The Lurking Disaster of American Education, Why Do We Work So Hard?

[GoLeft TV]

From Ring of Fire:

American schools are modeled to teach children that affirmation comes from achievement and that’s a dangerous model to follow. We’ve seen a general evacuation of interest in the humanities, in favor of more ‘profitable’ and ‘tangible’ studies. But along with that sea change, Americans are reporting more stress, less satisfaction, and earning less. So why do we work? Is our appreciation of education for hard skills misguided?

During the past decade, enrollment rates in the humanities, e.g. English, philosophy, language, etc., have declined. At Stanford, it is reported that only 15% of the student population is enrolled in a humanities major but 45% of the undergraduate faculty teach it.

Teaching students that working hard, studying, being innovative, etc., will result in success is great. But they may have no means of quantifying that success. In fact, it has been found that some of the richest nations in the world, by the tangible measurement, see that approximately 1 out of every 10 adults uses an antidepressant. In the United States, that number has been increasing by 20% for the past 3 years.

You can read the full article here at Ring of Fire.

[kwassa]

1. My niece has a PHD in English.

She was a bit of a star, getting special grants, flown to Washington to study at the Folger.

She has searched long and hard for jobs, but there are no tenure-track things happening out there. Fortunately, she is getting paid something to teach at her alma mater.

but many PHDs in the humanities can never make it past the adjunct professor job, which means they are paid far less, usually, than public school teachers.

I don't blame today's students for being more realistic.