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The William G. Bowen Series
College: What It Was, Is, and Should Be - Second Edition
The strengths and failures of the American college, and why liberal education still matters
As the commercialization of American higher education accelerates, more and more students are coming to college with the narrow aim of obtaining a preprofessional credential. The traditional four-year college experience―an exploratory time for students to discover their passions and test ideas and values with the help of teachers and peers―is in danger of becoming a thing of the past.
In College , prominent cultural critic Andrew Delbanco offers a trenchant defense of such an education, and warns that it is becoming a privilege reserved for the relatively rich. In describing what a true college education should be, he demonstrates why making it available to as many young people as possible remains central to America's democratic promise.
In a brisk and vivid historical narrative, Delbanco explains how the idea of college arose in the colonial period from the Puritan idea of the gathered church, how it struggled to survive in the nineteenth century in the shadow of the new research universities, and how, in the twentieth century, it slowly opened its doors to women, minorities, and students from low-income families. He describes the unique strengths of America’s colleges in our era of globalization and, while recognizing the growing centrality of science, technology, and vocational subjects in the curriculum, he mounts a vigorous defense of a broadly humanistic education for all. Acknowledging the serious financial, intellectual, and ethical challenges that all colleges face today, Delbanco considers what is at stake in the urgent effort to protect these venerable institutions for future generations.
As the commercialization of American higher education accelerates, more and more students are coming to college with the narrow aim of obtaining a preprofessional credential. The traditional four-year college experience―an exploratory time for students to discover their passions and test ideas and values with the help of teachers and peers―is in danger of becoming a thing of the past.
In College , prominent cultural critic Andrew Delbanco offers a trenchant defense of such an education, and warns that it is becoming a privilege reserved for the relatively rich. In describing what a true college education should be, he demonstrates why making it available to as many young people as possible remains central to America's democratic promise.
In a brisk and vivid historical narrative, Delbanco explains how the idea of college arose in the colonial period from the Puritan idea of the gathered church, how it struggled to survive in the nineteenth century in the shadow of the new research universities, and how, in the twentieth century, it slowly opened its doors to women, minorities, and students from low-income families. He describes the unique strengths of America’s colleges in our era of globalization and, while recognizing the growing centrality of science, technology, and vocational subjects in the curriculum, he mounts a vigorous defense of a broadly humanistic education for all. Acknowledging the serious financial, intellectual, and ethical challenges that all colleges face today, Delbanco considers what is at stake in the urgent effort to protect these venerable institutions for future generations.
280 pages, Paperback
First published March 20, 2012
53 people are currently reading
1126 people want to read
About the author
Andrew Delbanco
33 books75 followersAndrew H. Delbanco (born 1952) is Director of American Studies at Columbia University and has been Columbia's Julian Clarence Levi Professor in the Humanities since 1995. He writes extensively on American literary and religious history.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 84 reviews
May 5, 2013
A very engaging yet deeply frustrating book, Delbanco's College tries to offer a grand vision of higher education, but falls into the error of mistaking a niche for the whole.
College is, mostly, a pleasure to read. Delbanco is passionate about his subject, and keenly committed to learning. His account of academic history draws nicely from primary sources, yielding humorous quotes and echoes of the present. Delbanco's prose is thoughtful and elegant.
His overall claim for a specific form of higher education is also appealing. He envisions small classrooms led by engaging professors, spaces where inquiry and discussion range freely. I agree with the excellence of this vision based on my work as a teacher and from my memories of being a student. Delbanco's additional claim that colleges can boost citizens' democratic engagement is one I'm sympathetic to.
However, this vision is so partial and limited as to constitute special pleading, or at least a grossly inaccurate depiction of higher education in reality.
To begin with, Delbanco openly admits that his focus is on a handful of Ivy League campuses (mostly Yale, Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford). "[M]y focus is on the so-called elite colleges" (6). The experience of more than 4500 American institutions counts for little or nothing in College. Towards the book's end the author observes that many new trends (see below) don't really apply to "the old and prestigious colleges that have been at the center of this book" (153)... then changes the subject.
The classicism of this move is a bit breathtaking. Delbanco even observes that "our 'best' colleges are doing more to sustain than to retard to growth of inequality in our society" (26-7; repeated 122), and stays silent about ways of addressing the problem. Moreover, this strategy follows the hoary cliche of every campus wanting to be Harvard, and the unfortunate media trope of paying too much attention to Harvard and Yale at the expense of the rest of American academia. Delbanco has said elsewhere that many Americans envision college life based on a dream of the 1920s, failing to grapple with a century of development; his book is predicated on a similar problem. He admits that there is a "[growing] disparity among institutions"(7), only to plunge onwards.
For instance, adult learners are simply not an issue in College. The book is all about the traditional-age undergrad: "At its core, a college should be a place where young people find help for navigating the territory between adolescence and adulthood" (3). That this doesn't describe the majority (!) of college and university students is a serious weakness for the book.
This focus leads the book away from any serious consideration of college economics. Yes, College sketches the development of financial aid over the 20th century (ch. 4), but stops before our current decade of the Great Recession and our present funding crises. Funding a transformation of American higher education into four thousand Princetons stocked with seminars is a colossal problem, one the book sidesteps. Delbanco tentatively suggests "in theory, at least" that governments could spend more money, but fails, remarkably, to note the political reality of governments moving in the opposite direction (160). It's "encouraging" when a wealthy institution reduces the number of huge lecture classes in favor of small seminars, but the lack of describing how to fund the additional number of instructors ("[s]uch a faculty is expensive to recruit and retain") is discouraging (88-9).
Similarly, Delbanco's imagined classroom is not taught by a part-timer, non-tenure-track faculty member. In reality adjuncts now teach the majority of classes, and there are no signs of that changing in the near future. The adjunctification of the professoriate makes scant impression on College (6, 123, 153), and no solutions to the problem appear. Let me expand the passage cited earlier: "my focus is on the so-called elite colleges, which have so far been relatively immune to the gutting of the faculty that is already far advanced at more vulnerable institutions" (6). This is especially galling for a book claiming to depict, as its subtitle claims, "College: What It... Is, and Should Be."
Beyond economics, College downplays a host of other disciplines. The STEM world barely appears in this book. Instead the humanities dominate on multiple levels. Delbanco quotes beautifully from literary and philosophical writers, but never from scientists. His curricular examples are usually, if not exclusively, found in the humanities (57-60, 100-101, 173); in one case, they are explicitly against the sciences (99). His pedagogical model is solely that of discussion, not the lab. Students engage by writing papers, never by composing lab reports or completing problem sets. Undergraduates take classes from "a grab bag of unrelated subjects" (85) - sometimes true for humanities majors, but impossible for science students.. As a humanist, I know too well the tendency of humanists to mistake their part of the academic world for the whole; it's unfortunate to see it happen in as thoughtful and well-researched a book as this. Seeing computer science described as "narrowly vocational" (12) is not so much insulting as depressing.
Speaking of STEM, Delbanco calls his approach to technology "skepticism", but that is really a misnomer for ignorance. He touches on MOOCs and online learning, only to rapidly shunt them aside. The digital humanities appear in a single paragraph, unnamed, and framed in mockery and marginalization (98). Delbanco doesn't do anything with blended learning, the flipped classroom, digital multimedia, social media, open education, cMOOCs (as opposed to xMOOCs), open access publication, the crisis of scholarly communication, the rise of the digital public intellectual, information literacy, etc. He would have done better to exclude technology entirely for reasons of space, or else take it seriously.
College is, mostly, a pleasure to read. Delbanco is passionate about his subject, and keenly committed to learning. His account of academic history draws nicely from primary sources, yielding humorous quotes and echoes of the present. Delbanco's prose is thoughtful and elegant.
