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Stephen Karlson has two posts on the academic food chain that are worth juxtaposing.
I strongly suspect that “upward mobility” as pursued by the [Southwest] Missouri States and Memphis States, er “Universities of,” of the world (not to mention the place whose offer I politiely declined) is only going to end in tears. To bring up your median ACT scores (and thus mobilize upward), you need to sell high-scoring students on coming or discourage low-scoring students from entering; the former is difficult, in these days of declining state subsidies to the mid-majors and below (reducing their cost advantage over the top-tier publics and the private alternatives), and the latter is politically infeasible in this era of “access.” So, the best they can hope for is a secular trend of improving ACT scores more generally—which hardly is going to improve their relative positioning much.
Changing the name on the letterhead is unlikely to have much effect, either; the day Mississippi Southern College became the University of Southern Mississippi was no watershed event in its academic prestige. There might be something to be said for ditching names like “the University of Western Outer Mongolia at Altay” (substituting appropriately for Altay the name of any other “alternative” campus of some “real” university) for “Altay University,” but this is not as common a case as one might expect.
Nor is it all that clear that the “upwardly mobile” have much clue what they’re striving towards. [Southwest] Missouri State’s “mission statement” expressing fealty to the concept of being “a multipurpose, metropolitan university providing diverse instructional, research, and service programs” is nice, but I’m damned if I know what a “multipurpose, metropolitan university” is supposed to be. The cynic might read “multipurpose” as “rudderless” and “metropolitan” as “unsure if it’surban, suburban, or rural.” Then again, “operating a diploma mill for kids who couldn’t get into Mizzou, and stoking the egos of those who could have gone to Columbia by giving them a free ride and straight A’s” probably doesn’t look as quite as good when going up for reaccreditation…
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5 comments:
I think Karlson’s reasoning is flawed.
Granted, it works perfectly: “kids want degrees to get better jobs…universities that don’t offer career enhancing degrees will not be chosen by the best students….the university with the best students will be those that are sensitive to the ‘market’ of ‘marketable’ degrees.”
This is absolutely, without a doubt accurate. And it is fundamentally, inalterably flawed. The flaw is not within the self contained reasoning of this equation. Rather the flaw is with the underlying core assumption of the reasoning: that the primary purpose of education should be career enhancement/ professional preparation.
I will get snarky derisive sneers for being out of touch with reality for saying this (for which I offer my large white rump for the kissing), but this three decade plus slide of academia into “Enhanced Tech School (Now with more beer!)” is a distinctive turn away from the purpose of the institution of higher education.
Professional training prepares you for a job. Law schools, medical schools, MPAs, and Air Conditioning Repair programs do a wonderful job of this. But this is not the purpose of an education. You will note that all but the last of the professional training programs I mentioned do not begin until you have already gotten your education. Why? Because an education should be as much about process as content: broadening the horizons of students and giving them the perspective to be able to grasp, judge, accept/reject, implement, or tweak new ideas as they see fit. Most people are capable of being taught the skills of the trade. The when/ how/ where/ why/ and how much to apply these skills comes from perspective. You might say that “experience” provides perspective. It does, but only in the narrow band of circumstances experienced. A quality education should give one a broad adaptive cognitive capacity to apply one’s skills even outside the realm of one’s direct experiences.
The first argument against this is: “Ha!…and your university will fail because no one will want to go to it because it doesn’t offer the latest cutting edge twist on career prep majors that have overtaken the latest cutting edge twist on career prep majors that were in vogue 5 years ago.”
My answer? You are almost certainly correct. But that doesn’t make you right.
Because “university” sounds better than “college” and “University of” sounds better than “weathervane state.” Period.
Scott: I think Stephen would agree with you.
Bryan: Undoubtably, the “sounds better” argument is the one that carries the day. Although “college,” if properly applied, can be a mark of prestige; ask Dartmouth and William and Mary. Academic naming fads are probably worth a post of their own…
Yeah? Huh. I guess my eyes (well…technically eye) started to glaze over when he started lambasting attempts to focus on diversity. Not being sarcastic there…I might not have given it a fair read (which would have noted agreement with my position).
On the name change: Dartmouth and William and Mary STARTED with the prestige. The current spate of name changes may be an attempt at an “astronomical nudge.” The small bump may make no discernable difference now, but fast forward a few million miles of travel and your course is light years away from where it would have been on the other course. The “long view” argument….
Yes, the “college” label can be marketed well, based on past performance. Calvin College in Michigan, for instance, has vowed never to upgrade to University, simply because of their reputation. But most schools that do the upgrade have a middling reputation at best. The “University of the Cumberlands,” instead of Cumberland College, for instance, sells a lot better (cf. http://www.kybaptist.org/kbc/welcome.nsf/pages/cumberlandname )