ISI Faculty Resource Center

Excellent post about the mismatch between the public's expectation of college education and what the actual education consists of. But I would also point to the problem of inflation in college tuition (often at 6-8% per year). It seems that unless we can figure out some way to control these costs, the public will continue to devalue college education, whether they conceive of it as the acquisition of wisdom or preparation for the workforce.

An excellent post. The problem as I see it is that any attempt to define the value of an education in material terms is bound to fail, since the argument is already lost if the listener does not consider the non-material benefits....

I could go on and on, but maybe I should save that for a blog post of my own!

Good post. I would hope that the diminution in prestige of college educations is actually a sign that other kinds of knowledge/wisdom are again also becoming more valued: practical skill in trades, the inherited wisdom associated with the rearing of children, agricultural knowledge of all kinds, church tradition etc. The list goes on; one hopes the developments noted in the post indicate part of a general de-schooling of society, to borrow a phrase from an earlier time.

There is a wonderful book that talks about how wisdom can be discovered in practical pursuits: Crawford's Shopcraft as Soulcraft.

Interesting post and discussion. Richard Vedder made a modest proposal in today's Wall Street Journal: "Time to Make Professors Teach: My new study suggests a simple way to cut college tuition in half." http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304432304576369840105112326.html?mod=WSJ_newsreel What do you think?

I couldn't read the article, since I'm not an online subscriber to the WSJ. However, I would propose if one were serious about reducing college costs, then one would start with non-instructional spending, particularly with administrator's salaries. At some universities, there now are more administrators than faculty. If universities would cut or severely reduce things like plush dormities, student life programs, and six-figure salaries of deans and presidents, then I would suspect you would see costs drop dramatically.

I am all in favor of understanding college as the pursuit, or the first steps within the pursuit, of wisdom. If so I think that we would then have to understand that college is not for everyone. The idea that everyone should go to college is not comaptible with the notion that college is about the pursuit, never mind attainment,of wisdom.

Terribly interesting topic, with commentary that could take us in any number of different directions. I must exercise discipline. . . .

Gerson's initial reaction to his son or daughter's comment is telling. Why do academic sorts (I consider myself one in spirit) place such a high value on college education? Is college the best or only place to "foster a deep humanity" in our children, to instill in them wisdom and a love of the good? I don't think it is an exaggeration to say that for many, if not most, college students today, college has precisely the opposite effects. A true liberal education can still be found, and it is of great value; but the reason that it has become the "sine qua non" in the last few decades must, I think, be connected to the breakdown of the mediating institutions and smaller cultural communities that used to foster wisdom and virtue ("deep humanity") in their members.

Fortunately, as one or two of the previous comments suggest, we have not lost sight entirely of the possibility that other forms of "education" could foster the kind of individuals and communities we desire. But we (that is, tradition-minded types who are in or associated with or fond of academia) must make a special individual effort, especially as parents, to resist the cultural pressures which insist that a person can become successful (in the humane sense) and wise only with the help of a college education. Again, a true liberal education is still possible, and greatly to be esteemed; but if our goal is to foster wise and virtuous persons, then a college education should be only one of many paths for a person to achieve the telos he shares with his fellow-travelers on this earth (and not always the "best" possible way for any particular person, either).

Secondary education should already be preparing our children for a life of virtue and a life of the mind, the latter of which should be conceived of in such a way that it is accessible to businessmen and bakers and bricklayers, and not just full-time academics. Needless to say, most secondary institutions fail miserably at this; all that means is that we are going to have to shoulder a greater share of the burden of educating our own children.

I, for one, will not be the least bit disappointed if my child grows up to be a B.A.-less electrician, so long as he is still able to (and does) read great books and engage great ideas. If that seems unrealistic, I think it says more about our culture's (and our personal) imagination and the state of its educational institutions than it does about the actual possibility of the scenario.

Higher education, for those who desire it and are personally suited to it, and a sustaining cadre of full-time philosophers, if I may use the term broadly, are not only desirable, they are essential to the flourishing of a culture. But let us not confuse this with the notion that our cultural health requires everyone (or at least anyone who is socially and psychologically well-adjusted) to receive a college education.

I should clarify: even if my hypothetical B.A.-less electrician son does not spend much time reading great books and engaging great ideas in the way that an academic might, I shall be entirely satisfied so long as he is a good, virtuous, thoughtful, faithful, well-rounded man. I plan to teach my children how to read and think at a high level; whether they spend much time doing that throughout their lives is up to them.

