A somewhat depressing recent TIME article (The Future of College, March 9, p. 32) continued the obsession with getting into the top universities (Ivies, or 'Ivy-Plus') to secure "great jobs" and join the top 1 percent. As we read:
"Fewer than 1% of Americans attend the 12 'Ivy-Plus' colleges (the eight Ivy League schools plus Stanford, MIT, Duke, and the University of Chicago). Yet they account for over 13 percent of the top earners, half of all Rhodes scholars, and three fourths of the Supreme Court Justices appointed in the last half century."
This thinking totally places the 'cart before the horse' and is even more shortsighted when one considers 62 percent of Americans (more than 3 out of 5) have no college degree. So what are they, chopped liver? Rather than obsessing about how many more we can 'squeeze' into the Ivies we ought to be thinking how many more we just get into college, period. It is college that provides the ticket to higher earning power over a lifetime, not Ivy or Ivy-plus education.
This educational polarization is also at the root of much of the division and political polarization afflicting the country. It also explains why so many younger voters - lacking the critical thinking afforded by a sound college education - were unable to see through Trump's barrage of lies in the 2024 election. See e.g.
Young voters helped elect Trump, but some have regrets over the Iran war - The Washington Post
Wherein we read in the first paragraph:
Joshua Byers was hopeful when he voted for Donald Trump in
2024. The 26-year-old document clerk believed the former and future president
when he said he would lower prices and improve the lives of the working class.
Bearing this out, a later paragraph wherein we read:
Young people who supported Trump are also notably less
enthusiastic about voting in the midterms, with 51 percent of 18- to
39-year-olds who voted for Trump stating they’re certain to vote this fall,
compared with 77 percent of Kamala Harris voters in that age group.
The difference is glaring given most Harris voters had the benefit of college education. The young Trump voters, on the other hand, lacked the foundation and benefit of critical thinking. Hence, no surprise they blame the voting system itself rather than their own inability to properly parse the candidates. (Another young female Trump voter is quoted as saying she found Kamala Harris "too chaotic". Too chaotic how? It was Trump who barked in their only debate, "They're eating the cats and dogs!")
Byers, like to many of his peers, fell for Trump's claptrap and lies. Mainly because they were unable to do 'deep dive' reading on his political background in actual newspapers, websites - as opposed to Tik Tok and influencer, podcast codswallop. So no surprise we read later:
“I don’t really want to vote anymore. I’m
really starting to just think it just won’t matter. … I don’t want to feel
responsible for taking a vote and feeling misled, or misjudged, or making a
wrong move.”
But that's the damned problem when you vote on a lark, or on hunches or feelings from podcasts, as opposed to doing your homework! Had Byers (or his female friend) enough college critical thinking background I doubt they'd have fallen for Trump's bollocks.
Contradicting this focus and emphasis on the argument for more and more elite education (to make more $) - as opposed to more higher education - is the essay:
'The Myth of Higher Education'
By Dr. Steven B. Mason in the Oct. 2010 issue of Integra:
As Mason so aptly put it:
"The bottom line regarding a well -rounded college education is that it has
nothing to do with any kind of bottom line. Its value (non-monetary) is to be
found in the quality it adds to one's life. It allows one to better appreciate
music, art, history and literature. It contributes to a better understanding of
language and culture, nature and philosophy. It expands rather than limits
horizons and replaces faith and belief with reason and logic"
Mason adds that it "teaches a person to live - not to earn a living" - and that "living encompasses an incentive for learning for its own sake".
Bolstering this from a slightly different angle was Frank Bruni's 2016 NY Times' Review Op-Ed 'Why College Rankings Are A Joke' . His essay merits commendations for exposing the annual college rankings marketing racket. From numerous points of view Bruni skewers the commonplace trope that a media listing of colleges, universities can provide a seminal insight into quality. And, of course, which schools always end up at the top? Well, the Ivies because they peddle their brand most ardently and invest the time in advertising, and marketing that brand to too many gullible parents- who then join battle with tens of thousands of other parents. All intent on getting Junior or Missy into the "best" school.
But most of this effort is doomed to end up merely with outstanding college debts, and the graduates will leave without having received the specific education they expected. Whereas, if they hadn't been blinded by the brand they might have made a more judicious pick. As Bruni puts it:
"The rankings nourish the myth that the richest, most selective colleges have some corner on superior education."
Reinforcing this take was the May 2011 issue of MONEY magazine piece:
"Don't assume an Ivy League education is better than one from a public or state university."
MONEY found that key data measures or 'bang for the buck' included college graduation rates and post-college success rates - which compared favorably to - or exceeded - what one obtained from the hallowed Ivies. Alas, this has still not trickled down into the mainstream media (like TIME) where the elite education obsession still seems to be just getting into an Ivy or Ivy-Plus to make life bearable.
So no wonder students and their parents are neurotically driven to believe the Ivies are the only route to success. Or in the case of the recent TIME essay, having a chance to reach the upper 1 percent. But just getting into an Ivy or Ivy -plus with no thought of the context, or the student's particular aspirations or skills can have devastating consequences down the line.
What should most motivate people is the import of just getting into a good university but making the most of the opportunity there. That means taking courses that include enhancing and developing critical thinking, not just how to make more money. We who attended college in the 60s, 70s had that benefit but I am not sure how many have it now. And make no mistake that the selective media emphasis on aspiring to get into elite schools turns away many kids who might otherwise have wanted to attend college.
From Bruni's piece, it is highly instructive to see the assorted factors - all highly subjective- that are used to arrive at the elite rankings. For example, one is how highly officials at peer institutions rank said school. But as Bruni observes, if they know little or nothing about it (especially for the specific field) why would you expect anything other than a low to mediocre rank? In such a case it is more plausible they'd go by the "reputation" - but where does that originate? Well, usually from earlier US News rankings! So it's a case of subjective brand incest piled atop more perception incest.
To quote Bruni's still timely piece again:
"Intentionally or not, these rankings fuel a frenzy to get into the most selective schools. But they can't adjust for how well certain colleges serve certain ambitions."
And they lead to abominations and misfires like the Varsity Blues scandal, e.g.
College Admissions Scandal - The New York Times
So the parents who so feverishly paid to open elite college doors, ended up serving times. What if instead they had cultivated their sons' or daughters' interests in particular fields they wanted to enter, as opposed to a specific high end university? Well, things might have been much different.
Maybe a kid saw images of the aurora firing up the Arctic sky in a PBS documentary, and now wants to study the physical mechanisms driving it in detail. Will he be able to do this at Harvard, or even MIT? Not very likely. At least to the same extent as actually being in the Arctic and having access to resources such as provided by the Poker Flat rockets, or HAARP (High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program).
Perceptive citizens, especially parents, shouldn't be so hamstrung because they have nothing to prove to anyone else. If they are truly dedicated to the welfare of their charges they will do what is best for them- and that means securing the best college for their particular talents. And once they get there, maximizing the benefits outlined earlier by Dr. Steve Mason - especially critical thinking.
See Also:
Collapse Of The Humanities Isn't Merely For Dept. Of Art History At Yale
And:
Fewer Americans Value A College Degree? A Possible Explanation
And:
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