
Are Liberal Arts Colleges Doomed? - joker3
https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2019/10/21/downfall-hampshire-college-broken-business-model-american-higher-education/
======
jkingsbery
I went to a liberal arts school for undergrad. The emphasis on writing has
been very important to my career- I've found as I've advanced in my career as
an engineer, being able to write well has helped in writing design documents,
pitching ideas and in lots of other ways. It's funny, because at a time when
the liberal arts skills are maybe more valuable than ever, liberal arts
schools seem to be concerned less with what makes them valuable.

~~~
reilly3000
Spot on. Cogent writing will probably be the last thing that automation can
touch, and the most important for navigating the complexities it creates.

------
ydnaclementine
To me, part of the problem is the supply of colleges. There's so many of them!
Every state has their big state schools, and their smaller, private, low
acceptance rate "institutions". But then there's a billion small schools that
no one has every heard of, and I'm not sure who is even going there. But I may
be biased and don't understand having gone to a big state school.

Maybe they were created to fill demand that is now drying up. But if you
search for any US state like: "Ohio colleges", google will show you "100+ more
colleges" for majority of states.

~~~
ineedasername
In terms of a full college enrollment scenario, i.e., everyone goes to
college, there wouldn't be enough supply. About 70% of HS grads start college,
and considering many stop out along the way, we're way off from college having
the sort of enrollment that High School has. However, enrollment has been
increasing steadily. The rate at which students attend college has increased
about 10% since 2000. In that sense, as long as we don't add to the inventory
of colleges, gradual enrollment growth will fill the ranks of existing
colleges.

However, the above assumes that the value proposition of college in society
doesn't significantly change. There are pointers that it is. Although the
problem is there isn't any alternative ready for it to switch to en mass. If
people doubt the value proposition today, they're left with not going at all,
which is a worse value proposition, or looking at something like a trade
school-- that's a perfectly reasonable option, but issues of social
perception/prestige make it less attractive, and many trades have low salary
caps. A "medical assistant" tops out around $45k for example, though the more
rigorous "physicians assistant" can pay up to double that. But overall, trades
are fairly likely to have a firm ceiling on wages. Not that graduating college
as an English major is always going to pay more, it's just that there's less
of a ceiling baked in to it. (Though I'd argue the floor is much lower, like
$10/hour barista low)

~~~
secabeen
The other challenge with the trades is that they are more subject to the boom
and bust cycles than the jobs that a liberal-arts degree qualifies you for.
When construction is hot, it's hot, but when the market turns, a lot of those
companies that were employing 20 electricians drop to just 5-7. That's less
common in social work, law/medicine, government and non-profit, etc.

~~~
Scoundreller
In other words, some jobs are stocks, others are bonds.

A lot of the “bond” jobs are overvalued. Being able to earn when everyone else
can’t has its benefits.

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WalterBright
95% of my college education was listening to the professor lecture with chalk
and a chalkboard, taking notes, doing the homework, going over the homework
with fellow students and the TA. The dorms were pretty spartan. The fun was
hanging out with one's fellow students.

All the expensive facilities added little.

~~~
WalterGR
In contrast to what?

This is how the article describes the focus of the article.

 _The buildings are severe 1970s concrete. The radio station is in a yurt. ...
if you’re used to the grassy quads of state flagships or the rich Gothic and
brick of the Ivy League, Hampshire’s austerity is striking. On my visit in the
spring, tarps covered study carrels in the library to protect them from a
leaky roof._

~~~
WalterBright
The school's operating costs may still be a legacy of when they were spending
lots more money, i.e. expensive buildings still cost to maintain.

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wideasleep1
Me: Why does your [38 year old] sister hate your parents so much? She has a
real chip on her shoulder, doesn't she?

Friend: Well..long story short, they refused to continue to pay for her
college, cutting her off at the end of her sophomore year. She couldn't afford
to continue on her own, and she feels betrayed, and that it set her back
decades.

Me: That really sucks..now I get it. They're bastards! So, where did she go?

Friend: Evergreen State.

