The crusade against college
Ben Werdmuller,
benwerd,
Jun 07, 2011
I think we need to manage the message a bit. This is the conclusion I draw after reading Ben Werdmuller's analysis of the 'crusade against college'. "There's been a lot of buzz in tech circles about college being a waste of time," he writes, giving a number of examples. But "if we are to lose faith in college degrees, how can we best represent what an individual is capable of?" Moreover, "if you take salaries away and look only at the overall education of a person, and the overall knowledge of our global society at large, don't universities have some inherent value?" He argues, and I agree, that they do. But - and here's the key point - maybe college (properly so-called) isn't the best way to achieve this end. Leaving aside the other (unsavory) purpose of the college system - to create an elite ruling class - it seems to me that while we may say 'college is not for everyone' we also want to say that 'a college education is for everyone'. The world does not divide naturally into geniuses and dullards; we divide it that way, and contribute in great measure to the creation of each.
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