"U.S. Universities are Sliding into Decline"

link

I thought I was reading something from a decent source...but about 1/3 of the way through I realized it was pretty much crap...and realized it was from the Washington Monthly...

   It doesn't address the most important problems with academia--politicization, vocationalization, and lack of rigor. Cost is a big problem--though if universities actually delivered what they promise--or suggest that they're promising--it wouldn't be. If universities really did transform students for the better, they might be worth the cost. But they probably don't and they're probably not.

   Universities are eaten up with Woketarianism--which is the approximate intellectual and moral equivalent of Scientology. Grade inflation is rampant--largely because [a] student evaluations of instructors are rampant, easier grades mean easier eval scores, and hiring and promotion largely depend on such scores; and [b] high grades mean happy students, and happy students mean less work for the instructor. A colleague who went to grad school at Harvard told me that there giving 'A's was a conscious strategy among grad students--to some extent to get good evals, but mostly so that time didn't have to be wasted on grading. No student questions an 'A'...

   As for universities getting less federal funding: well, stop with the DEI and Woketarian indoctrination. Fact is, universities value those things more even than they value federal $$...which, lemme tell you, they value a lot.

   As for faculty looking to move to other countries: a lot of that is probably because they're leftists, and looking for lefty cred for pretending to flee from Trump. Lemme know if there's ever an actual wave of faculty emigration.

   But, then, I didn't sleep and I'm cranky.