion of her Masters. These are good, smart kids who will do well, and they have LOTS of similar peers.
While the points of the study and some of the posts here are not lost on me, I’m choosing to view the glass half-full, cut them some slack, and accept that just as all degrees are not equal, neither are all students and all graduates. Really, is this significantly new from the last couple generations?
Think I’ll wait for yet another “unprecedented study”. You know, from the experts.
Politicizing distinct disciplines of higher learning seems quite parochial if not downright petty, does it not? Especially when considering the true Renaissance man ideal that demands all our respect – the polymath. (a person of wide-ranging knowledge or learning across a wide variety of disciplines).
Ecce, Leonardo da Vinci, a premier polymath.
Off I fly, careering far
In chase of Pollys, prettier far
Than any of their namesakes are
—The Polymaths and Polyhistors,_
Polyglots and all their sisters.
Engineers who tend to overly flatter themselves should read some of the learned bios of these to see what they lack in the liberal and fine arts:
Cicero
Zhang Heng
Aristotle
Archimedes
Ptolemy
Leonardo da Vinci
Zhuge Liange
Abbas Ibn Firnas
Chamundaraya
Abhinavagupta
Acharaya Hemachandra
Trotula of Salerno
Ibn Al-Haytham
Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Zakarlya al-Razi
Abu Rayhan al-Biruni
Amir Khusrow
Nicholas of Cusa
Leone Battista Alberi
Michelangelo
Akbar the Great
Galileo
Copernicus
Pascal
Hooke
Newton
Leibniz
Benjamin Franklin
Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov
Maria Gaetana Agnesi
Thomas Jefferson
Goethe
Thomas Young
Jagadish Chandra Bose
Rabindranath Tagore
Jose Rizal
link
Gee Mr Filterman,
You left Barack Obama off that list, and we’re often regaled by the MSM with stories of his BRILLIANCE! and JUDGEMENT!.
And, I mean, we all know the MSM is completely objective, beyond suspicion; that their articles can be trusted with metaphysical certitude, right?
Engineers shouldn’t be written off so quickly; not only do we have to learn the disciplines of numbers and the scientific method, but have to communicate our findings, theories, and ideas to many folks that understand neither.
My Regards
Flit also neglects the fact the true Polymath is exceedingly rare, and it is almost, if not completely, impossible to become such today.
It also neglects the thrust of the argument about the sad state of Liberal Arts these days. Standard Flit.
QM – “Rare” if not “completely impossible?” Please.
Perhaps you fail to understand the concept. There are no doubt a number of people here at Lex’s place that fit the fundamental description of a polymath. There are also some who in the unfortunately disparaging venacular are of a jack of all trades but master of none. (Which is pretty good, especially of you are fairly competant at most trades, itsn’t it? )
The ones I listed were exceptional. They stood out especially when compared to the general populous of their time.
With today’s emphasis on specialization there may be fewer extraordinary polymaths in our modern world. Nevertheless there still are many notable ones.
Check this link for 20 noted and successful contemporary polymaths.
BT
As for the state of liberal arts today – more blame lies with the student than the school. My liberal arts college was and remains one of the best. But I as a less-than-dedicated student was not.
IOW, my lack of quality education was my own fault, and not my liberal arts institution, its curriculum, or my professors’ fault.
On a lark, I thought I would check out your list. I figure it would be good for a chuckle, as I often get when I get insight into what passes for thought in a progressive’s mind.
The first thing that jumped out at me was the inclusion (at 4 strings, no less) of Noam Chomsky. While I know that there are those that deify him, his base of knowledge is limited to “America bad”. Or, in his more free-ranging moments “Capitalism bad”. Now, he does have a lot of ways to express those thoughts, but when your entire body of work can be summed up in two words, that doesn’t show much depth of knowledge.
The second thing I noticed was the lack of physical sciences and mathamatics on the list. Of the 20, only 5 had anything other than arts and social sciences. How can one be considered a polymath when your entire resume is “Novelist, law professor”? Or even more bizarrely, “Poet, critic, poker player, climber”? Other than Myhrvold, I didn’t see anyone I knew as a scientist first. There are plenty of great scientists who were also great authors. Asimov and Buzz Aldrin jump into my mind, along with others. Why are they so conspicuous by their absence? (Yeah, I know Asimov is dead. He is just an example of a person whose education began as a scientist, then bloomed into other areas).
And check out this guy:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Dickinson
Apparently being lead singer for a heavy metal band (with the requisite “record producer” added for good measure) and writing two books, and one screenplay (for a flop of a movie) qualifies you as a “polymath” in Flit’s estimation.
The one symptom of our PC and entitlement mentality that most stands out is the Angry Studies that now overflow many of the most liberal college campuses like kudzu. These “degrees” were created specifically to allow for substandard students and professors to enter the hallowed halls based on their particular victomhood status, not their intelligence. Given a carte blac, they proceeded to create a self-perpetuating system, where “right thinkers” were rewarded, based on how well they hewed to the anti-white, anti-male, anti-straight narrative. The performance of this particular strain has over and over again showed itself to be nothing more than hateful envy, wrapped up in multisyllabic tomes. It was this group that led and celebrated the lynch mob that screamed for the blood of three students at Duke for a crime that never even occured. It was this group that has faked countless acts of *ism, only to be eventually caught in their web of lies. And it is this group that is attracted to Democrats and government in appaling numbers.
When I read resumes today for Construction Manager/ Project Manager positions I need filled my eyes will look for degrees yes, but also Vets, boots on the ground summer jobs, internships, etc.
Did he/she get their hands dirty? Did they lead a squad? Did they have mentors?
If I’m going to pay you $100k/yr and let you have a piece of my reputation you had better been there, done that, and got the shirt.
Social Sciences may work for the person working the copying machine.
Skip – So may I take it that you would not hire a young Benjamin Franklin, who did not complete his education, was not a vet, spent his time mostly reading and hanging out with a bunch of aspiring artisans, and did none of the things you seem value in a prospective employee?
I know I would not. But then again, a person like Ben Franklin wouldn’t exactly be applying for a job either, now would he? He was a self made man. Folks who are applying for a job, especially for a job like Skip mentions (Construction Manager or Project Manager), you do NOT hire a dilettante off the street who has no work history or other potential reference to suggest they can take that job. And if you’d get off your high horse, you’d admit you wouldn’t hire someone without any of those qualifications for a $100k position either. Because chances are, someone applying for that position without work history, or military service, or education is less likely to be a Ben Franklin, and more likely to be a Spicoli or Theodore S. Preston, Esq.
flit/
My good man. Your list proves nothing in terms of this discussion. Almost ALL listed therein lived before the recent modern 19th & 20th Cent. knowledge explosion and the age of specialization–in the days when ANY well-”educated”/”learned” man thirsting for knowledge about the workings of the world studied the entire spectrum of knowledge precisely because it was so limited and intuitively coherent. Besides which also, many were subsidized by either rich patrons and/or ruling governments.
PS: Completing the last sentence, I meant to say that these people, by dint of support not usually available to today’s student who is burdened with making a living unsupported, in the main, by anyone other than himself, had the luxury of having the time to allow their interests/academic curiosity range far afield.
If I were hiring a Statesman, yes. A PM, no.
http://ricochet.com/main-feed/Defining-College-Down Bolding is mine.