I remember how it was -- JR
Is it time to defund the humanities?
As I have often pointed out, I am a big fan of much in the humanities but I don't see it as deserving of taxpayer subsidy
My own first degree was an Arts degree but I think the argument in favour of Humanities involvement in education is greatly over-egged. I am not at all sure that any arts and humanities courses should be publicly funded. There is very little evidence that they do any good. All we get are high flown assertions to that effect
I myself greatly enjoyed my studies of Homer, Thucydides, Chaucer, Tennyson, Wordsworth, Hopkins, Goethe, Wittgenstein, Schubert, Bach and Beethoven etc. and still do -- but I can't see that I needed to go to university to acquire that familiarity
Much of the cost of running our universities and other centres of higher education is borne by government, meaning the taxpayer. Therefore, to reciprocate, one of the main responsibilities of these institutions should be to produce graduates who meet the needs of society. This is not to suggest that we should exclude the ‘follow your dreams’ brigade from higher education. But funding, facilities and priority should be given to subjects that will contribute more to our national prosperity and societal requirements. These subjects would include engineering, computer science, mathematics, chemistry, physics and other sciences intended to improve our skill deficiencies, our industrial productivity and to encourage more entrepreneurs. To improve our public services, we need to expand training in medicine, dentistry, nursing, other healthcare professions as well as social work of different kinds.
The state should consider reducing university funding for the arts and humanities. Would our society suffer by having fewer graduates in English, history, geography, modern languages and other subjects, or would it prosper by redirecting that university funding to more beneficial subjects? Many readers will be enraged by that suggestion and I will be accused of being an intellectual philistine attempting another form of social engineering. On the contrary though, this is merely being pragmatic. As a nation, we should cut our cloth to suit our need.
A case in point is the cap on medical student places of 7,500 annually which has been static for almost a decade with the exception of A level grade inflation in 2020 and 2021. This number of training slots is totally inadequate for the needs of the NHS. To plug the gap, the General Medical Council registered 53,296 doctors from abroad between 2016 and 2021. The cap exists because of the costs of training doctors. There is no additional funding available but that could change if places for less essential subjects were reduced.
It is not to insult the humanities or other subjects to point out the problem we have in this country with ‘Mickey Mouse’ degrees. The term was even expressed by Margaret Hodge when Minister of State for Universities in the Tony Blair Labour government. She described it as ‘a degree where the content is not as rigorous as one would expect and where the degree itself may not have huge relevance in the labour market.’ That was 20 years ago and priorities have not changed. If anything more non-academic modules have been introduced.
Dame Margaret’s comment would have annoyed her boss who in 1999 had expressed a target of 50 per cent of school leavers going to university, a target recently increased to 70 per cent by the Tony Blair Foundation. That ambition would guarantee the creation of more unsuitable subjects especially for less able students who would be laden with debt from tuition fees. Why does Tony Blair not listen to his son Euan and voices from industry who advocate more apprenticeships?
By reducing funding for the humanities, students would begin to not think of university life as a goal in itself or as being a means of finding independence and liberation from parental influences. Instead the primary consideration would be the utility of their subject. There are of course, exceptions to this rule at the moment. The brightest students from the best universities studying the most esoteric subject may effortlessly move into finance, management consultancy or the law. There will also be scientists who fail in the job market. But it is the average student from the average university gaining the average BA degree who will have the most difficulty finding relevant employment. It is for them that this article is written. They should not suffer because of misguided career advice and a flawed state university funding policy.
The problem may be self-limiting as universities push for tuition fees to be increased closer to the £24,000 per year paid by foreign students. Prospective university students whose chosen subject has little relevance to the job market may be reluctant to take the excessive debt gamble. A glance at tables linking degrees to graduate entry salaries or to the chances of getting a job with that degree would be a wise move for most young people.
Part of the problem is that the decision on approximate career paths must be taken while selecting A level subjects. That is how we have arranged our higher education. At that age, students may be more attracted to softer subjects in preference to the greater discipline and demands of science subjects. That truth delegates greater responsibility to schools and to realistic career advice. Schools have the responsibility to guide students to good jobs.
I’m not suggesting that schools should indoctrinate students into science subjects but the advantages, importance and greater challenges of the broad range of studies defined by the STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) should be explained. Science and mathematics teachers could be encouraged to make the case to counterbalance the preference some pupils at that age have for softer subjects. They could be paid more than other teachers given the greater relevance of their subjects. And the state should itself reduce funding and therefore the number of humanity places available so that only the most rigorous and successful courses continue.
