The Cost of Education and the Rights of Expectation

That the cost of education is sky-rocketing comes as no surprise to anyone. In the late 80s, I accrued a student loan in the range of forty thousand dollars. Today it is common for students to leave their undergraduate education with a student loan exceeding one hundred thousand; I’ve read reports of students graduating with B.A. degrees from tony ivy-league universities with loans over two hundred and fifty thousand. That price tag is equivalent to buying a house. Imagine being twenty-two years old with a thirty-year home mortgage, and not a starter home at that, and on the lookout for an entry-level job.

Yet at the same time, we live in a consumer culture. Buying a car? Of course one negotiates, paying more for the sun roof, asking for less when the color isn’t one’s first choice. If that car doesn’t please the customer during the first month, the customer takes it back for a refund. Can the same be done with a college degree? Does the person shelling out a hundred thousand dollars have the right to complain if their college experience doesn’t “meet their expectations”? Should that same person also complain if their college degree doesn’t “guarantee” a career and salary of his or her liking? Notice I say “person shelling out” the money—more often than not, that person is a parent, not a student.

Parents and students have already begun to make that leap. “I paid a lot of money for this degree, and I expect you to give me an A.” I hear this already at the low end of the totem pole; how frustrated will I be after another five to ten years of dealing with it? I have also noticed another trend: the people making this complaint are the very people who apply little to no effort into achieving the degree in the first place.

Charles Murray, author of the often-criticized book, The Bell Curve (the media reported Murray’s connection of race to intelligence as stated fact rather than concerned implication), has recently argued that colleges should scrap the bachelor’s degree and replace it with certification programs. He models this notion on the CPA exam. According to Murray’s argument in the Wall Street Journal, “Outside a handful of majors -- engineering and some of the sciences -- a bachelor's degree tells an employer nothing except that the applicant has a certain amount of intellectual ability and perseverance. Even a degree in a vocational major like business administration can mean anything from a solid base of knowledge to four years of barely remembered gut courses.” Evan R. Goldstein, in his response, “Degrees of Potential,” in the September 5, 2008, issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education, has already addressed how such a program can’t work. One of the more surprising (and devastating) arguments involves liability, that such certification programs will be inundated with claims of employment-discrimination.

Murray’s argument, however, offers another, more surprising implication.

Students (or parents) are not the customer base for a college or university.

Employers are the university’s true customer.

Employers hire based on the qualifications of the degree the university confers. I know, based on conversations with business school administrators of a large southern state university, that some corporations have already begun to differentiate the quality of new hires from particular degree programs. On the other hand, many corporations don’t make those distinctions, other than whether the candidate holds a B.A. or not. I know from personal experience, spending twelve years working in corporate, eight of them with a multi-national corporation, affiliated with sales, IT and human resources, that hiring managers do indeed expect that a bachelor’s degree confirms “that the applicant has a certain amount of intellectual ability and perseverance.” The intellectual ability involves critical thinking, problem solving and communication skills. The perseverance suggests time and project management, interpersonal skill sets (with both colleagues—classmates—and superiors—professors), and the ability to balance work versus play. I frequently grew frustrated that hiring managers never asked any further question other than “Do you have a B.A.?” I wanted to interrupt, “But let me tell you about my major. Don’t you want to know which school?” I had worked my way through a regionally prestigious liberal arts university. Nor did anyone ever ask me about my GPA. All that hard work to graduate with honors, and no one cared.

The lack of the B.A., however, curtailed the careers of some of my colleagues. And perhaps I’m revealing part of the intellectual snobbery that Murray identifies as the mystique around the bachelor’s degree, but I could tell a difference in the demeanor and skill sets of my colleagues without a degree. Part of the issue lay in an inability to diagnose problems and offer effective solutions. Yet there was something else. They lacked a certain ability to interact with their peers, mostly on a social level. They lacked a certain polish, what Donald Bartholomae, the rhetoric and composition guru, would call a “discourse.” They couldn’t “speak” the language, and that language included more than just words; it included tone, delivery and composure.