His overall claim for a specific form of higher education is also appealing. He envisions small classrooms led by engaging professors, spaces where inquiry and discussion range freely. I agree with the excellence of this vision based on my work as a teacher and from my memories of being a student. Delbanco's additional claim that colleges can boost citizens' democratic engagement is one I'm sympathetic to.
However, this vision is so partial and limited as to constitute special pleading, or at least a grossly inaccurate depiction of higher education in reality.
To begin with, Delbanco openly admits that his focus is on a handful of Ivy League campuses (mostly Yale, Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford). "[M]y focus is on the so-called elite colleges" (6). The experience of more than 4500 American institutions counts for little or nothing in College. Towards the book's end the author observes that many new trends (see below) don't really apply to "the old and prestigious colleges that have been at the center of this book" (153)... then changes the subject.
The classicism of this move is a bit breathtaking. Delbanco even observes that "our 'best' colleges are doing more to sustain than to retard to growth of inequality in our society" (26-7; repeated 122), and stays silent about ways of addressing the problem. Moreover, this strategy follows the hoary cliche of every campus wanting to be Harvard, and the unfortunate media trope of paying too much attention to Harvard and Yale at the expense of the rest of American academia. Delbanco has said elsewhere that many Americans envision college life based on a dream of the 1920s, failing to grapple with a century of development; his book is predicated on a similar problem. He admits that there is a "[growing] disparity among institutions"(7), only to plunge onwards.
For instance, adult learners are simply not an issue in College. The book is all about the traditional-age undergrad: "At its core, a college should be a place where young people find help for navigating the territory between adolescence and adulthood" (3). That this doesn't describe the majority (!) of college and university students is a serious weakness for the book.
This focus leads the book away from any serious consideration of college economics. Yes, College sketches the development of financial aid over the 20th century (ch. 4), but stops before our current decade of the Great Recession and our present funding crises. Funding a transformation of American higher education into four thousand Princetons stocked with seminars is a colossal problem, one the book sidesteps. Delbanco tentatively suggests "in theory, at least" that governments could spend more money, but fails, remarkably, to note the political reality of governments moving in the opposite direction (160). It's "encouraging" when a wealthy institution reduces the number of huge lecture classes in favor of small seminars, but the lack of describing how to fund the additional number of instructors ("[s]uch a faculty is expensive to recruit and retain") is discouraging (88-9).
Similarly, Delbanco's imagined classroom is not taught by a part-timer, non-tenure-track faculty member. In reality adjuncts now teach the majority of classes, and there are no signs of that changing in the near future. The adjunctification of the professoriate makes scant impression on College (6, 123, 153), and no solutions to the problem appear. Let me expand the passage cited earlier: "my focus is on the so-called elite colleges, which have so far been relatively immune to the gutting of the faculty that is already far advanced at more vulnerable institutions" (6). This is especially galling for a book claiming to depict, as its subtitle claims, "College: What It... Is, and Should Be."
Beyond economics, College downplays a host of other disciplines. The STEM world barely appears in this book. Instead the humanities dominate on multiple levels. Delbanco quotes beautifully from literary and philosophical writers, but never from scientists. His curricular examples are usually, if not exclusively, found in the humanities (57-60, 100-101, 173); in one case, they are explicitly against the sciences (99). His pedagogical model is solely that of discussion, not the lab. Students engage by writing papers, never by composing lab reports or completing problem sets. Undergraduates take classes from "a grab bag of unrelated subjects" (85) - sometimes true for humanities majors, but impossible for science students.. As a humanist, I know too well the tendency of humanists to mistake their part of the academic world for the whole; it's unfortunate to see it happen in as thoughtful and well-researched a book as this. Seeing computer science described as "narrowly vocational" (12) is not so much insulting as depressing.
Speaking of STEM, Delbanco calls his approach to technology "skepticism", but that is really a misnomer for ignorance. He touches on MOOCs and online learning, only to rapidly shunt them aside. The digital humanities appear in a single paragraph, unnamed, and framed in mockery and marginalization (98). Delbanco doesn't do anything with blended learning, the flipped classroom, digital multimedia, social media, open education, cMOOCs (as opposed to xMOOCs), open access publication, the crisis of scholarly communication, the rise of the digital public intellectual, information literacy, etc. He would have done better to exclude technology entirely for reasons of space, or else take it seriously.
June 5, 2017
This is a skimpy little book of mammoth pretensions, and it's full of self-serving pieties, but it does contain some amusing anecdotes about college life in generations past.
For example, I always thought "meatball" was just generic slang for loser, but Delbanco reports that at Harvard in the Thirties and Forties a "meatball" was a commuting student (usually Jewish) who was too poor or too socially awkward to live on campus. This actually blew my mind because there's a key scene in Norman Mailer's THE NAKED AND THE DEAD where the WASP hero refers to another guy as a "meatball." Now that scene has a totally different meaning to me!
Other than that, this book doesn't have much to offer. Delbanco is full of vague generalizations about how much college does for undergraduates, but he's short on convincing arguments. He never addresses the actual quality of life for undergraduates at his own school, Columbia. He never mentions problems like alcoholism, drug abuse, sexual abuse, suicide, or depression. He talks a lot about the joys of teaching but doesn't offer a single anecdote about faculty members interacting with undergraduates on a human level. He never talks about undergraduates seeking (let alone receiving) any kind of mentoring or career advice from faculty members. He does admit that military veterans are in short supply on the Columbia campus. But he doesn't acknowledge the ugly legacy of the Sixties, the open hatred most Columbia faculty and alumni have for military people as ignorant baby-killers and trigger-happy proles. (Most military people are "not smart, not rich, not directed enough for college," in Barnard girl Anna Quindlen's infamous phrase.)
There's a lot of vaguely liberal posturing in this book about how great it is when college students do public service and work off campus to help the less fortunate. But in a Columbia context, there's no mention of things like urban crime and violence right off campus. (My roommate was mugged less than a month after we arrived as freshmen. He dropped out two months later. Nobody asked why.) Altogether I would say this is an empty and unsatisfying book, written by a real phony. But that's just because I went to Columbia, and understand the vast difference between what these people promise and what they actually deliver.
For example, I always thought "meatball" was just generic slang for loser, but Delbanco reports that at Harvard in the Thirties and Forties a "meatball" was a commuting student (usually Jewish) who was too poor or too socially awkward to live on campus. This actually blew my mind because there's a key scene in Norman Mailer's THE NAKED AND THE DEAD where the WASP hero refers to another guy as a "meatball." Now that scene has a totally different meaning to me!
Other than that, this book doesn't have much to offer. Delbanco is full of vague generalizations about how much college does for undergraduates, but he's short on convincing arguments. He never addresses the actual quality of life for undergraduates at his own school, Columbia. He never mentions problems like alcoholism, drug abuse, sexual abuse, suicide, or depression. He talks a lot about the joys of teaching but doesn't offer a single anecdote about faculty members interacting with undergraduates on a human level. He never talks about undergraduates seeking (let alone receiving) any kind of mentoring or career advice from faculty members. He does admit that military veterans are in short supply on the Columbia campus. But he doesn't acknowledge the ugly legacy of the Sixties, the open hatred most Columbia faculty and alumni have for military people as ignorant baby-killers and trigger-happy proles. (Most military people are "not smart, not rich, not directed enough for college," in Barnard girl Anna Quindlen's infamous phrase.)
There's a lot of vaguely liberal posturing in this book about how great it is when college students do public service and work off campus to help the less fortunate. But in a Columbia context, there's no mention of things like urban crime and violence right off campus. (My roommate was mugged less than a month after we arrived as freshmen. He dropped out two months later. Nobody asked why.) Altogether I would say this is an empty and unsatisfying book, written by a real phony. But that's just because I went to Columbia, and understand the vast difference between what these people promise and what they actually deliver.
January 21, 2014
I read this as I picked up part of a conversation between 2 of my former colleagues. Though I am now emeriti librarian, I haven't stopped caring about the educational enterprise.
