Must Reads

Brandon Platt:

So what does professor Pardo have to say about the changing economy and education? “If these programs keep growing, you’re going to wind up with more and more students who are graduating and can’t find meaningful employment. They can’t generate income needed to pay back their loans, and they’re going to end up in financial distress.”

But according to the New York Times, this isn’t a statement about the growing number of law graduates that can’t find the employment they felt they were promised, or even the 32% of students at Professor Pardo’s own school that aren’t able to find employment and begin paying back those loans at graduation. It’s about the career college sector – amazing given the outrageous level of oversight and regulation that exists, but that the Seattle University School of Law and thousands upon thousands of other institutions don’t have to follow. If almost any career college had the placement rates of the Seattle University School of Law, they would be approaching major sanctions and loss of their essential Title IV status.

George Leef on Universities and Economic Development:

very few profs are engaged in work that's even remotely connected to innovation in goods, services, and processes. Moreover, since knowledge knows no borders, the location of schools is irrelevant.

higher ed can help employers — for example, in worker training and management consulting. The free market already has plenty of options for companies looking for assistance in those areas. Why do they need to turn to universities?

Schools can "develop and manage property in a number of roles." Okay, but why are nonprofit institutions better at managing property than are individuals and firms that operate under the profit motive?

since the U.S. already has a glut of college grads doing fairly low-skill jobs, we need to doubt the hype about college being ever more important.

Anne Neal and Anette Meeks on the declining quality and burgeoning costs of public higher ed in Minnesota:

too many state institutions have poured money into the Ph.D. equivalent of candy -- hiring administrators -- while neglecting their true purpose: delivering a quality education in the classroom. Unless they change their ways, their pleas for protection in the midst of budget cuts will understandably fall on deaf ears.