Which brings me to my main point—perhaps colleges and universities should enquire what exactly our “customers” seek in the 21st century, but with a considered inquiry into who exactly are our “customers.” These “customers” clearly are not happy. According to the often quoted NEA “Reading at Risk” survey, 38% finds high school graduates “deficient” in reading skills, while 63% rated those skills “very important.” They also report that the number of college graduates with deficient reading skills had increased by 23%. What skills sets are needed? Is academia qualified to answer that question without input? I also suggest that we consider that the medieval nature of the university has reasserted itself—we are an apprenticeship program, not a certification program. The professoriate represents a collection of individuals who dedicate their lives to the mastery of one single skill set. Each professor measures the acquisition of skill, not knowledge, based on a mutual agreement between our own expertise and the expectations and needs of the “market. “

To my colleagues who find such a paradigm too mercenary, based too much on capitalist business models, I refer them to Louis Althusser’s work on Ideological State Apparatuses: schools teach students “the ‘rules’ of good behavior, i.e. . . . rules for morality, civic and professional conscience, which actually means rules of respect for the socio-technical division of labor and ultimately the rules of the order established by class domination.” We teach students to appear before us on time, in an orderly fashion, sit in rows, accept their identities to be reduced to numbers and perform tasks per schedules, all to create perfect members of the petty bourgeoisie. The reason I bring Althusser’s critique to my colleagues’ attention is to remind them that even their fight against such ideological entrenchment only furthers the illusion of academia’s neutrality. To them Althusser has already written—“I ask pardon of those teachers who, in dreadful conditions, attempt to turn the few weapons they can find in the history and learning they ‘teach’ against ideology, the system and practices in which they are trapped. They are a kind of hero. . . . So little do they suspect it that their own devotion contributes to the maintenance and nourishment of this ideological representation of the School, which makes the School today as ‘natural,’ indispensable-useful and even beneficial.” The current education system already works in tandem with the market whether we agree or not, or even whether we fight it or not—perhaps we should address this situation on a more conscious level.

In addition, academia should consider other portions of our social networks. Our “customers” are not just the industrial-military complex, but health care, science and public administration, into which I include non-profits. Perhaps if academia is more specific about the number and kinds of professors universities need, we would also save ourselves the ethical quandary of creating thousands of new Ph.D.s, especially in the Liberal Arts, for the handful of jobs that come available each year. The “market,” however that is defined, with as many components from the arts as will make my colleagues comfortable and not some ethereal ivory tower ethos, should determine what skill sets we should teach. At the same time, that same market should realize that academia is the best organization qualified to teach those skill sets, a “Tell us what you want, and we’ll tell you how to make it happen” mentality.

And, yes, I’m fully briefed on academia’s mission to enlighten, to broaden, to better each individual, mentally, emotionally, maybe even spiritually, and that by doing so, we improve the human condition. I wonder, though, if that ethos isn’t simply nostalgia for the leisure class values of the gentleman (and gentlewoman) scholar. Not all of us have a trust fund, and because there are so few tenure track positions for us, many of us adjuncts doing the grunt work of teaching aren’t so inclined to buy that model any more. Impractical personal enlightenment can indeed be achieved alongside practical apprenticeship.

Throughout this discussion, I’ve used the term “skill set” and not content. All too often I hear from former colleagues in the corporate environment that such disciplines as art, philosophy or history (to name a few) are not valuable. These kinds of conversations are dangerous when disciplines are reduced to content and not skill sets. All of the liberal arts teach critical thinking, problem solving and communication skill sets. Can the same be said for the technical degrees, the ones most often touted as “important” to the market? A recent survey, posted by the Wall Street Journal, showed philosophy majors can expect to make a higher mid-career salary than an accountant, architect, marketing or information technology major, and on-par with a finance, international relations and information management major.

And as a mentor of mine once mentioned, if English majors can’t communicate the value of a liberal arts degree to the market, then we have a serious problem. Cost is still an issue; that’s not been my focus in this discussion. But in addressing complaints about meeting students’ (and parents’) expectations, the true expectations of a degree’s worth come from the people who intend to hire them. More should be asked about what the “market” wants, rather than what students want.