The author defends the humanities, which I studied for the sheer joy of it on the way to graduate school, so he captured my attention right away. Delbanco does a thorough job of presenting a history of higher education in America, the importance of an informed citizenry (another of my interests)and offers a balanced view of the state of colleges and universities. In addition, he described the state of the professoriate and it sounded true to my own experience.
Clearly interested in improving the undergraduate experience, Delbanco is engaging and articulate in his discussions. Like all good educators, from the beginning of our American experience, the author examines and analyzes the undertaking always looking for new and different ways to preserve the experience for future generations.
The author defends the humanities, which I studied for the sheer joy of it on the way to graduate school, so he captured my attention right away. Delbanco does a thorough job of presenting a history of higher education in America, the importance of an informed citizenry (another of my interests)and offers a balanced view of the state of colleges and universities. In addition, he described the state of the professoriate and it sounded true to my own experience.
Clearly interested in improving the undergraduate experience, Delbanco is engaging and articulate in his discussions. Like all good educators, from the beginning of our American experience, the author examines and analyzes the undertaking always looking for new and different ways to preserve the experience for future generations.
June 10, 2012
Good info, interesting read. I read this for some background info for my interview with admissions - cross your fingers for me!
January 23, 2023
erm idk it was fine nothing mind blowing
I think it’s funny when professors assign their own books 😁
I think it’s funny when professors assign their own books 😁
July 20, 2023
I read this book off and on for a couple months until I finally decided to finish it. Very fast read if you decide to commit to it though. My version which included an afterword was only 170 some odd pages not including the afterword.
Overall I found this book to be a very good read. It did not necessarily touch on the topics that I picked it up for, but for the time it was written (the early 2010s) it has proven rather prescient.
I think it's a unique experience reading as someone who is now halfway through my undergraduate degree since it prompts to read then reflect then read and reflect. Often times finding similarities to the problems that Delbanco identifies in his book.
If you are looking for answers to the question of higher education in the United States this book offers some steps that could be taken, but it does not give you answers. Nor should you look for answers in this book, but treat it more as a dialogue. It for sure can lead to some interesting conversations.
Overall I found this book to be a very good read. It did not necessarily touch on the topics that I picked it up for, but for the time it was written (the early 2010s) it has proven rather prescient.
I think it's a unique experience reading as someone who is now halfway through my undergraduate degree since it prompts to read then reflect then read and reflect. Often times finding similarities to the problems that Delbanco identifies in his book.
If you are looking for answers to the question of higher education in the United States this book offers some steps that could be taken, but it does not give you answers. Nor should you look for answers in this book, but treat it more as a dialogue. It for sure can lead to some interesting conversations.
May 16, 2015
Hot-iron review, to be revised with a more complete one when I go through it again in a few weeks. — A solid look into college and how it has progressed over time, and the key challenges today with college. The main thing that Delbanco argues is that college is moving away from the key points that made it a useful institution, mainly, that it serves as a "mid-point" for students to transition into real-world life. We are losing that: with a more vocational (technical-skills) focus, movement away from the liberal arts ideal, adjunct professors, and the growing costs of college, the institution is becoming sort of a shadow of its former self.
Delbanco does not try to extensively describe why a liberal education matters—this sort of question is better addressed by the 'soft skills, hard skills' approach that Fareed Zakaria takes in In Defense of a Liberal Education —but he does make the common argument that liberal/humanistic education is pretty much the only one that can make us think about the harder questions of life, ethics, and meaning, questions that science cannot, and usually does not attempt to answer (save for some future consilience event in neuroscience, he says).
The interesting thing that Delbanco does is that he ties these ideals back to the Puritan roots of college: that college should be a place where character and self-questioning is developed, and that our external condition, be it wealth or credentials, say nothing about the "inward condition of the soul," and that college was a place to nurture this sort of thing. Yet, today, admissions and other programs are bogged down with legacy, athlete scholarships, the sway of money, the "new Jews" of Asian-Americans (at elite colleges) and low-income students.
Many of these changes to the system of college are rooted in economics on both sides. On the student side, many see college as a gateway to a career and not so much as the sort of 'development ground' like before, and many are anxious to turn the college investment into some sort of credential that can be leveraged for a job. On the institutional side, colleges, with less public support, growing costs, and lots of other complicated things, are highly inclined to cut departments, reduce costs, and selective colleges have to try to balance the dual ideals of admitting an equitable set of students (including lower-performing low-income ones) while also rewarding educational performance, with less-endowed colleges having to reach to more wealthy out-of-state or out-of-country students to stay in the black. These are all very complicated problems, as is evident though Delbanco's analysis.
Finally and most importantly, undergraduate education is given very little attention in research universities. Faculty are judged by their research ability, not their ability to teach. PhD students are admitted on the same scale. Faculty at Columbia in particular rarely meet to discuss the undergraduate education, and undergraduates rarely have a seat at the table in university considerations. The beneficial innovations to the classroom have mostly been driven by teachers that care—outside of any systems of evaluation (which rarely take the quality of undergraduate education into consideration), and thus outside of any desire for a raise or promotion.
All in all, Delbanco portrays a system of college that has lost its way, but still has motivated students inside the system that are trying their best. He portrays a number of solutions, none of which seem totally new, and many of which require a lot of investment. The key point is that these are very complex problems that have to do with internal problems, economics, and mismatched incentives.
I'm only focusing in on a few things that stuck out to me, but he also talks about a lot of other things—rigid curriculums vs. free-flowing, for example. I generally liked the book, but I think it would have been better if it were tied together a bit better—the wide area of analysis was good, but it could have done with a bit more consolidation. I think I learned a few new things, but for the most part, I learned the background and additional detail behind realities that I already thought were true (mismatched incentives, neglect of the undergraduate education, movement from the humanities to the sciences, etc.) Missing from it was also how to get students and others to care about liberal education, since that is a key problem by itself that provides the basis of why we should maintain the institution of college despite challenges. It did make me want to sign up for the year-long Western Literature class at my school, though, since he makes the point that they bring up very personal questions of character and conduct that we see in ourselves through the characters in those books.
Delbanco does not try to extensively describe why a liberal education matters—this sort of question is better addressed by the 'soft skills, hard skills' approach that Fareed Zakaria takes in In Defense of a Liberal Education —but he does make the common argument that liberal/humanistic education is pretty much the only one that can make us think about the harder questions of life, ethics, and meaning, questions that science cannot, and usually does not attempt to answer (save for some future consilience event in neuroscience, he says).
The interesting thing that Delbanco does is that he ties these ideals back to the Puritan roots of college: that college should be a place where character and self-questioning is developed, and that our external condition, be it wealth or credentials, say nothing about the "inward condition of the soul," and that college was a place to nurture this sort of thing. Yet, today, admissions and other programs are bogged down with legacy, athlete scholarships, the sway of money, the "new Jews" of Asian-Americans (at elite colleges) and low-income students.
Many of these changes to the system of college are rooted in economics on both sides. On the student side, many see college as a gateway to a career and not so much as the sort of 'development ground' like before, and many are anxious to turn the college investment into some sort of credential that can be leveraged for a job. On the institutional side, colleges, with less public support, growing costs, and lots of other complicated things, are highly inclined to cut departments, reduce costs, and selective colleges have to try to balance the dual ideals of admitting an equitable set of students (including lower-performing low-income ones) while also rewarding educational performance, with less-endowed colleges having to reach to more wealthy out-of-state or out-of-country students to stay in the black. These are all very complicated problems, as is evident though Delbanco's analysis.
Finally and most importantly, undergraduate education is given very little attention in research universities. Faculty are judged by their research ability, not their ability to teach. PhD students are admitted on the same scale. Faculty at Columbia in particular rarely meet to discuss the undergraduate education, and undergraduates rarely have a seat at the table in university considerations. The beneficial innovations to the classroom have mostly been driven by teachers that care—outside of any systems of evaluation (which rarely take the quality of undergraduate education into consideration), and thus outside of any desire for a raise or promotion.