Science and technology look forward to a progressive future while English and history look back into the past and at best, attempt reinterpretation and revision. These subjects can be learnt alongside STEM subjects. And in my experience, many scientists are also hungry culture vultures – there’s no reason students can’t enjoy the arts outside of a university degree.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2022/09/is-it-time-to-defund-the-humanities/
******************************************************Family-run bakery hails $36.5 million settlement that Oberlin FINALLY paid - after woke college defamed the small business with false racism claims
The owners of an Ohio bakery celebrated on Thursday their $36.5 million victory over the liberal arts institution Oberlin College in a defamation case, declaring that 'David has overcome Goliath'.
The college had been ordered to pay after jurors ruled that it had defamed Gibson's Bakery by describing the institution as racist, after the storeowner chased down three black students who stole from the business in November 2016.
With legal fees and interest, the amount rose to over $36.5 million.
Oberlin College had tried to appeal the case to the Ohio Supreme Court, which announced on August 30 that it would not take up the issue.
Finally, in a statement on Thursday, the college announced it 'has initiated payment in full of the $36.59 million judgment in the Gibson's Bakery case and is awaiting payment information from the plaintiffs.
A lawyer for the bakery celebrated the huge settlement. 'With Oberlin's decision to not pursue any additional appeals, the Gibson Family's fight is finally over,' said Brandon McHugh, an attorney for the family. 'Truth still matters, and David has overcome Goliath.'
McHugh said the ruling meant the family firm was saved from collapse. 'While Oberlin College has still refused to admit they were wrong, the jury, a unanimous panel from the court of appeals, and a majority of the Ohio Supreme Court decided otherwise,' he said.
'Now, the Gibsons will be able to rebuild the business their family started 137 years ago and keep the lights on for another generation.'
The anger at Oberlin was whipped up by the former dean of students, Meredith Raimondo, who led the woke mob's attacks against Gibson's - and even turned up outside the business to screech accusations while toting a bullhorn. While named as a defendant in the suit, she won't have to pay the settlement.
And despite the disgrace she heaped on her former employer, Raimondo has now landed a cozy job at Oglethorpe Liberal Arts College in Atlanta, and has yet to speak out over her role in the costly scandal.
The statement continued to say that while school officials are 'disappointed by the Court's decision... We hope that the end of the litigation will begin the healing of our entire community.'
'We value our relationship with the City of Oberlin, and we look forward to continuing our support of, and partnership with, local businesses as we work together to help our city thrive,' school officials said.
They added that 'our careful financial planning... means that we can satisfy our legal obligation without impacting our academic and student experience.
'It is our belief that the way forward is to continue to support and strengthen the quality of education for our students now and into the future.'
Former Dean of Students and Vice President Meredith Raimondo stoked protests against Gibson's Bakery following the shoplifting incident, even though the claims were found to be totally false.
She has since been blamed for much of the behavior that has seen Oberlin ordered to pay $35 million for defamation, with Raimondo since moving to a college in Atlanta
Store owners Allyn Gibson and his son, David Gibson, both now deceased, sued Oberlin College in November 2017 claiming they had been libeled by the school and that their business had been harmed.
The suit was filed a year after David's son, also named Allyn, chased and tackled a black male student he suspected of having stolen a bottle of wine.
Two black female students who were with him then intervened, and all three were arrested and later pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges.
The arrests sparked protests outside Gibson's Bakery where flyers were handed out, some by an Oberlin College vice president and dean of students, accusing Gibsons of a long track record of racial profiling and discrimination.
A Student Senate resolution condemning the Gibson family was then emailed to all students and was posted in a display case at a school student center, where it remained for a year.
Soon, the woke college — located in the small town of Oberlin southwest of Cleveland — ordered its campus food provider to stop buying cookies, bagels and other items from Gibson's, hurting the bakery's profits.
And even after the storeowners complained about the way they were being portrayed by college officials, they refused to retract their claims, protests continued, and the store was forced to lay off half its staff and cut opening hours.
In June 2019, after a five-week trial, jurors awarded the Gibsons $44 million in compensatory and punitive damages.
The award was later reduced to $25 million and $6 million in legal fees, but rose again in this week's state supreme court decision after a series of appeals.
The bakery has been begging school officials to pay up, claiming their comments and subsequent boycott of their business hurt its reputation.
In an opinion article just last week, Lorna Gibson, widow of the former bakery owner, said the 'shelves are bare', it now only has a trickle of customers, staff has been laid off and the family — which is white — is deep in debt.
