Gresham's Law in education
Race to the bottom
I am so glad I will be retiring soon as a full-time college professor, although I will continue my work as a part-time adjunct professor. Having just received my annual performance evaluation, I can see what is valued by the management of contemporary academia. This in turn explains the collapse of enrollment, as the public perceives the lack of value in the diploma.
My manager is upset because a few students are distressed that my class is hard and that a very few students complain they did not have enough time on their tests. Those are tests for which I show them an outline of questions in a review during the class before the test. This is a STEM class that is a prerequisite for other STEM classes and business classes. STEM knowledge is cumulative. If the foundation is wrong, everything that follows will be wrong as well.
With sufficient motivation and guidance, I have been able to lead my classes to having an average grade of B. I wonder what my manager expects the average grade to be - perhaps A? Should students who fail their tests and don’t submit homework assignments get a grade of A?
At my college, there is no verification of faculty’s teaching the required learning objectives. This is in contrast to every other college and university where I have taught. Indeed, some classes are not being taught; attendance is optional and instruction by the faculty member is optional.
Students are permitted to remain registered in courses for which they stopped attending after the first week. That way, they can keep their financial aid, and the college gets to keep the tuition.
America is waking up to the scam. They can get yelled at for 4 years about capitalism, climate, colonialism, fluidity, oppression, race, sex, and socialism; go tens of thousands of dollars in debt for a worthless degree while unable to find a full-time job - or they can opt out. Go to trade school, go into business, all while keeping your sanity, your connection to reality, and your patriotism and faith.
Those who survive the Gen Z crisis may turn into our country’s strongest leaders in a generation.
I work for a professional training company and we now have lots of young people who would rather pay us for practical professional management qualifications rather than spend a fortune on university education.
It started during the lockdowns when the universities were taking money and offering nothing other than some lame zoom lectures.
Now I am training university staff to manage projects that push education online but they are faaar too late as more people are moving back into classrooms because the zoom training experience is too often nothing more than chalk and talk boring drivel.
How sad that college level education in this country has fallen to such a despicable low level. Evidently, students today are not interested in getting an actual education. Instructors have no interest in teaching or only teach that which is worthless or destructive. Foreign students came here once upon a time to get a great education. Now it seems the foreigners are here solely to steal secret or proprietary knowledge to bring back to their home countries. Teaching Marxist principles (as a force to destroy free market capitalism and democratic liberties) is hardly a wise use of billions of taxpayer dollars. It appears that there is some debate about whether the higher education system in this country can be reformed enough to be of some value. I have doubts as to whether the colleges and universities are salvageable. It is best not to rebuild on a crumbling foundation.