All in all, Delbanco portrays a system of college that has lost its way, but still has motivated students inside the system that are trying their best. He portrays a number of solutions, none of which seem totally new, and many of which require a lot of investment. The key point is that these are very complex problems that have to do with internal problems, economics, and mismatched incentives.
I'm only focusing in on a few things that stuck out to me, but he also talks about a lot of other things—rigid curriculums vs. free-flowing, for example. I generally liked the book, but I think it would have been better if it were tied together a bit better—the wide area of analysis was good, but it could have done with a bit more consolidation. I think I learned a few new things, but for the most part, I learned the background and additional detail behind realities that I already thought were true (mismatched incentives, neglect of the undergraduate education, movement from the humanities to the sciences, etc.) Missing from it was also how to get students and others to care about liberal education, since that is a key problem by itself that provides the basis of why we should maintain the institution of college despite challenges. It did make me want to sign up for the year-long Western Literature class at my school, though, since he makes the point that they bring up very personal questions of character and conduct that we see in ourselves through the characters in those books.
November 8, 2013
Andrew Delbanco opens this book describing a faculty meeting early in his tenure at Columbia where the end of "needs blind" admissions was being debated. He described this debate as the beginning of a journey of thinking about not only his chosen discipline but the whys and wherefores of the university, of which this book is a product.
The book follows the schema of the title. He looks at the origins of colleges in this country, particularly dwelling on the church-related character of their beginnings, the changes in college education post-Civil War driven by our industrial economy and the influence of the German research university model, and the current state of the collegiate world.
In contrast to some, he is not a doomsayer, although he reckons seriously with the trends of for-profit schools, online education, and the cost pressures in modern education, particularly post-2008. Nevertheless, he argues for the continued importance of college as a place where undergraduates do not simply learn a skill, but wrestle with the big questions that "make life interesting". He ultimately comes down against a "merit-driven" admissions process alone--arguing for a kind of "grace" that permits those who might not otherwise enjoy the college experience to have a place at the table. In this, he consciously cites the early college ethos that recognized the undeserved privileges of those who obtain such education and the requirements of noblesse oblige that follow. I discuss this last point further in a blog post found here: http://rtrube54.wordpress.com/2013/11...
It is fascinating for me as a collegiate ministry worker to see his references to Christian influences in the university, that in some way provide the basis for a love of learning that is not simply pragmatic, yet consider these as anachronistic beliefs no longer relevant to the current scene. He even remarks at his surprise when he attended a Veritas Forum at Columbia and discovered a large lecture hall full of intellectually earnest and thoughtful people considering the relevance of Christian truth claims to the university world.
I noted in his acknowledgements several people of faith in university leadership positions. It is my hope that Delbanco and others recognize that the love of God and the love of learning need not be at odds with one another. Some of the people who may indeed be his most serious co-belligerents in seeking the flourishing of the 21st century university are those very people of faith.
There was much that I appreciated in his treatment, particularly the evident love of learning, love for students, and conviction about the importance of the university in the formation of students for lives of meaning, of fruitful citizenship, and useful work.
The book follows the schema of the title. He looks at the origins of colleges in this country, particularly dwelling on the church-related character of their beginnings, the changes in college education post-Civil War driven by our industrial economy and the influence of the German research university model, and the current state of the collegiate world.
In contrast to some, he is not a doomsayer, although he reckons seriously with the trends of for-profit schools, online education, and the cost pressures in modern education, particularly post-2008. Nevertheless, he argues for the continued importance of college as a place where undergraduates do not simply learn a skill, but wrestle with the big questions that "make life interesting". He ultimately comes down against a "merit-driven" admissions process alone--arguing for a kind of "grace" that permits those who might not otherwise enjoy the college experience to have a place at the table. In this, he consciously cites the early college ethos that recognized the undeserved privileges of those who obtain such education and the requirements of noblesse oblige that follow. I discuss this last point further in a blog post found here: http://rtrube54.wordpress.com/2013/11...
It is fascinating for me as a collegiate ministry worker to see his references to Christian influences in the university, that in some way provide the basis for a love of learning that is not simply pragmatic, yet consider these as anachronistic beliefs no longer relevant to the current scene. He even remarks at his surprise when he attended a Veritas Forum at Columbia and discovered a large lecture hall full of intellectually earnest and thoughtful people considering the relevance of Christian truth claims to the university world.
I noted in his acknowledgements several people of faith in university leadership positions. It is my hope that Delbanco and others recognize that the love of God and the love of learning need not be at odds with one another. Some of the people who may indeed be his most serious co-belligerents in seeking the flourishing of the 21st century university are those very people of faith.
There was much that I appreciated in his treatment, particularly the evident love of learning, love for students, and conviction about the importance of the university in the formation of students for lives of meaning, of fruitful citizenship, and useful work.
Want to read
April 25, 2012Apparently a celebration of the old-fashioned liberal arts education. Even beyond the fact that such a thesis is dear to my heart, any book that begins with the observation (quoting Vedders) that “with the possible exception of prostitution, teaching is the only profession that has had absolutely no productivity advance in the 2,400 years since Socrates," makes it straight to the top of my Must Read list.
August 10, 2013
As our oldest child is about to head off to college, I appreciated this book. It's a long essay on the history and promise of liberal arts institutions. Much of the history was completely new to me. Some of his concerns about the present reality were too.
December 27, 2013
Each year a book is selected that Vanderbilt sends to all first year students over the summer and then discusses this book at the commons in houses and Vanderbilt Visions groups:
http://commonplace.vanderbilt.edu/?v=...
In some ways the selection of this book is a bit of a surprise to me (oh, you are just admitted to college – let’s take a look at the inglorious past of higher ed and all its problems today) and on the other hand I am really excited to see what input students will have on this and hopefully in confronting the challenges the book presents.
The book start out listing many of the changes currently weighing on higher education (p.4):
- Globalization
- Economic instability
- Revolution in information technology
- Inadequacy of K-12 education
- Elongation of adolescence
- Breakdown of faculty tenure as an academic norm
- Collage of consensus abut what students should know
And I’ll add some specific challenges (I believe all of which came up in the book):
- Boom of for-profit universities
- Increasing competition for top spots in colleges and universities (p.112-124)
- Rapidly rising cost of higher education, and decrease of governmental support
- Explosion of online learning, and especially MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) and other means to learn online (p.150-151)
- Decrease in students experiencing a residential liberal arts college education
- An inverse relationship between good teaching and having high prestige/compensated faculty (p.2-3)
- “a college degree long supplanted the high school diploma as the minimum qualification for entry into the skilled labor market” (p.25)
- Potential growth of a near caste system between those who can and cannot attend top schools (p.112-124)
- Rise in the number of adjunct faculty, and decrease in those who are full-time “tenure track” to around 35% of faculty (p. 153)
- Method of assessing faculty (and any other service/part of the school) based almost solely on student satisfaction surveys (p.155) – is the goal to make students happy?
If America has something to add to the higher education experience, Delbanco says, it is that it has democratized it (p. 35, 107-112). This certainly wasn’t always the case, as originally several groups (women, Jews, blacks) were kept from college. But in 1900 2% of Americans went to college and by the end of WWII this had risen to 33% (p.108). Why did this happen?