The Dumbing Down of the History Channel

I am and have always been an ardent fan of the History Channel and its spin-off, History International. When I do choose to sit down in front of the television, I rarely select anything with narrative in it; one of my friends, in fact, calls in non-fiction TV. I prefer these kinds of niche channels, ones where I can reasonably expect the content and quality to match certain conventions, in this case, history. The same can be said for my preference for the Discovery Channel (run by a different network). And yet, over the past year, maybe year and a half, I’ve noticed disturbing trends in the History Channel’s programming choices, trends that I fear will cause it to devolve into some amorphous conglomeration of programs that have no little to do with history.

Like the other networks, the History Channel has discovered the cost benefits of producing reality series, most notably Ax Men, Ice Road Truckers, Sandhogs and Tougher in Alaska. As reality series, these shows are clearly better conceived than Seriously, Dude, I’m Gay or Who’s Your Daddy. But I question the historicity of watching a collection of obnoxious men of questionable intellect driving transfer trucks. Granted, social historians like Studs Terkel have demonstrated the trials and tribulations of the working class as just as important as tales of princes and prime ministers, and I’ve come to prefer learning about the history of the working class (for example, Tony Robinson’s delightful Worst Jobs in History series). What I despise, however, are co-workers bitching about each other for the camera, especially when, because of the nature of reality television, I doubt their sincerity. Believe me when I say I can get my fill of co-workers bitching about each other at work: why would I want to see it on television when I get home? Clearly these shows are an attempt to copy the Discovery Channel’s success with The Deadliest Catch and Mike Rowe’s surprisingly charming Dirty Jobs. But when it comes to the content of these particular shows, like wine, I prefer my “history” with at least some vintage. Please give the grapes at least a little time to ferment before you cork the bottle.

Some of the History Channel’s reality shows do at least pretend to address history. These shows, like Surviving History, attempt to recreate historical artifacts. By far Surviving History is the worst. For forty minutes a passel of former workshop rejects jerry-rig medieval torture devices in an embarrassing pseudo-copy of MTV’s Jackass (which Jackass wanna-be can withstand the thumbscrews the longest?), with a ten minute spiel by some historian about what the torture device was designed to do. I can only imagine the former Jackass staffer who unwittingly found himself in a History Channel conference room, brazenly raising his hand and saying, “Oh, I have an idea.”

I will at least give the channel credit for not becoming all-reality, all-the-time. However, the entire reason for this tirade is because of another trend I’ve noticed in their programming—what I call the “let’s review” format. For such shows, the basic structure can be broken down to this—twelve minutes of introduction; commercials; twelve minutes of “let’s review,” where the same gee-wiz computer recreations are replayed, the same content is rehashed, though a different expert might weigh in; commercials; another twelve minutes of review material with maybe a teaser of new information added; commercials; and the final twelve minute “conclusion” where all the viewpoints of the various experts are rehashed. By far the worst offender is Jurassic Fight Club (more later on this notion of whether paleontology is history). In this show, fights between two dinosaurs are recreated in CGI, a cross between an autopsy procedure drama and mixed-martial arts bouts. However, with each twelve minute segment, another minute of the CGI battle is revealed, so that in order to follow the entire mini-movie from start to finish, one must watch the conclusion. This show is lead, not by a paleontologist, but by “dinosaur expert” (the actual title attributed to him onscreen) George Blasing, a former retail executive with a passion for fossils.

The “let’s review” format is clearly a reaction to American viewing habits. We can’t sit through commercials, and once they appear, we grab our remotes and begin to surf. If we arrive at the History Channel at, say, 8:20 p.m., then we can “catch up” with the content of the show and perhaps stick around for twelve minutes long enough to suffer the first commercial before we can surf away. That said, the most successful History Channel watcher is the one who arrives at 8:45 to see the conclusion.

