Adam Kissel of FIRE has a provocative article in the new Academic Questions entitled “Will Universities Rediscover Their Core Mission as They Shrink?”
He thinks they might: “As universities shrink and higher education loses air — more like a hissing tire than a bursting bubble — the pressure of competition will rise as we’ve never seen before, and colleges will feel the need to make clear what their core missions are and what they really stand for.”
There is a lot of splendid writing in the piece — this line for example: “It’s easy, I guess, to let students ricochet their way through college, pinball style, simply amassing a magic number of credit hours by hitting enough bumpers.”
That describes very well the “college experience” for many students these days. So long as just having some college degree was thought to be highly desirable because most people assumed that having one opened the doors to success, that sort of “education” seemed satisfactory. If, as I suspect, Americans will increasingly question the need for getting the generic college degree, then colleges and universities probably will feel the pressure to offer real education with their more limited resources. The fighting to preserve politically correct but educationally worthless programs — especially those that are rooted in the diversity mania — will be fun to watch.
My prediction is that core missions will be to deliver the most diverse, inclusive, no hurt feelings, education possible.
The "studies" departments and "Diversity" administration will continue to grow.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIf Parkinson's Law is any guide, the last thing to shink will be administration. When the number of students falls below the number of administrators, they'll hire someone to chair a commission to look into the matter.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe "studies" departments get a lot of flak, much of it well-deserved, but they do not account for many majors. The real culprits for low-value education are departments like communications, marketing, some business departments, etc. Lots of majors, lots of fluff.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseGrievance Studies departments may not produce many majors but the do produce a lot of minors and their courses are insinuated all over the breadth requirements in many universities, especially state universities.
Plus, the departments themselves serve as launch pads for careerist kook professors.
They're the NPR and NEA of academia. They've got to go. (Defunding the Left is over 30 years overdue.)
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