- Creation of women’s and “Negro” colleges
- Expansion of land-grant colleges into state university systems
- Civil rights movement and decrease of race barriers
- 3-tiered systems of community colleges, state colleges, and research colleges (Clark Kerr’s California “master plan”)
- Opening of all-male institutions to be become co-ed ones
- Development of financial aid (by religious institutions) for those who couldn’t otherwise attend college (p.109) and eventually “need-blind” financial aid and “need-blind admissions” (p.111)
- Democratic and Puritan belief that human capability and intelligence is found through those in all levels of society (p.109)
- GI Bill (Servicemen’s Readjustment act)
- Rapid growth after WWII of junior colleges (now community colleges) (p.110)
Another important topic that is address is college admissions, which has a much less than spotless history (at one point this was the way to keep out the diverse groups mentioned above). One of the ethical questions of admissions is the value of test scores, and the fact that higher SAT scores correlate closely with increased family socioeconomic status (p.118). Unfortunately these days college admissions may not be having a democratizing effect, but rather the effect of strengthening existing class divisions.
Chapter 5 points out that, “Our oldest colleges have abandoned the cardinal principle of the religion out of which they arose: the principle that no human being deserves anything based on his or her merit” (p.139). Delbanco gives the example of how God choose Abraham not because of his merit, but “freely of his [God’s] grace”. He then points out how today we so often view colleges as a “meritocracy” a place where only the best get in to the best places, and if you come from wealth it is because you deserve it. It is almost reminiscent of the Indian caste system, where we are almost fatalistically each reserved our own place in life (p.125-139). Standing where we are now, one can’t help but wonder what prompted such a switch. From my perspective, our own pride -- a means to fueling our own egos, seems to be a major reason. Delbanco also points out how some of this is a result of how universities used to be a refuge from the “world of getting and spending in which young people are destined to spend so much of their life,” but now many aspects of a university run counter to this:
- The huge salaries and perks of university presidents
- Opportunities for academics to make a lot of money through consulting, media visits,…
- “Technology-transfer" partnerships with corporate investors and government agencies (p.141-143)
- Commonness of plagiarism and cheating, and the means to do so
- The “athletic incubus” (p.145-147)
Interestingly, after mentioning through all these he then hops to the example of the “Veritas Forum”, and how it draws large numbers of college students to look at issues from a thoughtful ethical and intellectual perspective. This seems to be his counter point to the above. But, he ends the chapter about where he started it. With an excellent point “Unfortunately, but failing to reconnect their students to the idea that good fortune confers responsibility to live generously toward the less fortunate, too many colleges are doing too little to help students cope with the siege of uncertainty.” The uncertainty he mentions is a challenging of commonly held viewpoints about how things would work in light of the shakeup of the Great Recession. “One of the insights at the core of the college idea – indeed of the idea of community itself – has always been that to serve others is to serve oneself by providing a sense of purpose, thereby countering the loneliness and aimlessness by which all people, young and old, can be afflicted” (p.148). As an American, a Christian, and a father, I am so glad to hear this injunction. To me there is very much a connection between the waning of this belief and the rise in economic inequality of the US.
In the final chapter, Delbanco revisits many of the problems effecting higher education that I mentioned above. One major issue he looks at is how if colleges don’t keep themselves accountable (as they are currently) then someone else will get involved. (“…if colleges don’t keep their houses in order, the state will – or should – do it for them” – p. 156) It seems like we are already starting to see some of this. First, in the ranking systems that have become so recognized and that so many schools shape their missions around. Second, with President Obama’s report card on how graduates from given schools fair -- an initiative likely due in response to the rise of for-profit colleges. A second major issue he looks at is the rising cost of college and how this is making college more and more something for the well-to-do.
In response to these concerns and others, he finally moves to some suggested best practices:
- Increasing partnerships between community colleges and 4-yr colleges (and with high schools and community orgs helping school-aged students) as a way to aid low-income families in getting support to get to college (p.161)
- He points to research that students from low-income families have increase retention rates if they are in a place that “encourages close contact among students and between students and faculty members” (p.161) Sounds like a vote for the VU Commons. He gives a specific example of how this is done at U of Maryland where there is “mentoring, encouragement of structured group study, and apprenticeships to faculty” (p.163)
- Carnegie Mellon’s “open learning initiative” where online courses provide students with regular feedback and then the feedback is used to revise the course (p.163)
- Delbanco points out that the internet has great potential to give those of less wealth a nearly equal opportunity to learn
- Duke Professor Cathy Davidson’s “collaboration by difference” – “The idea that multiple perspectives contributed by students with different gifts and interests are not only desirable but essential.” (p.164) It sounds like a Montessori school. And I think would make for a great research class, where students work on a research project.
- Denison’s University’s strategic scheduling of sabbaticals that allow there to be more tenure-track professors and less adjuncts
- Valparaiso’s “How the University Works” half-day workshops twice a year where faculty can meet with administrators from throughout the university (p. 164). Sounds like a great place to problem solve.
- Eric Mazur at Harvard who uses short periods of teaching in between which students work together for 10-minute periods to work as a group on a project. Students provide their answer via electronic feedback so the professor can make on-the-spot decisions about the class understanding (p.165).
- To encourage professors (especially at Research 1 Universities) to care more about teaching and interacting with students their needs to be rewards for this. And graduate programs need to do more to prepare upcoming professors in teaching as well as research (p.166-167)
- Have PhDs interact more with MDs to see how seriously they treat their work.
- Stanford’s Hope House where faculty, undergrad volunteers and female addicts and ex-convicts discuss philosophy and literature (p.173)
- Bard College – where faculty teach several areas at the local correction facility.
- Columbia’s devotion to regularly admitting non-traditional students who came back from war or other work and are then very grateful to be at college (p.174)
- “Students integrate their reading and writing assignments with volunteer work helping immigrant families cope with public bureaucracies, doing research for an environmental advocacy group, tutoring at-risk children,… (p.175)
- Project Pericles’ “Debating for Democracy” events where students are involved in constitutional interpretation
- Amherst’s offering mentoring for students at local community colleges and helping strong students to move to Amherst
- Yale’s working with local schools
- Univ of Tulsa’s giving staff up to 8 hours/month paid leave to do community volunteer work
In the last few pages of the book Delbanco then recounts of a couple of sources for us to refer to as we look at what higher ed can aspire to:
- Relevance of college’s religious origins, particularly how God is no respecter of one’s position in life. Also to Puritan view of education as transformative. (p.171)
- Ideal of democracy – that good education be something that is open to all. That colleges find ways to balance excellence and equity (p.172).
- College as a place to ask the fundamental questions about life.
- Further the integration of ethics and learning (p. 174)
- Encouraging student interest in engaging the broader communities they live in, especially via community service (p.175)
He ends coming back to the idea that colleges carry much of democracy and more than anything they need to teach students that “self-interest” need not be at odd with concern for one another”. Having had a chance to listen to a half-dozen YouTube videos where Commons house faculty talk about the book or talk with students about the book, I was pretty surprised how this idea only occasionally came up, and how the idea of college’s religious roots never came up.
http://commonplace.vanderbilt.edu/?v=...
In some ways the selection of this book is a bit of a surprise to me (oh, you are just admitted to college – let’s take a look at the inglorious past of higher ed and all its problems today) and on the other hand I am really excited to see what input students will have on this and hopefully in confronting the challenges the book presents.
The book start out listing many of the changes currently weighing on higher education (p.4):
- Globalization
- Economic instability
- Revolution in information technology
- Inadequacy of K-12 education
- Elongation of adolescence
- Breakdown of faculty tenure as an academic norm
- Collage of consensus abut what students should know
And I’ll add some specific challenges (I believe all of which came up in the book):
- Boom of for-profit universities
- Increasing competition for top spots in colleges and universities (p.112-124)
- Rapidly rising cost of higher education, and decrease of governmental support
- Explosion of online learning, and especially MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses) and other means to learn online (p.150-151)
- Decrease in students experiencing a residential liberal arts college education
- An inverse relationship between good teaching and having high prestige/compensated faculty (p.2-3)
- “a college degree long supplanted the high school diploma as the minimum qualification for entry into the skilled labor market” (p.25)
- Potential growth of a near caste system between those who can and cannot attend top schools (p.112-124)
- Rise in the number of adjunct faculty, and decrease in those who are full-time “tenure track” to around 35% of faculty (p. 153)
- Method of assessing faculty (and any other service/part of the school) based almost solely on student satisfaction surveys (p.155) – is the goal to make students happy?
