The National Association of Scholars recently published a study on required summer reading for incoming college students and in this Guardian piece, Ashley Thorne (of NAS) discusses the findings. Almost never do schools pick works that could be described as classics. Instead, the choices are almost always quite contemporary, and usually have some political theme to them.

Evidently, one reason for choosing modern books is that the authors can be invited to give a talk at the college or university. You have to wonder if the hefty price tag for doing that is a sensible use of limited funds.