I was driving back from Maryland to Pennsylvania on Black Friday when I tuned in to Steve Levitt’s Freakonomics podcast. Typically I don’t associate my mood or the setting with podcasts the way I do with music. But that changed as I listened to Levitt and his guest, Michael D. Smith.
Sidenote: Tracy Chapman: a singer-songwriter who actually went to college (so many don’t). This week’s NYTimes Popcast podcast features an interview with the writer who did the 1988 Rolling Stone cover article on Chapman and her reluctance even then to embrace celebrity and fame.
Great piece with smart analysis interspersed with a compelling personal story. Thank you for writing this.
May I also mention: Virtual education doesn't work. There is massive attrition, and for those who do complete courses, achievement is much lower, because most people cannot continue to commit to learning material on their own for a reward as shallow as a credential. The only reason education was ever important, as with every other meaningful human activity, is for the connections it allows with other humans. Making it about the "product" of a credential reverses the order.
I detest academia now for these very reasons among others, i.e., racism, white supremacy, sexism, classism, and misogyny. I make slightly more money tutoring writing this year with less stress. It's also allowing me to write a lot more. My terminal degree is an MFA in creative writing. I may not go back to adjunct teaching if I don't have too. Dr. Biden teaches at a community college. She has to be aware of this, and I am ticked she doesn't use her platform to speak against the exploitation of adjuncts and the neoliberalism and corporatization of higher education.
I suppose the supply and demand imbalance that drives some of this — too many PhDs, particularly in some areas, and too few students, particularly in some areas — will eventually correct itself. At that point maybe we’ll be in a situation where the relatively few who pursue a PhD in, say, English, will have a good chance at having the kind of comfortable career your professor had.
But nostalgia is almost never recoverable. I suspect the push into virtual will continue inexorably, at least for a while. Young people coming up now will have a say in how far it goes. Certainly, their relationship with digital tech often makes me uncomfortable, but I don’t think I have a say in that relationship.
Virtual learning ought to be a boon for many students — the shy student, the disabled, anybody living in the middle of nowhere — but I think most college students recognize and desire an in-person experience. Virtual ought also to help keep college costs down, but that appears to be happening anyway:
I’ve never quite understood the Ivy angle. Your own example demonstrates that one doesn’t need celebrity teachers at a highly selective school to reach their potential. Is it just for the connections? Looking at, say, where the Biden cabinet were educated, you might very well think it was largely an East Coast elite. But maybe that’s a different question.
"A colleague of mine who did his undergrad at St. Lawrence University (a fine liberal arts school) and his PhD at Iowa, confessed that his own graduate program would not hire him. Iowa wants faculty with Yale, Harvard, and Stanford degrees so it can compete in the scarcity game."
I experienced the same thing, albeit not in academia. I went to law school at Georgetown and Emory, with my degree issued by Emory, but when I wanted to apply for a job with Emory's Office of General Counsel years later (after being a partner at the 5th largest law firm in the country), I was told not to bother because the General Counsel only wanted applicants with degrees from Ivy League law schools.
Sidenote: Tracy Chapman: a singer-songwriter who actually went to college (so many don’t). This week’s NYTimes Popcast podcast features an interview with the writer who did the 1988 Rolling Stone cover article on Chapman and her reluctance even then to embrace celebrity and fame.
Great piece with smart analysis interspersed with a compelling personal story. Thank you for writing this.
May I also mention: Virtual education doesn't work. There is massive attrition, and for those who do complete courses, achievement is much lower, because most people cannot continue to commit to learning material on their own for a reward as shallow as a credential. The only reason education was ever important, as with every other meaningful human activity, is for the connections it allows with other humans. Making it about the "product" of a credential reverses the order.
Great analysis Josh. I actually read some portions out loud to Tom by way of emphasizing my own experience.
Glad you got to spend time with a teacher who had such a powerful impact on you.
I detest academia now for these very reasons among others, i.e., racism, white supremacy, sexism, classism, and misogyny. I make slightly more money tutoring writing this year with less stress. It's also allowing me to write a lot more. My terminal degree is an MFA in creative writing. I may not go back to adjunct teaching if I don't have too. Dr. Biden teaches at a community college. She has to be aware of this, and I am ticked she doesn't use her platform to speak against the exploitation of adjuncts and the neoliberalism and corporatization of higher education.
I suppose the supply and demand imbalance that drives some of this — too many PhDs, particularly in some areas, and too few students, particularly in some areas — will eventually correct itself. At that point maybe we’ll be in a situation where the relatively few who pursue a PhD in, say, English, will have a good chance at having the kind of comfortable career your professor had.
But nostalgia is almost never recoverable. I suspect the push into virtual will continue inexorably, at least for a while. Young people coming up now will have a say in how far it goes. Certainly, their relationship with digital tech often makes me uncomfortable, but I don’t think I have a say in that relationship.
Virtual learning ought to be a boon for many students — the shy student, the disabled, anybody living in the middle of nowhere — but I think most college students recognize and desire an in-person experience. Virtual ought also to help keep college costs down, but that appears to be happening anyway:
https://www.economist.com/united-states/2023/07/23/american-universities-have-an-incentive-to-seem-extortionate
I’ve never quite understood the Ivy angle. Your own example demonstrates that one doesn’t need celebrity teachers at a highly selective school to reach their potential. Is it just for the connections? Looking at, say, where the Biden cabinet were educated, you might very well think it was largely an East Coast elite. But maybe that’s a different question.
"A colleague of mine who did his undergrad at St. Lawrence University (a fine liberal arts school) and his PhD at Iowa, confessed that his own graduate program would not hire him. Iowa wants faculty with Yale, Harvard, and Stanford degrees so it can compete in the scarcity game."
I experienced the same thing, albeit not in academia. I went to law school at Georgetown and Emory, with my degree issued by Emory, but when I wanted to apply for a job with Emory's Office of General Counsel years later (after being a partner at the 5th largest law firm in the country), I was told not to bother because the General Counsel only wanted applicants with degrees from Ivy League law schools.