Some shows, though, have cleverly been able to avoid the “let’s review” format by their very nature, for example, Wild West Tech, Cities of the Underworld or Engineering an Empire. Each twelve minute segment tackles a different technology or location, when, that is, in the case of Engineering an Empire, Peter Weller isn’t voraciously chewing the scenery.

Granted, the History Channel is not a history department in a university, where equal coverage and rigorous standards are the norm. One could argue that the History Channel is not intended to distribute history but to entertain those people who like history, with the essential disclaimer that fans of history “might also enjoy science and reality programming.” The History Channel is a profit venture, one that follows the ratings. The highest rated show to date, according to the History Channel’s website, is The Universe. Like paleontology, when did astronomy become history? Yes, the Big Bang, like the dinosaurs, occurred “in the past,” yet somehow I suspect that the paleontology and astronomy professors of this world might take issue. Actually, such science offerings are an attempt to leach viewers away from the Discovery Communications’ family of science channels.

Why is this an issue? I fear the trend set forth by the AETN (A&E Television Network), described on their corporate website as “a joint venture of The Hearst Corporation, Disney-ABC Television Group and NBC Universal.” A&E began as the “Arts and Entertainment Channel” before their discovery that true crime programming brought in higher ratings that Shakespeare and ballet, at which point the network dropped arts and entertainment from its name along with any programming even remotely artsy. Something similar occurred on The Learning Channel, when programmers discovered the reality cash cow, Trading Spaces, at which point the network devolved into TLC. I suspect, based on the number of channels currently offered by Discovery Communications versus the number of channels offered by AETN, that Discovery Communications is eating AETN’s lunch. As the History Channel begins to break out of the history niche and scramble after Discovery Communications’ viewers, how soon before they devolve so much that they, too, must drop “history” from their name? Has anyone noticed the recent change in the History Channel’s logo? The logo is now just a simple gold H. Is the H channel not far behind?

There is one bright spot on the horizon. Discovery Communications offers some history programming for their international networks. How soon before they smell blood in the water and begin to offer their own history channel in the United States?

Who is the Low Professor

I’ve been frequently asked to compose short biographies for several workshops, conferences and seminars, and over the years, I’ve come to rely on this one.

CR was born a poor white boy in rural east Georgia, in a town found only on the most ancient of maps, surrounded by horses, cows, chickens and pine trees. Through hard work and intense study, he managed to escape, abandoning his post from atop his rusting John Deere tractor. He ran, hiding behind billboards and attaching himself to the undercarriages of passing cars until he managed to reach the heart of downtown Atlanta. There he survived as a corporate trainer, teaching rapacious corporate suits such skills as conflict resolution, sales negotiation, account management, public speaking, business writing, and analytical and creative thinking. However, this easy lifestyle of art festivals, boutique shopping, glitzy celebrity restaurants and martini-swilling gallery openings resulted in that kind of fuzzy-headed liberal thinking which leads to being eaten. He had grown soft, and one late evening, as he was walking to his car on the fifth level of the parking garage, his complacent life ended. He was, sadly, jumped by the very enemy he had forgotten--Rural Life. When he eventually came to, he found himself living in rural east Polk County, Florida, surrounded by horses, cows, chickens and orange trees.

On lonely moonlit nights, when the wind blows from the east, one can sometimes hear his sad, plaintive cry.

Irony aside, I have completed my masters in English literature from the University of South Florida, along with a graduate degree in creative writing and a master’s thesis on Shakespeare, on the beardless male characters in his canon and the early-modern actors who portrayed them, to be precise. I’m taking a break at the moment before finishing my Ph.D., in American literature between 1865 and 1920, and my dissertation research focuses on male friendships in the literature of the period, especially those tales set in the American West. I’m trying to find a home for a scholarly note on the astronomical event referenced in John Dryden’s "Astrea Redux," along with two short stories. I’m currently working on an article on Erskine Caldwell’s Tobacco Road, and in October 2008, I delivered a paper at the FCEA conference in Ybor City on colonializing architecture and commoditized culture at EPCOT’s Showcase Lagoon.