The report is due tomorrow
The report is due tomorrow. We’re hearing a lot these days that college is a scam. For some, degrees are not a good return on investment, as colleges are seen as factories mass-producing “woke sheeple”. This has led to the common view that college degrees are useless, with students learning subjects that are equivalent to majoring in basket weaving, rather than marketable skills to help them succeed in a competitive economy. However, according to scholar Paulo Freire, are these views dependent on what he calls the “banking model” where learning becomes little more than a transaction?
Today, we ask the question: what is education for? Before we continue, we want to give a shout out to this video’s sponsor, Private Internet Access, a VPN that can help you securely navigate the internet. With a VPN, your digital life is protected from those who would want to exploit your information for their own interests. Plus, you can access content from around the world that would otherwise be blocked. Private Internet Access plans let you cover an unlimited amount of devices at the same time, so you can protect your entire household with one subscription. For a limited time, you can get 83% off your subscription and four months for free.
For most of our lifetime, a college degree has been seen as a one-way ticket to the American middle class or better. But recently, a 2023 Wall Street Journal/NORC poll showed that 56% of Americans agree that a four-year degree is not worth the cost, as people often graduate without specific job skills and with a large amount of debt to pay off. The Wall Street Journal also spoke to multiple college graduates who believe that they will be unable to pay back their student loans and that they will not see a return on investment.
Meanwhile, conservative politicians are increasingly decrying universities for what they perceive as “woke indoctrination” and professors’ ideological agendas. For example, the new College of Florida was once a place where students could let their “freak flag fly”. However, Governor Ron DeSantis has been cracking down and adding right-wing activists like Candace Owens to the school’s board.