'If I got the money from the college, I wouldn't buy a house, or go on vacation, or leave Ohio. I would replace the compressors for the refrigerators and replace the fryers and proofers that we use for our dough,' she wrote.
'If the money doesn't come through within the next couple of months, I'll be forced to declare bankruptcy and shut the doors of Gibson's for good,' she added.
She then went on to describe how the massive protests in the days after Donald Trump's election affected the family's business.
'They blocked the door and screamed at customers who elbowed their way through to the counter. A few came in to record videos on their phones of our customers.'
'Our world was turned upside down and has never been set right,' Lorna Gibson wrote in the article, in which she strenuously rejected claims her family were 'white supremacists' who racially profiled customers. 'Calling us racists wasn't just wrong, it was deeply painful to our core.'
The boycott effectively continues to this day and freshmen nowadays are 'brainwashed to hate us' she added.
By November 2018, David Gibson died at the age of 65 after battling pancreatic cancer. His bereaved wife said she wanted to do everything she could 'to honor his final wish' and 'keep the doors open, no matter what'.
Allyn Gibson then died in February, aged 93. He spent much of his eighties sitting in front of the bakery, a 'fixture in the community' who chatted with locals, wrote Lorna Gibson.
After the protests, 'no one would talk to him. It broke his heart', she added.
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Princeton will offer 'free ride' worth $300,000 to all students whose families earn less than $100,000: Includes tuition, housing and meals
One wonders a little about what this will do for standards
Princeton announced it will offer a 'free ride' for most undergraduate students from families making under $100,000, including tuition, accommodation and food.
The Ivy League institution's offer breaks down to about $79,540 annually, and is equivalent to more than $300,000 over the course of four year-degree.
The offer will also be extended to some students coming from families making as much as $300,000 that have multiple children at the New Jersey college.
About a quarter of the elite University's student body of about 5,500 - some 1,375 students - is expected to qualify. The new aid program will come into effect fall of 2023.
The money to support the aid program is coming out of investment returns from the school's endowment worth over $79 billion according to The Washington Post.
Princeton previously offered a similar package for students coming from families making under $65,000.
The move comes as Princeton has spent years trying to shake its long-held reputation as being a stronghold for the wealthy and elite by recruiting heavily from a high schools representing diverse economic background.
Princeton president Christopher L. Eisgruber's announcement of the program echoed those ideas.
'We know that Princeton can achieve its research, teaching and service goals only if it attracts the best talent from throughout society,' Eisgruber said, 'I hope that these improvements will help prospective students and families see more clearly than ever one of this University's core commitments - at Princeton, we seek and welcome talented learners from every background and every sector of society.
Princeton president Christopher L. Eisgruber said he hope the new measures would help students 'flourish on our campus' +3
Princeton president Christopher L. Eisgruber said he hope the new measures would help students 'flourish on our campus'
Eisgruber explained the students from families earning up tp $300,000 with more than one child in college would qualify for aid in increments proportionate to the family income.
Families earning $150,000 would pay $12,500 per year; families earning $200,000 would pay $25,000; families earning $250,000 would pay $37,500; and families earning $300,000 would pay $50,000.
Eisgruber noted the school was going away with an old policy requiring students accepting financial aid to provide $3,500 for books and other expenses. He said he hope the new measures would help students 'flourish on our campus.'
The move comes weeks after Joe Biden announced plans to spend up to $1 trillion to cancel student loan debt for Americans earning under $125,000, angering many who said it was unfair to those who'd scrimped and saved to pay off debts already.
And not all were impressed with the leafy school's efforts, including Sandy Baum, an economist at the Urban Institute who previously studied financial aid and tuition tends for College Board.
'Does it change the world? No,' Baum said, 'Will it make life better for the small number of people who are fortunate enough to get into Princeton? Sure.'
'I'm not really worried about these Princeton students. I'm worried about all the people who don't go to Princeton,' she added.
Princeton's acceptance rate is among the lowest in the country - of the tens of thousands who apply annually, the acceptance rate hovers around 4 percent.
The school has been working to boost its undergraduate enrollment up to 5,700 by 2025 and has been adding new residence halls to accommodate.
Princeton's move is the latest in a tuition arms race amongst the ivy league, as the elite institutions vie for to draw students and to foster more inclusive student bodies.
In June Dartmouth College abolished student loans for families that qualify for financial aid, after well-heeled donors provided $120million for the initiative.
Both Harvard and Yale also cover the full tuition costs for students coming from families earning up to $75,000.
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My other blogs: Main ones below
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
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