Quote of the day: on American higher education

America’s universities lost their way badly in the era of easy money. If they do not find it again, they may go the way of GM.

Yep.
I have been writing and blogging about this for years, much to the displeasure of my colleagues :)

Anyway, that quote is from The Economist's Schumpeter column, where it is further noted that:

Two right-wing think-tanks, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) and the Goldwater Institute, have both produced damning reports about America’s university system. Two left-wing academics, Andrew Hacker and Claudia Dreifus, have published an even more damning book: “Higher Education? How Colleges are Wasting Our Money and Failing Our Kids and What We Can Do About It”. And US News & World Report, a centrist magazine, says in its annual survey of American colleges that: “If colleges were businesses, they would be ripe for hostile takeovers, complete with serious cost-cutting and painful reorganisations.”

The contemporary state of American higher education is under severe criticism from the right, left, and center; anybody feeling left out, please take a number and await your turn :)
So, ...

This luxury model is unlikely to survive what is turning into a prolonged economic downturn. Parents are much less willing to take on debt than they were and much more willing to look abroad for better deals. The internet also poses a growing threat to what Bill Gates calls “place-based colleges”. Online, you can listen to the world’s best lecturers for next to nothing.

Again, as far as I am concerned, Schumpeter is late to this party. I have consistently blogged about how such a system cannot continue anymore, and have repeatedly pointed to the online mode too.  But then, nobody listens to me, and if they do it is only to tell me that I have no free speech rights :)

I really, really, hope that the reforms will come from within. Because, those imposed from the outside will completely screw up the liberal education that I so cherish.

BTW, I had a delightful conversation with Claudia Dreifus.  First I got an email from her; apparently she had read something really interesting in my blog.  In my reply, I gave her my cell number, and a couple of hours it was Claudia Dreifus at the phone.  Her email and phone call made my day :)