If America has something to add to the higher education experience, Delbanco says, it is that it has democratized it (p. 35, 107-112). This certainly wasn’t always the case, as originally several groups (women, Jews, blacks) were kept from college. But in 1900 2% of Americans went to college and by the end of WWII this had risen to 33% (p.108). Why did this happen?
- Creation of women’s and “Negro” colleges
- Expansion of land-grant colleges into state university systems
- Civil rights movement and decrease of race barriers
- 3-tiered systems of community colleges, state colleges, and research colleges (Clark Kerr’s California “master plan”)
- Opening of all-male institutions to be become co-ed ones
- Development of financial aid (by religious institutions) for those who couldn’t otherwise attend college (p.109) and eventually “need-blind” financial aid and “need-blind admissions” (p.111)
- Democratic and Puritan belief that human capability and intelligence is found through those in all levels of society (p.109)
- GI Bill (Servicemen’s Readjustment act)
- Rapid growth after WWII of junior colleges (now community colleges) (p.110)
Another important topic that is address is college admissions, which has a much less than spotless history (at one point this was the way to keep out the diverse groups mentioned above). One of the ethical questions of admissions is the value of test scores, and the fact that higher SAT scores correlate closely with increased family socioeconomic status (p.118). Unfortunately these days college admissions may not be having a democratizing effect, but rather the effect of strengthening existing class divisions.
Chapter 5 points out that, “Our oldest colleges have abandoned the cardinal principle of the religion out of which they arose: the principle that no human being deserves anything based on his or her merit” (p.139). Delbanco gives the example of how God choose Abraham not because of his merit, but “freely of his [God’s] grace”. He then points out how today we so often view colleges as a “meritocracy” a place where only the best get in to the best places, and if you come from wealth it is because you deserve it. It is almost reminiscent of the Indian caste system, where we are almost fatalistically each reserved our own place in life (p.125-139). Standing where we are now, one can’t help but wonder what prompted such a switch. From my perspective, our own pride -- a means to fueling our own egos, seems to be a major reason. Delbanco also points out how some of this is a result of how universities used to be a refuge from the “world of getting and spending in which young people are destined to spend so much of their life,” but now many aspects of a university run counter to this:
- The huge salaries and perks of university presidents
- Opportunities for academics to make a lot of money through consulting, media visits,…
- “Technology-transfer" partnerships with corporate investors and government agencies (p.141-143)
- Commonness of plagiarism and cheating, and the means to do so
- The “athletic incubus” (p.145-147)
Interestingly, after mentioning through all these he then hops to the example of the “Veritas Forum”, and how it draws large numbers of college students to look at issues from a thoughtful ethical and intellectual perspective. This seems to be his counter point to the above. But, he ends the chapter about where he started it. With an excellent point “Unfortunately, but failing to reconnect their students to the idea that good fortune confers responsibility to live generously toward the less fortunate, too many colleges are doing too little to help students cope with the siege of uncertainty.” The uncertainty he mentions is a challenging of commonly held viewpoints about how things would work in light of the shakeup of the Great Recession. “One of the insights at the core of the college idea – indeed of the idea of community itself – has always been that to serve others is to serve oneself by providing a sense of purpose, thereby countering the loneliness and aimlessness by which all people, young and old, can be afflicted” (p.148). As an American, a Christian, and a father, I am so glad to hear this injunction. To me there is very much a connection between the waning of this belief and the rise in economic inequality of the US.
In the final chapter, Delbanco revisits many of the problems effecting higher education that I mentioned above. One major issue he looks at is how if colleges don’t keep themselves accountable (as they are currently) then someone else will get involved. (“…if colleges don’t keep their houses in order, the state will – or should – do it for them” – p. 156) It seems like we are already starting to see some of this. First, in the ranking systems that have become so recognized and that so many schools shape their missions around. Second, with President Obama’s report card on how graduates from given schools fair -- an initiative likely due in response to the rise of for-profit colleges. A second major issue he looks at is the rising cost of college and how this is making college more and more something for the well-to-do.
In response to these concerns and others, he finally moves to some suggested best practices:
- Increasing partnerships between community colleges and 4-yr colleges (and with high schools and community orgs helping school-aged students) as a way to aid low-income families in getting support to get to college (p.161)
- He points to research that students from low-income families have increase retention rates if they are in a place that “encourages close contact among students and between students and faculty members” (p.161) Sounds like a vote for the VU Commons. He gives a specific example of how this is done at U of Maryland where there is “mentoring, encouragement of structured group study, and apprenticeships to faculty” (p.163)
- Carnegie Mellon’s “open learning initiative” where online courses provide students with regular feedback and then the feedback is used to revise the course (p.163)
- Delbanco points out that the internet has great potential to give those of less wealth a nearly equal opportunity to learn
- Duke Professor Cathy Davidson’s “collaboration by difference” – “The idea that multiple perspectives contributed by students with different gifts and interests are not only desirable but essential.” (p.164) It sounds like a Montessori school. And I think would make for a great research class, where students work on a research project.
- Denison’s University’s strategic scheduling of sabbaticals that allow there to be more tenure-track professors and less adjuncts
- Valparaiso’s “How the University Works” half-day workshops twice a year where faculty can meet with administrators from throughout the university (p. 164). Sounds like a great place to problem solve.
- Eric Mazur at Harvard who uses short periods of teaching in between which students work together for 10-minute periods to work as a group on a project. Students provide their answer via electronic feedback so the professor can make on-the-spot decisions about the class understanding (p.165).
- To encourage professors (especially at Research 1 Universities) to care more about teaching and interacting with students their needs to be rewards for this. And graduate programs need to do more to prepare upcoming professors in teaching as well as research (p.166-167)
- Have PhDs interact more with MDs to see how seriously they treat their work.
- Stanford’s Hope House where faculty, undergrad volunteers and female addicts and ex-convicts discuss philosophy and literature (p.173)
- Bard College – where faculty teach several areas at the local correction facility.
- Columbia’s devotion to regularly admitting non-traditional students who came back from war or other work and are then very grateful to be at college (p.174)
- “Students integrate their reading and writing assignments with volunteer work helping immigrant families cope with public bureaucracies, doing research for an environmental advocacy group, tutoring at-risk children,… (p.175)
- Project Pericles’ “Debating for Democracy” events where students are involved in constitutional interpretation
- Amherst’s offering mentoring for students at local community colleges and helping strong students to move to Amherst
- Yale’s working with local schools
- Univ of Tulsa’s giving staff up to 8 hours/month paid leave to do community volunteer work
In the last few pages of the book Delbanco then recounts of a couple of sources for us to refer to as we look at what higher ed can aspire to:
- Relevance of college’s religious origins, particularly how God is no respecter of one’s position in life. Also to Puritan view of education as transformative. (p.171)
- Ideal of democracy – that good education be something that is open to all. That colleges find ways to balance excellence and equity (p.172).
- College as a place to ask the fundamental questions about life.
- Further the integration of ethics and learning (p. 174)
- Encouraging student interest in engaging the broader communities they live in, especially via community service (p.175)
He ends coming back to the idea that colleges carry much of democracy and more than anything they need to teach students that “self-interest” need not be at odd with concern for one another”. Having had a chance to listen to a half-dozen YouTube videos where Commons house faculty talk about the book or talk with students about the book, I was pretty surprised how this idea only occasionally came up, and how the idea of college’s religious roots never came up.