In discussions of this kind there always appears to be some unstated but golden age that is the foil of the conversation. At what time was the virtuous man the dominant human type or the life of the mind considered the best life by the culture as a whole?

A cadre of full-time philosophers does not appear to me to be a cultural good. If anything I suspect such a cadre is in fact a threat to cultural health.

There seems to be a contradiction in discussions of this sort. One the one hand a call back to a sort of classically conceived way of life but based upon certain modern and enlightenment prejudices. One such prejudice is the public good of philosophy.

John,

I'm confused: what does the relative rarity of virtue and of the life of the mind tell us, exactly? That these are not goods to be pursued personally or promoted for others? Perhaps you can explain in more detail.

I don't believe I said anything that implies I am measuring the current state of higher education in America against some non-existent golden age. In fact, I think we would agree on this much: as my post made clear, I don't think college is for everyone. (A "life of the mind," rightly conceived, is, like virtue, something open to everyone and good for everyone, even if only relatively few people desire and achieve it—and it does not depend upon, though it can be improved by, a college education.)

As for the "cadre of philosophers" issue, perhaps I should have been clearer. No doubt intellectual elites can do great damage to a society with their ideas. I think what I was trying to suggest is that sustaining anything like a real "culture" in a society requires a least some members of that society to dedicate their lives to some purer mode of reflection than is typically available to the average citizen—whether that life of leisure manifests itself in "philosophy" proper, religious thought, the fine arts, etc., which is why I used the term "philosophers" at its broadest. I don't think a total society of mere producer-consumers who spend any free time they have doing nothing more than devising new ways to entertain themselves could have much claim to "culture."

To clarify, my original phrasing made it sound like this sustaining core of philosophers should be a sort of elite professional class, which is by no means true. Ideally, the life of leisure should be closely united in a reciprocal, organic relationship with an integral community. Intellectuals go astray precisely insofar as they become divorced from the society which makes their life possible; the result is that alien ideas born within this class start to dissolve the foundations of the supporting society.

Patrick, I supposed our disagreement is rooted in the whether or not the "life of the mind" is open to everyone and good for everyone. I don't think so and I understand the notion that is it is or ought to be as an enlightenment prejudice. That not all ought to embark on the rational investigation into the nature of things is in insight shared by almost, if not all classical thinkers. It is also something that Thomas warns of in 1.1.1 of the Summa.

I'm not so confident that culture is the product of people engaged in a "purer mode of reflection." I would perhaps draw a sharper line than you might between art and philosophy.

John,

Thanks for the response. As you note, I'm using the terms "life of the mind" and "philosophy" very broadly, more broadly than is probably justified.

Let me clarify with a pedestrian example. Is it possible for my plumber, who has no college education, to have a "life of the mind"? Is it inconceivable that he might go home at night and read Jane Austen rather than watching American Idol? I think the only reason this seems slightly absurd is the degeneration of elementary and secondary education in our country, which brings along with it a sharpening of intellectual and professional class lines. At one time, not so very long ago, many American farmers read political philosophy, and the townsfolk from Galesburg, Illinois, could sit for three hours and listen to (and presumably understand) Lincoln and Douglas as they debated complex ideas at an extremely high level (now the debates are read as political texts in college classrooms).

This—the learned, that is the acquired/taught/cultivated, capacity for engaging important ideas and art at fairly high levels—is what I mean by "life of the mind," and I see no reason why theoretically it is or should be less accessible to my plumber than it was to the baker and his wife in 1858 Galesburg. (I do not mean that my plumber should be capable of digesting Aquinas.)

And I have no hesitation in suggesting that, while it would not necessarily make my plumber a better plumber, it would almost certainly make him a better, more informed, less pliable citizen. What I have described is, I don't doubt, "good for everyone," and a country of such citizens would be a better country, and less likely, among other things, to wish to offload all problem-solving to a higher ("smarter") authority. The current system—bread and circuses and an awfully poor education for those blue-collar hicks—sharpens intellectual/professional/social class lines and undermines local communities and organizations—no?

Finally, I too see a distinction between philosophy proper and art. I was simply using "philosophy" to stand for those activities that are made possible by leisure, a la Pieper. A total life of leisure seems to be something open only to a few, and the "work" those few do seems, historically, to have been essential to the fostering of "culture."

Sorry my comments are also so intolerably long. Brevity was never my strong suit.