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Friday, April 15, 2005
AIN'T GONNA STUDY STUDIES NO MORE Via Ralph Luker, at Cliopatria -- From an interview with Victor Davis Hanson: ' TAE: What is your idea of a perfect curriculum? HANSON: My curriculum is old-fashioned. It's a zero sum game, and there are only so many disciplines that will always exist: literature, mathematics, biology, hard science, foreign language, politics, philosophy. To make space, I would eliminate anything that has the word "studies" in it: ethnic studies, women's studies, cultural studies, American studies. That would free up about 25 percent of the current therapeutic curriculum. Most of the new things that universities are trying to introduce are not academic subjects. They're just popular culture dressed up as learning. Not only are these not university subjects, but they come at the expense of time diverted from real education. For every hour a kid is in Chicano studies or environmental studies classes, he's not learning history or philosophy. TAE: What is the biggest problem in higher education in contemporary America? HANSON: I don't know where to start. I guess it is really about the lack of accountability. Tuition rises faster than inflation. If you ask why nobody does anything about it, the answer is that with tenure and faculty governance there's no accountability. There's no accountability for administrators either. It's a fantasyland immune from the laws of American oversight and audit. I think that's coming to an end, because the people in charge are not doing a very good job. We can put up with the idea that universities are fat cats that overcharge Americans, but not when they also fail to educate kids. Americans are getting angry, and looking for new solutions. ' |