July 2, 2019
This book wanders across time and geography, and is hard to sum up. but it eaves one with a broader vidsion of what undergraduate education is was and may be. It would be a good read for any high school senior even if it siseven years old. Our assessment methods have changed due to abandoning No Child Left Behind. Thankfully abandoned, but the side effects of cutting music, arts to a marginal status that they may never rebound from. On a personal note, it was interesting to find that colleges, as opposed to Universities were largely designed to civilize young men to take place inn societyy. My understanding as a child was that college was supposed to socialize men and women to serve in a democratic society. When I actually got to college I found it to be a circus of hoop jumping, alienation and infrequent inspiration. It was considered to be a trade school in some ways to a white collar job, although my college university was only a gateway to middle management. It also cultivated a radical outlook that would have made such jobs insfferable if you drank the coolaid. And I wish very much my university experience had been in an environment with undergradauate, but it was a traditional university in that regard. These distinctions would have been mysterious to me when I opened my first college catalog, or when I first applied. We had no guidence in my huge high school unless we were amongst the honors elite. I was only amongst the honors. to return to the work at hand he sums up his project nicely-I do not want to stick to any one of the genres to which such a story usually conforms--Jeremiads (invoking the past to shame the present elegy (gone are the greats of yesteryear), call to arms (do this or that and we will be saved)--so the result, no doubt, is a messy mixture of all of them." 150. It's all of those things, and it also respects the things that are the best values of education while listing the pitfalls of diploma mills, on line rip offs and false indorcements by declining institutions that once had better prestige. What we will definately lose in the digital revolution is the unorchestrated mixing of residental colleges.
August 22, 2023
Little seems to have changed in higher education since this book was published eleven years ago. Harvard may now cease considering legacy admissions; that may be all. Oh, and the Supreme Court recently struck down the concept of Affirmative Action—causing most thoughtful admissions departments to reconsider their policies. The “college” experience (four thousand in number) really only covers a small percentage of those who receive a secondary education. The majority attend a combination of community colleges or large research universities where the faculty are too busy really to teach and/or mentor undergraduates. And, as Delbanco claims in his preface to this edition, “College in America costs too much and students learn too little” (xi).
Delbanco spends a chapter each on the following topics: the purpose of college; its origins; how the college has evolved into the university; questions of who gets to go and who pays for it; new developments; and what is to be done about college and university deficiencies. Having visited hundreds of institutions, Delbanco, a professor of literature at Columbia University, outlines what may be wrong but also puts forth a few ideas that might ameliorate the situation. One idea is practiced by a Harvard professor who realized one hour is too long for a lecture—students were memorizing facts instead of digesting material. Instead, he now lectures for shorter periods, alternated with ten-minute break-out sessions where students work together on assigned problems. Through electronic feedback the professor learns whether he’s gotten the idea across. If significant numbers don’t understand, he returns to the material to present it again until most students have gotten it (165).
Ultimately, Delbanco asserts, “. . . faculty must care . . . teaching is its own reward” (166).
Amen.
Delbanco spends a chapter each on the following topics: the purpose of college; its origins; how the college has evolved into the university; questions of who gets to go and who pays for it; new developments; and what is to be done about college and university deficiencies. Having visited hundreds of institutions, Delbanco, a professor of literature at Columbia University, outlines what may be wrong but also puts forth a few ideas that might ameliorate the situation. One idea is practiced by a Harvard professor who realized one hour is too long for a lecture—students were memorizing facts instead of digesting material. Instead, he now lectures for shorter periods, alternated with ten-minute break-out sessions where students work together on assigned problems. Through electronic feedback the professor learns whether he’s gotten the idea across. If significant numbers don’t understand, he returns to the material to present it again until most students have gotten it (165).
Ultimately, Delbanco asserts, “. . . faculty must care . . . teaching is its own reward” (166).
Amen.
April 9, 2023
I really enjoyed this consideration of American colleges (and universities). It is far more idealistic than some that I have read that consider trying to contract the college system, and my own idealism in the realm of education was drawn to this. The idea of college as a "BS detector" and development of actual humans has always been my belief, and I am often frustrated by the idea of mere vocational training.
I was fascinated by the historical perspective and what college has meant and now means in America. I'm not sure I was really aware of the nuanced shifts in focus or the balance between learning and research that reflects my own experience (in a an undergraduate college at a research university). The consideration that college-aged youth is always the same but also unique to a time period is a nice tension and forgives a lot of the cynicism that is so often touted.
Delbanco does a wonderful job of considering the socio-economic determinants and results of college that may perpetuate inequalities but also have the potential to undermine them. One of my dear colleagues has said that high school may be the final opportunity to do what colleges used to do... and I hope, based on what this book has to say, that maybe he is wrong. Or maybe we do have to transfer that exploration of self and questioning of the world entirely to pre-college ages. It all depends on where things go from here.
Updated for post-pandemic considerations, this book considers the long trajectory of American colleges and what might be worth saving and looking for in the future. It is a wonderful counterpoint to the utilitarian/economic considerations of the college experience, and I hope that young people will consider this as a call to arms.
I was fascinated by the historical perspective and what college has meant and now means in America. I'm not sure I was really aware of the nuanced shifts in focus or the balance between learning and research that reflects my own experience (in a an undergraduate college at a research university). The consideration that college-aged youth is always the same but also unique to a time period is a nice tension and forgives a lot of the cynicism that is so often touted.
Delbanco does a wonderful job of considering the socio-economic determinants and results of college that may perpetuate inequalities but also have the potential to undermine them. One of my dear colleagues has said that high school may be the final opportunity to do what colleges used to do... and I hope, based on what this book has to say, that maybe he is wrong. Or maybe we do have to transfer that exploration of self and questioning of the world entirely to pre-college ages. It all depends on where things go from here.
Updated for post-pandemic considerations, this book considers the long trajectory of American colleges and what might be worth saving and looking for in the future. It is a wonderful counterpoint to the utilitarian/economic considerations of the college experience, and I hope that young people will consider this as a call to arms.
June 27, 2020
Good.
220 pages.
Text = 60,000 words.
282 footnotes = 10,000 words
If there's a single theme or idea pervading this book from start to finish, I don't know what it is.
Delbanco's one of my favorite public intellectuals, so I tend to read whatever he writes, a teacher-student relationship that began in the early 1990s when I first 'discovered' his stuff in the pages of the New York Review of Books.
In this book he says many interesting things, and — even better — he drops into his text many smart one-liners, aphorisms, & quotes from other brainiacs riffing on this subject. There are lots of riffs in these pages, and valuable footnotes. Maybe I read it too cursorily, but the whole book strikes me as a long interesting riff, or footnote — to a story or theme I can't quite isolate. Someday I'll reread this and render my verdict then.
Chapter 4 — "Who Went [to college]? Who Goes? Who Pays?" — struck me rather weak, uninteresting. Chapters 1, 2, 5 & 6 were good.
I read Louis Menand's short book on higher ed The Marketplace of Ideas (2010) and recollect it being a tighter narrative than this one.
Delbanco refers to the 2008 financial crisis a half-dozen times, always with a dismissive, pejorative valence, as if there is a settled opinion of it with which everyone knows and/or agrees. But he never tells us what his understanding of those events is.
Since he's a public intellectual, I wish he'd put his musings about the 2008 meltdown into print for his fans (people like me) to read. His published writings — reviews, essays, opeds — seems to have diminished in recent years. I'd like to know what he makes of current events.
220 pages.
Text = 60,000 words.
282 footnotes = 10,000 words
If there's a single theme or idea pervading this book from start to finish, I don't know what it is.
Delbanco's one of my favorite public intellectuals, so I tend to read whatever he writes, a teacher-student relationship that began in the early 1990s when I first 'discovered' his stuff in the pages of the New York Review of Books.
In this book he says many interesting things, and — even better — he drops into his text many smart one-liners, aphorisms, & quotes from other brainiacs riffing on this subject. There are lots of riffs in these pages, and valuable footnotes. Maybe I read it too cursorily, but the whole book strikes me as a long interesting riff, or footnote — to a story or theme I can't quite isolate. Someday I'll reread this and render my verdict then.
