CDZ The College Bubble Bust, How Bad is it?

[william the wie]

Having a generic degree has been a disaster for quite a while but some analysts are claiming that it has taken a turn for the worse and I didn't think that was possible. Anyone know what's going on and willing to explain the problem? I mean what does it matter if the liberal arts colleges close?

 

[ScienceRocks]

We're already having a hard time competing against asia and the rest of the world...This would mean the downfall of our country.

 

[SYTFE]

Other than getting a degree for one of the major professions, colleges are only good for meeting hot chicks and getting drunk. But not everyone is going to be a doctor, a lawyer, an architect, etc. The real problem is that universities themselves have been somewhat unable to keep up with the rapidly changing modern world.

The other elephant in the room that few seem to discuss is the fact that many disruptive businesses are slowly killing off jobs. Analysts, pundits and talking heads are too busy singing their praises, I guess. The cold ruthless double edged sword of technological advances is a big factor as well. At the same time though, there are still many companies that won't hire people unless they have a bachelors degree in something at least.

 

[frigidweirdo]

Having a generic degree has been a disaster for quite a while but some analysts are claiming that it has taken a turn for the worse and I didn't think that was possible. Anyone know what's going on and willing to explain the problem? I mean what does it matter if the liberal arts colleges close?

Oh, wow, right wingers again calling for the end of education.

 

[DarkFury]

Having a generic degree has been a disaster for quite a while but some analysts are claiming that it has taken a turn for the worse and I didn't think that was possible. Anyone know what's going on and willing to explain the problem? I mean what does it matter if the liberal arts colleges close?

It does not and you only half to look to Mexico for the results of socialist education. They offer degrees in how to be clean and dress right. That offers degrees for baby sitting and cleaning a house.

 

[Toronado3800]

Having a generic degree has been a disaster for quite a while but some analysts are claiming that it has taken a turn for the worse and I didn't think that was possible. Anyone know what's going on and willing to explain the problem? I mean what does it matter if the liberal arts colleges close?

It is difficult for a private or even public institution to turn down $$,$$$ or even $$$,$$$ for a "generic degree" even if they would rather be issuing a more focused or scientific degree.

I am aware of the pay to graduation state universities in the area and now I am in a position to hire folks or not based on that.

Capitalism should make these degrees less desirable. Off course the internet makes capitalism work like a race to the bottom with many products....

 

[cnelsen]

There is a difference between well-educated and well-trained.

 

[william the wie]

A mechanic has to take care of how many years and models vs. The two basic models of human a physician repairs and the mechanic is considered the dumber of the two? I knew that was off base Now the whole shooting match of higher education has gone to hell?

 

[MarathonMike]

College curriculums will have to adapt. So far they haven't had to because incoming students and their parents haven't been savvy enough to demand a better value for the six figures they are shelling out. I think we are about 5 years away from seeing real change in college education. But right now I still see high school age kids and their parents blindly applying to college X, Y and Z with little thought given to "what is the payback on this investment"?

 

[Disir]

Having a generic degree has been a disaster for quite a while but some analysts are claiming that it has taken a turn for the worse and I didn't think that was possible. Anyone know what's going on and willing to explain the problem? I mean what does it matter if the liberal arts colleges close?

A generic degree? Most universities provide a "generic degree" unless it is necessary to answer the requirements of some other accreditation.

What Can You Do With That (Useless) Liberal Arts Degree? A Lot More Than You Think

Sure, there are a few degrees (like philosophy) that go nowhere. A bachelor degree in psychology doesn't do anything. Some degrees you need to be independently wealthy to pursue because they fall into the begging for funding category. But, the pretense that liberal arts majors are useless came out of the last financial crisis. Legal has been outsourced and off shored, banking has been off shored, etc. and so on. Hell, teaching was destroyed when it was decided a degree wasn't needed.

But, what's funny is that IT was destroyed, majoring in sciences isn't all that anymore because R&D was off shored. California hired engineers from China even though there was/is more than enough local. And we get to watch nursing destroyed.

So, the name of the game is to destroy the jobs and then point fingers at people and pretend it didn't happen or pull some excuse out of the behind and label it economics........the softest science there is. It's almost as good a line as we have to go to war in the ME because you drive.

 

[Fishlore]

Having a generic degree has been a disaster for quite a while but some analysts are claiming that it has taken a turn for the worse and I didn't think that was possible. Anyone know what's going on and willing to explain the problem? I mean what does it matter if the liberal arts colleges close?

Having a liberal arts degree is not a disaster compared to not having a college degree. In terms of current employment and lifetime earning, a BA degree is valuable indeed.

Liberal arts colleges are not going to close. We are going to dramatically expand the percent of the next generation that goes to college by lifting the affordability barrier. The good of America demands it. The alternative is to grow the bitter and disaffected Trump fans who never went to college and never learned much in high school either.

 

[MarathonMike]

I agree that Liberal Arts colleges will not close, but I do believe they will be forced to adapt in the next few years. That might be either significantly reducing the cost of Arts degrees and/or augmenting the choices with more technology oriented degrees. That wouldn't have to be straight up engineering, math or physics but traditional degrees with an emphasis on data analysis and/or computer skills. For instance Political Science but with a statistical emphasis (think Karl Rove and his white board).

 

[william the wie]

I agree that Liberal Arts colleges will not close, but I do believe they will be forced to adapt in the next few years. That might be either significantly reducing the cost of Arts degrees and/or augmenting the choices with more technology oriented degrees. That wouldn't have to be straight up engineering, math or physics but traditional degrees with an emphasis on data analysis and/or computer skills. For instance Political Science but with a statistical emphasis (think Karl Rove and his white board).

