4 Comments

Ramsey
January 31st, 2013 | 12:06 pm

link seems to be broken, unless you’ve adopted a pseudonym

Steve Billingsley
January 31st, 2013 | 2:09 pm

Peter,

I completely agree with the bemused take on the writer’s jargony, buzzword-stuffed, straw-man slaying argument (such as it was – I kept waiting for him to drop “synergy” and “paradigm shift” into the mix).

But given the state of higher education in many places – anything that skewers the monopolistic practices of the accrediting agencies and the treatment of the B.A. as little more than a white-collar union card brings a smile to my face and wishes for success.

Peter Lawler
January 31st, 2013 | 3:22 pm

Steve, So I added a whole post based on your smile.

Tim Anderson
January 31st, 2013 | 3:35 pm

Peter, please let me know when you are opening that liberal arts college. I wish it were in the Fall when my last heads off to school, but I am sure it will not be soon enough. The sales jargon of schools is almost enough to make me suggest he not waste his money or mine, because the product doesn’t often hold up. It has been hard work for my kids to make their way through the mess in order to find professors who could really teach about things that matter to the soul and not just a future paycheck. A paycheck is a good and necessary thing, but not if there is nothing good to live for and give life meaning and purpose.
It is not because such professors don’t exist, but because there are so many distractions and false choices through the maze of four years to go along with the pressure of being products rather than students. Seminaries — at least in many denominations — and graduate schools are sadly following close behind as I read their mail and reports.