Chapter 4 — "Who Went [to college]? Who Goes? Who Pays?" — struck me rather weak, uninteresting. Chapters 1, 2, 5 & 6 were good.
I read Louis Menand's short book on higher ed The Marketplace of Ideas (2010) and recollect it being a tighter narrative than this one.
Delbanco refers to the 2008 financial crisis a half-dozen times, always with a dismissive, pejorative valence, as if there is a settled opinion of it with which everyone knows and/or agrees. But he never tells us what his understanding of those events is.
Since he's a public intellectual, I wish he'd put his musings about the 2008 meltdown into print for his fans (people like me) to read. His published writings — reviews, essays, opeds — seems to have diminished in recent years. I'd like to know what he makes of current events.
December 15, 2023
One of the strengths of the book is its historical perspective. Delbanco delves into the origins of American higher education, tracing its roots back to the founding principles of liberal arts education. He highlights how colleges have traditionally served as places of intellectual exploration, personal growth, and social mobility. Through his exploration of historical context, Delbanco effectively conveys the value and potential of a liberal arts education.
Furthermore, Delbanco addresses the challenges and criticisms facing higher education today. He discusses issues such as rising tuition costs, the corporatization of universities, the focus on vocational training, and the declining emphasis on the liberal arts. Delbanco argues for the importance of preserving the core values of higher education, promoting critical thinking, fostering intellectual curiosity, and developing well-rounded individuals.
The book is well-researched and provides a balanced assessment of the current state of higher education. Delbanco's writing is accessible, making complex ideas understandable to a broad audience. He presents his arguments in a clear and logical manner, substantiating his points with evidence and real-life examples. https://run3online.pro
Furthermore, Delbanco addresses the challenges and criticisms facing higher education today. He discusses issues such as rising tuition costs, the corporatization of universities, the focus on vocational training, and the declining emphasis on the liberal arts. Delbanco argues for the importance of preserving the core values of higher education, promoting critical thinking, fostering intellectual curiosity, and developing well-rounded individuals.
The book is well-researched and provides a balanced assessment of the current state of higher education. Delbanco's writing is accessible, making complex ideas understandable to a broad audience. He presents his arguments in a clear and logical manner, substantiating his points with evidence and real-life examples. https://run3online.pro
January 13, 2022
Somewhat limited in scope in that he focuses on liberal arts colleges and his assumption that the Ivy League is necessarily the guiding force in education. The chapter on meritocracy (Brave New World) is the most original and interesting. He asks whether there is a connection between rise of meritocracy and decline of sense of social obligation. He says that the old boys network of rich white guys used to have a sense that there were there by chance of birth and therefore felt obligation to serve society and “give back”. New generation thinks they earned their place and have no sense of owing anyone anything. Evidence is not strong but interesting thing to consider. Not much in the way of concrete proposals for action in the concluding chapter. Makes a decent case for the importance of asking big questions as centerpiece of education and that this isn’t something that should be for elites only. Reads more like a reflection at times than a real argument.
July 9, 2024
Delbanco's historical narrative is both informative and engaging. He skillfully weaves together the development of American colleges with broader social and cultural trends, providing context for the current state of higher education. The author's exploration of how colleges gradually opened their doors to women, minorities, and students from low-income backgrounds is particularly insightful.
Overall, "College: What it Was, Is, and Should Be" is a thought-provoking and eloquently written examination of the state of American higher education. It serves as both a celebration of the college experience and a call to action for preserving its most valuable aspects.
For readers interested in exploring this topic further or seeking guidance on college-related matters, resources such as https://studyinghq.com/ and https://nursingstudy.org/ offer free college guides that can be valuable.
Overall, "College: What it Was, Is, and Should Be" is a thought-provoking and eloquently written examination of the state of American higher education. It serves as both a celebration of the college experience and a call to action for preserving its most valuable aspects.
For readers interested in exploring this topic further or seeking guidance on college-related matters, resources such as https://studyinghq.com/ and https://nursingstudy.org/ offer free college guides that can be valuable.
May 19, 2019
Delbanco correctly reminds the reader that the American college originated in Puritan religion with its emphasis on “the mystery and contingency of learning.” Especially in the historical portion of this book, the author communicates his views with clever anecdotes and illustrations, some of which, I’m sure, meant more to me than they will to others, and vice versa. Just how Delbanco would reform American higher education is a bit fuzzy, but he clearly favors a democratic and humanistic path and reveals considerable skepticism about the sort of materialistic approach that would privilege for-profit institutions, “merit-based” financial aid, and vocational training masquerading as academics.
August 16, 2024
Just had to share my experience with https://denver.manymanuals.com/ after struggling to find a manual for my Denver TV. This site is a goldmine for anyone needing manuals. The search feature is fast and accurate, getting you to the right document without hassle. One of the standout aspects is the variety of formats available for download – PDF, online view, you name it. I found the step-by-step troubleshooting guide particularly useful for fixing a connectivity issue. Here’s a tip: bookmark the site and download the manuals you need so you can refer to them even offline. It’s definitely worth checking out.
December 7, 2021
The book makes a great point for a sound liberal arts education. Taking the discussion back to the core ideas of what college education is supposed to be, how it was and massage by our forefathers and the ways in which it has changed over the years and how it might change in the future. It derives from extensive scholarship, educational surveys and studies to point the ills which plague Americas College education. It's a great book to read if you want to learn more about how the Ivyes came to be and how the core philosophies behind education have been changing.
June 10, 2024
I tried to finish the book for 2 years and came to it. It was a hard read with some difficult chapters. The author tries to explains the concept the university and how it was historically but it failed to grab my attention in certain areas. In certain parts though, it was very interesting as it explained with more details with a students’ perspective and experience rather than feeling like an “long academic essay”. But I do feel that I learned a lot reading this book.
November 19, 2020
Such an insightful almost introductory read to so many texts.. and a great conversation starter to ponder what we should want from college. and asking the essential questions such as is college helping students strive for truth in their lives? As well as providing students with the means to chase after meaning in their life, or more so to uncover what would lead them to live fulfilling lives.
November 15, 2024
A chronological look at the evolution of the college system in the United States.
I really enjoy how Deblanco starts from the very beginning with the humble origins of Harvard (his alma mater) and then shows the gradual evolution of college into the bureaucratic University system that it is today.
I really enjoy how Deblanco starts from the very beginning with the humble origins of Harvard (his alma mater) and then shows the gradual evolution of college into the bureaucratic University system that it is today.
August 27, 2018
Excellent title discusses the diminishing of the liberal arts colleges under pressure from pure science and from vocational training. Argues for encouraging students to reconsider the liberal arts for secondary education, where possible.
September 13, 2023
Interesting, follows the path of college and its evolution throughout American history. Presents a number of problems without necessarily thoroughly considering solutions. Thank you to the publisher and libro.fm for the advance listening copy.
January 5, 2025
Thank you Princeton University Press and Libro FM for the ALC of College: What It Was, Is, and Should Be! All opinions in this review are my own.
This exploration into the history of colleges and how they have changed is fascinating. I like that the author talks about how the purpose of college has changed over time and how it seems like it is on the brink of changing again. Since this is the second edition, there is an added chapter on how the pandemic changed the college format and opened up new possibilities due to technology.
This exploration into the history of colleges and how they have changed is fascinating. I like that the author talks about how the purpose of college has changed over time and how it seems like it is on the brink of changing again. Since this is the second edition, there is an added chapter on how the pandemic changed the college format and opened up new possibilities due to technology.
January 28, 2025
great book for my Shields class. read the first three chapters and skimmed the last three. great history of the American college system and the ways in which it has remained stagnant. looking forward to discussing.
January 10, 2017
In this small book, this Columbia University professor provides a wide-ranging look at the development of higher education in America, beginning with its origins up to the present day.
February 24, 2017
The conversations with colleagues regarding this book were good. Delbanco brings up many important points.
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