Sounds good but the students in liberal arts school either can't pass those courses or don't need them to run their family's trading at freeports to avoid taxation.

 

[Picaro]

I've seen first hand the ridiculous requirements many businesses make up for positions in the tech fields, and universities as well; they will require a 4 year degree for jobs like receptionists, which is ridiculous. In the tech fields you get the same sort of nonsense. I was asked to hire another employee for a laser project, we needed a tech according to them, as they claimed they 'couldn't find anybody qualified', which I thought was odd, so I went to the HR dept. and started going through apps and resumes, which is an enlightening experience in itself, but in any case I found a guy in the 'Do Not Hire' stack who had the best qualifications: He had a business repairing lawn mower and small businesses, and other experience using hand tools. High school education was it. He picked up laser alignments and tunings in less than a week. They were demanding degrees, bizarre levels of experience, etc., for what was basically just an assembly position. this guy knew less than nothing about lasers and electro-optics, and did just fine. This sort of ridiculous certification mania stupidity is rife throughout Silly Con Valley and the corporate bureaucracies of today.

 

[Picaro]

Having a generic degree has been a disaster for quite a while but some analysts are claiming that it has taken a turn for the worse and I didn't think that was possible. Anyone know what's going on and willing to explain the problem? I mean what does it matter if the liberal arts colleges close?

Having a liberal arts degree is not a disaster compared to not having a college degree. In terms of current employment and lifetime earning, a BA degree is valuable indeed.

Liberal arts colleges are not going to close. We are going to dramatically expand the percent of the next generation that goes to college by lifting the affordability barrier. The good of America demands it. The alternative is to grow the bitter and disaffected Trump fans who never went to college and never learned much in high school either.

Yes, you're going to run ever bigger construction budgets and jam even more seat warmers in, and dumb down the system even more than it already is in order to keep filling those seats, and give yourselves ever bigger salaries and bennies from milking the system, same as you've been for the last 50 years.

 

[Rambunctious]

You can not teach a person well if you are trying to brainwash them at the same time.

 

[cnelsen]

Having a liberal arts degree is not a disaster compared to not having a college degree. In terms of current employment and lifetime earning, a BA degree is valuable indeed.

This is your first mistake--lumping training and education into the same basket. The purpose of an education is to teach humans to think. It is not to make their bank accounts bigger. Getting a law degree does not make you "educated". It only trains you to be a lawyer. Back when only a small percentage of the population got a college degree, it was generally the very motivated, very energetic, very smart kids went off to some institution somewhere to become "educated". These kids, unsurprisingly, tended also to do well over the course of their lives. Someone noticed that people who were successful also tended to have gone to college and came to the conclusion the college causes success. Most people can recognize the logical fallacy of that. However, it is accepted today as a given that, to succeed, you need to go to college. It's even on the Dept of Ed's website, as if college is a kind of magical place somewhere where you can go sit in these magical rooms for four years and when you return, people will automatically pay you more for your time. Now we have this as a friend sent me this morning from a class he "teaches"

In truth, this "student" is little more than a social security number serving to funnel taxpayer money to guys like this:

http://craignelsen.com/library/strayer.html

Liberal arts colleges are not going to close. We are going to dramatically expand the percent of the next generation that goes to college by lifting the affordability barrier. The good of America demands it. The alternative is to grow the bitter and disaffected Trump fans who never went to college and never learned much in high school either.

No, the "good" of America does not demand it. But then, you probably know that.

 

[usmbguest5318]

Having a generic degree has been a disaster for quite a while but some analysts are claiming that it has taken a turn for the worse and I didn't think that was possible. Anyone know what's going on and willing to explain the problem? I mean what does it matter if the liberal arts colleges close?

What? There is no such thing as a generic degree. No college or university offers a four year B.S. or B.A. in "general studies." One takes either of those degrees in specific field.

Has it occurred to you that liberal arts colleges offer among the most in-demand degrees one can obtain?

• Williams
• Amherst
• Middlebury
• Swarthmore
• Wellesley

What liberal arts colleges don't offer are undergraduate professional degrees, examples of which at the undergraduate level include business and engineering. What's the difference? There is considerably less theory and vastly more practice associated with a professional degree as compared with a non-professional degree. Broadly speaking, how does that "play out" pedagogically and scholastically? Students that are taught theory are required to think for themselves about how to apply their discipline's theory to solve practical problems. Professional degrees, on the other hand, a little bit about an assortment of theories from multiple disciplines, and teach students a variety of ways to apply them.

Is one methodology better than the other? In general, no. For any given individual, however, one approach to learning how to think may be more effective for them than the other. I took an economics degree and later got an MBA with a "self employment" concentration. A colleague of mine took an accounting degree with a history minor and also got an MBA with a operations management concentration. Other colleagues have humanities, engineering, computer science, etc. undergrad degrees with a variety of graduate degrees though the MBA is the most common, followed by math, tax masters, computer science, Ed doctorates, and MPAs. We are all equally adept at doing our jobs and we're all well compensated.

For very few careers does one's actual degree(s) matter. Why? Because above a certain level, one spends most of one's time generating ideas, managing people and managing processes, not performing tasks that require the skills associated a single specific field of study. It's the work one does in the early stages of a career that require those very specific skills.

P.S./Edit:
The most important skill of all -- critical thinking -- is honed as one pursues any degree, thought the foundations of that skill are taught in high school.