Me: Oh.

~~~
victor9000
This is what community colleges are for. You can get a decent education at a
fraction of the cost. Your degree won't stroke your ego, but you'll come out
with an employable skill set, and you can always transfer credits to a state
school to finish your bachelor's degree.

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bryanwb
Most liberal arts colleges are elaborate play centers for post adolescents
that also offer classes. My own Alma mater, Washington & Lee, esp. matches
that. I am not sympathetic.

I had great classes but I could have gotten the same education without the
fluff. I bet without the fluff the cost would have been half or even cheaper.

~~~
seibelj
It’s fine when wealthy people pay $200k for their children to have extended
playtime crafting sculptures and writing papers. It’s extremely depressing
when the poor are convinced to take out enormous loans to finance such
playtimes, which then ruin their lives.

I simply can’t feel sorry for an industry that yokes 18 year olds with $200k+
in loans for undergraduate degrees, especially in useless subjects. The faster
there is consolidation the better.

~~~
catalogia
$200k for an undergrad degree is _very_ far outside the norm. Don't get me
wrong, the norm is still pretty shit. But it's about an order of magnitude
less shit than that.

> _As of June 2018, Forbes reported that total US student debt was $1.52
> trillion and that 44.2 million people owed debt.[3] The average student debt
> is $38,390. The median student debt is between $10,000 and $25,000, while 2%
> of borrowers owe $100,000 or more._

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Student_debt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Student_debt)

$200k is closer to the kind of debt you'd expect from a medical school
graduate.

~~~
tengbretson
> $200k for an undergrad degree is very far outside the norm. Don't get me
> wrong, the norm is still pretty shit. But it's about an order of magnitude
> less shit than that

That may be, but when the 6 year graduation rate is only 60% thats a lot of
people paying "still pretty shit" in exchange for actually nothing.

~~~
catalogia
I agree. That's why I said it's still pretty shit. I don't think hyperbole
helps the situation though. Exaggerating the statistics isn't the right way to
seek change.

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all_blue_chucks
You can watch a lecture from anywhere with a cell phone. Those books could be
easily distributed digitally. With enough effort, even copyleft.

College is in serious need of disruption. Most degrees add little value
compared to their current cost. But the cost doesn't have to be so high.

