1. Most colleges are organized to give an average education to average students.

…

Stop for a second and consider the impact of [lack of uniqueness]. By emphasizing mass and sameness and rankings, colleges have changed their mission.

This may very well be true. I just did some quick research and discovered that the percentage of students 18-24 enrolling at U.S. universities from 2000 to 2008 had increased 4.1% (3M more students). One can assume that the percentage difference increases the further back one goes. With more students enrolling each year, it could be that standards and personalization in many schools is being watered down. Costs are another issue:

2. College has gotten expensive far faster than wages have gone up.

[Massive debt] leads to a crop of potential college students that can (and will) no longer just blindly go to the ‘best’ school they get in to.

Godin goes on to explain that universities are manipulating statistics to get a higher ranking in places like U.S. News and World Report. I think he’s absolutely right here:

Why do colleges send millions (!) of undifferentiated pieces of junk mail to high school students now? We will waive the admission fee! We have a one page application! Apply! This is some of the most amateur and bland direct mail I’ve ever seen. Why do it?

Biggest reason: So the schools can reject more applicants. The more applicants they reject, the higher they rank in US News and other rankings.

He goes on to lay out that the correlation between a college degree and success is becoming more tenuous. So what is the solution?

The solutions are obvious… there are tons of ways to get a cheap, liberal education, one that exposes you to the world, permits you to have significant interactions with people who matter and to learn to make a difference. Most of these ways, though, aren’t heavily marketed nor do they involve going to a tradition-steeped two-hundred-year old institution with a wrestling team. Things like gap years, research internships and entrepreneurial or social ventures after high school are opening doors for students who are eager to discover the new.

Godin links to three colleges (St. Johns, Deep Springs or Full Sail) which are doing something completely different and seem to be doing it right.

As for me, I don’t see a complete meltdown; I think universities will adjust to the exigencies of the time. But the adjustment is going to have to be a major one because the cost of university education and its diminishing status and uniqueness is correctly a recipe for disaster.

Photo by dbking

The student’s nightmare began when he was a fifth grader, when his father began to keep track of his academic ranking in the class.

Ranked only within the top 10, he was frequently subjected to ridicule by parents and relatives.

“If you fail to enter a key university, you had better kill yourself, and I would not drop a single tear …” he quoted his father as threatening.

Like nearly all students of his age, he was put on a quasi-military regimen.

A college can provide a brief respite from pressure, but soon the specter of employment expectations will begin to loom.

This approach to education is not limited to China, but is evident throughout most Asian countries. I think it’s clear that the effects of such an approach to education are having and will have deleterious effects in the long run; the question is whether Asian nations believe the trade-off is worth it.

Cartoon by Zhou Tao