Bret Devereaux's writing is often cited here for his writing about warfare, logistics, and the like. But he occasionally writes also about his own profession and the difficulties in getting there, c.f. https://acoup.blog/2021/10/01/collections-so-you-want-to-go-...
He also laments the difficulty in getting a full professorship (an opportunity recently denied to him) and finds universities increasingly focused on "paycheck degrees" such as STEM, which seems to rankle him. But it seems a likely outcome from the demographic and economic changes laid out in this article. I wish him all the best, I enjoy his writings, but I confess that my tech career seems more stable even with recent layoffs shaking the market.
A few points in an attempt to improve the discussion of education here:
1. The current model is not the only model. The US higher education system is unique amongst Western countries, AFAIK, in having both a very high cost and a large number of private institutions. This could (and probably should, IMO) change.
2. There is not one goal to education. For example, some people get an education to get a job while some people get an education to follow their interests. These are both valid reasons.
3. Education can drive equality or inequality, depending on how it is implemented. The current US system (and the UK system, to a lesser extent) probably drives inequality more than the other way around, but this is not the way it has to be.
Regarding 3, lots of things drive inequality, but there is no reason to address the myriad reasons, especially ones that cannot be addressed such as differences in innate ability or the parents you have.
If the problem is inequality, and the solution is deemed to be reducing inequality, then a marginal sales/income/wealth/estate tax to redistribute wealth is the only necessary solution.
> there is no reason to address the myriad reasons, especially ones that cannot be addressed such as differences in innate ability or the parents you have.
Why not?
I think most people tend to overestimate the degree of variation in innate ability among the general population. Most of what might typically be considered "innate ability" is actually a result of factors that are not innate at all.
To your second example - Do you really assume that nothing can be done to mitigate the potentially negative impact of having the "wrong" parents? I have a family member who works in education and spends lots of time working on that specific problem.
Creating an educational system that works for the majority of people, as opposed to the elite, doesn't have to be a destructive, or even particularly controversial, endeavor.
It is too complicated, and I do not even think possible.
Tackling problems directly, in the simplest way possible results the least amount of corruption.
Suppose you even “solved“ the discrepancy in parents, now you still have a million other inequalities, such as attractiveness, height, skin tone, accent, etc.
The goal is not to have an equal, uniform society. The goal is to put a limit on the size of the gap between opportunities available to all, and provide the freedom to move up and down within it.
> Do you really assume that nothing can be done to mitigate the potentially negative impact of having the "wrong" parents? I have a family member who works in education and spends lots of time working on that specific problem
Yes, I think certain factors of “success” require generations to cultivate. This does not mean people are not worth helping, but that it is not realistic to expect to be able to bridge the gap between two children from vastly disparate backgrounds just via schooling them in a different way from age 5 to 18.
In any other industry, expansion and contraction are expected oscillations. Demand surges and the industry expands; demand falls and it consolidates.
For some reason we are constantly told that the proliferation of independent colleges over the last 200 years was good, and their consolidation is bad.
Every other industry responds to the market, adapts to changing technology, accepts reality. Yet colleges want to duplicate the same courses throughout thousands of schools, charge eye-popping tuition backed by non-dischargeable loans, and make us feel bad that some of them have to close. Their main product is a piece of paper - not fundamental education.
Why can’t Harvard teach the entire country? Why do we need “prestige”? The technology is here. We don’t need 3000 different schools.
Harvard's selling proposal is not its quality of education, but its exclusivity in admissions. A Harvard graduate is not special because of their graduation, but because he got into Havard the first place (pre-college academic achievement here is just as good as being part of the gilded elite: They select for exceptional, not for 'good enough').
If everyone is super, no-one is. Of course that's something some people want.
I worked at an ivy league college and asked my boss (who now happens to run the college) why the college didn't expand since there was so much demand. He said those the college rejected could go to other schools, this college was only for the best of the best. (And of course the children of alumni donators.)
Over time I've realized that college exclusivity works exactly like image management for a pop star. You start by controlling where your image is available, sue those who use your image without permission, set up a press release outlet, create press packages. It is basically perception management. Being exclusive by rejecting most applicants and not expanding to teach more students is part of the perception management. It is a lot like the artificial scarcity of diamonds.
Online's already booming. Western Governors University -> Georgia Tech is becoming a common quick way to go from nothing to a MA in comp sci in 3 years.
These pipelines will continue developing while in person opportunities will be concentrate toward elite schools and those who don't want to rush their way to future employment. Networking etc. benefits in person are also higher.
Your username suggest to me that you probably see some value in decentralization. Education, of all things, shouldn't come from a single source. Institutions having different views on what and how to teach is a feature. The resulting discourse created by that difference leads to further academic advancements that can benefit everyone.
You do make a good point about us under utilizing technology though. We should be pumping money into open courseware models as an alternative to encouraging children to start off their adult life in often irrecoverable debt.
There is a ton of value, both academic and not, in going to college but let's not be so naive as to think that we can sustain a system whereby it's worthwhile for everyone to attend a brick and mortar university. Let's give the poorest among us a great alternative using the amazing technology at our disposal, today.
Are you implying video courses are worthwhile at all for most students?
Harvard can't teach the entire nation because their campus cannot accommodate the entire nation. Even if they opened satellite campuses, they'd still be secondary (or at least separate from) to the real Harvard.
Ironically these claims and questions - and similar ones common in STEMish communities like HN - make for critical thought that wouldn't pass in a good professor's class. They negatively impact the discussion.
We can think, rather than invest in non-issues and rhetoric, and with hard thought we add value and improve our situation and world. We can do it.
> Their main product is a piece of paper - not fundamental education.
Critical thought is the fundamental of education.
As examples, some serious questions are: What education works best in what conditions? Our dimensions are: Locally / remotely; Interactive / one-way / other (e.g., peer discussion); Topic characteristics; Student characteristics; Teacher characteristics; duration of class; duration of term. Probably there are more, and it's a complex matrix to tease apart. Then, seeing what works, we can see apply technology.
We can also look at outcomes for individuals and for our society: How many benefit from colleges as is? What if we changed teaching? What value does college provide, economically, socially, etc.?
>Critical thought is the fundamental of education.
I haven't seen any school that explicitly and effectively teaches critical thought. Many seem rather offended by it. As to your main point, I wonder if you've heard of Brian Caplan's "The Case Against Education"? In it, he (a Ph.D professor of Economics) ruthlessly analyzes exactly what you mention in the end, examining the actual provided value of higher education and concludes that for both the individual and society, it's rather shockingly overvalued. If you want a very data-driven analysis of the question of the current value of higher education, I haven't seen a better one.
We could have some backups, say, 9 universities max. Depend on how we design the system. For example, is major based a right approach? Are Engineering university, Medical university optimal, resource wise? A lot to think about the economy of education.
Most people don't need it. Look at sports. Why do top athletes have their own personal coaches, fitness trainers, nutritionists, psychologists, data analysts etc?
I don't quite understand the point you're making. Most people don't need what? A Harvard education, prestige, or a college education in general? What do "top athletes" demonstrate in support of your point?
He also laments the difficulty in getting a full professorship (an opportunity recently denied to him) and finds universities increasingly focused on "paycheck degrees" such as STEM, which seems to rankle him. But it seems a likely outcome from the demographic and economic changes laid out in this article. I wish him all the best, I enjoy his writings, but I confess that my tech career seems more stable even with recent layoffs shaking the market.