~~~
colinmhayes
College is mostly signaling. In tech it is easy enough to have rigorous job
interviews and do away with signaling, but most professions aren't able to do
that.

~~~
musicale
Currently that signaling is very valuable. The earnings gap between high
school graduates and college graduates is apparently larger than it has ever
been.

However, universities and banks have figured out how to eat up much of that
value by saddling students with debt that can take decades to pay off.

------
mmmBacon
I am a big proponent of liberal education. I believe liberal education is the
foundation of western democracy. However, I am also of the mind that one
cannot pay $70,000 per year for a diploma in Ancient Greek (as much as I
admire the pursuit). I think we are rapidly moving towards the past where
liberal education will be reserved for the elite. The upper middle will go for
more specialized Vocational education in CS, engineering, and the like. Given
that I got my degree in physics as part of a college of arts and sciences I
believe deeply that I received a better, more well rounded education than my
peers in engineering and CS. This in turn has allowed me to make better
decisions where I weigh the ethical nature of what I’m deciding.

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jimmywanger
[https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/445846-you-
wasted-150-000-o...](https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/445846-you-
wasted-150-000-on-an-education-you-coulda-got-for)

That summarizes the issue. Why pay 200k or even 100k at the beginning of your
adult life for something you can read and then talk to people?

If you think students or professors at these colleges will turn you away when
you've studied the material, you're sadly mistaken. Why do you need to get
stuck with the bill when you're not really getting anything out of it?

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kangnkodos
This is what I got out of the story:

One liberal arts college decided to admit more diverse, poor students and
fewer white rich students. Then to make things worse, they decided to give the
rich white students additional financial aid. Then, surprise! They ran out of
money.

This article does not touch on the real problem. A new Massachusetts
regulation says that colleges must have enough money to guarantee that they
can operate for four years.
[https://www.mass.edu/bhe/documents/THESIS%20Working%20Group%...](https://www.mass.edu/bhe/documents/THESIS%20Working%20Group%20Final%20Report.pdf)

"The resulting Teachout Viability Metric (TVM), ... focuses on an NPIHE’s
ability to meet its teaching obligations to currently enrolled undergraduate
students through to their expected graduation dates."

An NPIHE is a college.

In other words, if a college doesn't have the money to guarantee it can stay
open for four year, it has to start taking drastic steps which will probably
scare away next fall's students.

Hampshire never had enough money to make a guaratee like that. Hampshire has
always operated paycheck to paycheck, with almost no money in the bank. But it
wasn't a life or death problem. They managed to slide by decade after decade.
But now, with this new regulation, Hampshire is required to take drastic
actions including admitting a tiny freshman class. Hampshire finances were on
the shaky side and heading down. But this new regulation turned a manageable
problem into an existential crisis.

------
droithomme
I want to believe.

But the article has problems.

First, it's not about colleges, it's about a case study on one specific cool
hippy college that has no majors, no structure, a handful of semi-known
graduates, and 13 students in the recent freshman class and (they think)
probably 0 in the next.

Article has problems. Look at this:

> Depending on the state, needier students will usually pay less at a liberal
> arts college than they would at a state flagship. It sounds
> counterintuitive, but choosing a public school to save money is actually a
> privilege for the affluent.

It then clarifies:

> A survey of 405 private nonprofit four-year colleges by the National
> Association of College and University Business Officers found that though
> the average tuition rate was $38,301.

Average tuition at private colleges is $38,301, and it's more expensive at a
state college?

I think not. What state colleges charge more than $38,301 tuition? Rhode
Island has the _highest_ at $39,029 for _both_ tuition _and_ fees. The $38,301
private average is tuition only. Or you can pay $12,363 on average for tuition
in North Dakota. According to
[https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/state/](https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/state/).

But if you go to [https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/state/north-
dakota/](https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/state/north-dakota/) you find
that in state tuition is $6,608 for North Dakota residents and $8,766 for out
of state.

State colleges are dramatically less expensive in every single state than
private colleges, especially for in-state students. The article's claim is so
absurd that it demolishes the credibility of the entire piece.

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solidsnack9000
_Residential liberal arts colleges are rare in other parts of the world._

How do other parts of the world handle education in the liberal arts?

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dangjc
If I’m going to spend $200k on college for my kids, it had better be for a
professional degree. They can learn to be well rounded human beings from
primary, secondary school and MOOCs.

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ganitarashid
It’s pretty obvious that the answer is yes

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patagonia
No

~~~
cosmojg
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headline...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines)

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teambob
If the president of the college can't even remember what a Van De Graff
generator is... you're going to have a bad time

~~~
Waterluvian
I have to point out a little pedantic irony here and let the crowd obliviate
me if warranted.

You're poking at the lack of science knowledge and then immediately misuse
"your". I'm not a grammar nazi but I think this underlines that we're all good
and bad at various things.

~~~
hyperbovine
I assume (s)he edited it, but I saw that too. Delectable irony.

------
rshnotsecure
The AWS Associate and Professional Architect certifications together costs
$450. 12 months of self-study from knowing nothing about computers, and many
have done it in less. Compare them (although this is not the best metaphor) to
an Associate’s and Bacehlor’s degree. You would certainly earn as
much...probably quite a bit more.

The study materials for those exams, worst case, bring the total to $750.

So $750 vs $50,000 for a modestly priced 4 year university.

Can anyone in intellectual good faith argue that the latter system is going to
survive outside of the very short term?

~~~
jefft255
You talk about survival in the long term yet you talk about getting
certifications for technologies that can become obsolete after 5 years
(although AWS, specifically, will probably be around for a while). Also I’m
almost positively certain that if you do this certification without knowing
nothing about computer when starting, as you say, good luck finding jobs for
anything that would deserve the « architect » title.

Also going to university isn’t 50 000$ everywhere, this is mainly a weird US
thing. I am a firm believer in the importance fundamental CS education, and
picking up AWS from there shouldn’t be hard if that fundamental education was
any good.

~~~
technovader
AWS Launched 13 years ago...

Yet when I went to University they were teaching Java/Pascal. What got me a
job was learning more relevant subjects things on my own. Virtualization,
Cloud, Containers, Python, Shell scripting.

Yeah I'll add my voice to the "University is overpriced and ancient" vote.

