

'Academically Adrift': The News Gets Worse and Worse  - estevez
http://chronicle.com/article/Academically-Adrift-The/130743/

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Jun8
"The central problem in American higher education today is that most of the
people running things in politics, business, and academe come from the first
group, but most of the actual students enrolled in college are in the second
group. The former cannot see the latter, because they are blinded by their own
experience. And so they think the problems of the many don't exist."

This is a typical problem, that you can call "separate connected components"
problem: people tend to associate with people like themselves, so are very
surprised at results dealing with other social groups that they are not
connected. When Bush won the elections, I remember many Democrat friends
asking, in bewilderment, "Nobody I know voted for this guy, who voted for
him?"

The remedy is to go out of your comfort zone and try to connect with the other
groups. During my volunteering with an inner city high school on FIRST
Robotics Competition, I am amazed at the hard work and innovative spirit that
the students are putting in, yet they won't be able to go to a good college
due to many reasons. And going to a good college is shown as the _only_ was to
salvation to these kids, alternate paths such as entrepreneurship are not
described at all.

