Chalkboards

I grew up in india where we had chalkboards. When I had to teach the first time in uni, I was so bloody nervous that I managed to break every chalk stick in the box. But I still get excited when I hold chalk in my arms. Very primeval reaction. Not usually found these days of whiteboards and board pens. Not fun indeed. 

And then you see this. How extraordinary. The best we would get up to in school was to draw penis pictures. And these Japanese students are something else. 

Young Saudis See Cushy Jobs Vanish Along With Nation’s Oil Wealth

I'm not impressed by Saudi Arabia son. Besides the absolutely rampant racism and religious fundamentalism, the terrorism problem is big here. Then again what do you expect? I have seen the university syllabus and have interviewed Saudis and worked with them. The syllabus of most of the Saudi universities is shit. Teachers are shite. Atrocious. For a rich country to have such shitty university is a travesty. 

With some honourable exceptions, they are spectacularly unsuited for modern life. Professional middle class jobs or vocational jobs are simply out of the question. Entrepreneurship is minuscule. So what can you do with quarter of a million Saudis who enter the job market? Some wrenching changes are in train. And unfortunately you and I will see a large proportion of these young Saudis swelling the ranks of the jehadis. 
This will cause us problems. And the steps the Saudis are taking by embarking on two wars is very bad. A giant country like USA finds it difficult to wage war properly. Saudi Arabia will pay very heavily for its Yemeni and Syrian mistakes. And us as well.

Not good

Love

Baba



Young Saudis See Cushy Jobs Vanish Along With Nation's Oil Wealth
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/17/world/middleeast/young-saudis-see-cushy-jobs-vanish-along-with-nations-oil-wealth.html
(via Instapaper)

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Saudi men leaving a mosque in Riyadh last year. For decades, the royal family has used the kingdom's immense oil wealth to lavish benefits on its people, including free education and medical care, generous energy subsidies and well-paid government jobs. Tomas Munita for The New York Times

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia — In pressed white robes and clutching crisp résumés, young Saudi men packed a massive hall at a university in the capital city this month to wait in long lines to pitch themselves to employers.
It was one of three job fairs in Riyadh in two weeks, and the high attendance was fueled in part by fear among the younger generation of what a future of cheap oil will mean in a country where oil is everything.
For decades, the royal family has used the kingdom's immense oil wealth to lavish benefits on its people, including free education and medical care, generous energy subsidies and well-paid (and often undemanding) government jobs. No one paid taxes, and if political rights were not part of the equation, that was fine with most people.
But the drop in oil prices to below $30 a barrel from more than $100 a barrel in June 2014 means that the old math no longer works. Low oil prices have knocked a chunk out of the government budget and now pose a threat to the unwritten social contract that has long underpinned life in the kingdom, the Arab world's largest economy and a key American ally.

National Adjunct Walkout Day: Should We Feel Sorry for Adjuncts?

Having had taught in several universities in several countries, son, this is indeed an issue. Most professors don't like to teach. They prefer to research. The boring job of teaching is frequently pushed on to adjunct professors or doctoral or postdoctoral students. You yourself have been undergoing this phenomena.

Personally speaking I think academic staff need to do all three activities ideally, research teaching and administration. But what happens if that as usual specialisation happens. Some people do more in one area. And as economics will predict, their earnings will differ.

And yes people pile into doing a PhD without thinking through the implications. If you do a PhD from a good school and in a good area then you're good. But think about it. I'm embarking on a history PhD. If I'm lucky I'll get a job as a school teacher. Forget teaching in a university. Even on an adjunct basis. How many students want to study history eh? So sadly, this area is suffering. Finance. Mathematics. Economics computer science all top of the heap.

Anyway. We are but the choices we make son.

Love

Baba

National Adjunct Walkout Day: Should We Feel Sorry for Adjuncts?
http://bleedingheartlibertarians.com/2015/02/national-adjunct-walkout-day-should-we-feel-sorry-for-adjuncts/
(via Instapaper)

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Thesis: Adjuncts are victims of their own bad choices.

Caveat: Universities are run badly. Brown was run like the Russian government, and Georgetown is run like the Catholic Church. Universities suffer from a wide range of public choice-type problems. I mean it. I’ve even given public lectures (e.g., at a SUNY school last month) elaborating on the what and why of their persistent wrongdoing and mismanagement. Everything below is written with that in mind.

Let Them Eat MOOCs

One dissenter on mooc's son. I've just recently started on these and am on my 3rd one. 

I can see the benefits of a mooc but for the life of me, I cannot understand this argument that it's destroying education and it's culturally challenging and and and. And colonialism? Lol. I'm not sure this fellow really understands what it means. The difference is of distance, channel and cost. I teach at universities where students access my lecture via video conference. No difference. Channel same thing. And same with cost. I don't ask to be paid to teach. 

Luddites son. Life is changing. I think your generation is perhaps the last one to have formal education with degrees. By the time your son comes along, technology will have made education in large lecture halls lasting years will be defunct :) fun times

In the meantime, kannu, be a devotee of constant learning. May Saraswati bless you. And I'm proud of what you are son, not because you got into Oxford but because of the fact that you are now a good man. Truly a good man. 

Love

Baba

Let Them Eat MOOCs
http://blogs.hbr.org/2013/10/let-them-eat-moocs/

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One late afternoon last spring I received a visit from a former student and budding entrepreneur. I usually schedule these meetings at the end of the workday. It feels like a treat, witnessing aspiration and insight blend into leadership to create something new.

Luis (not his real name), however, had not come to see me for leadership advice. He had come to pitch his tech startup and ask for my involvement.

The venture, he explained, would contribute to the ongoing disruption and reinvention of business education and allow anyone anywhere — not just those as fortunate as himself — to have access to my teaching and insights online,for free.

Should Education Ministers have education experience? You betcha

as per this paper, they should. The authors look at the relationship between higher education ministers and the performance of the sector that they govern and use the European sector as an example. They find that if the minister has prior experience in the sector, the performance of the sector is higher as measured by ranking data.

Now you can quibble about whether or not ranking data is a good enough measure, but it goes without saying that it makes sense for somebody with expertise to drive this ministry.

As a small test, I looked up the central ministers in India who were responsible for Education since Independence. Here is the list. It started with Maulana Azad who was the Minister for Education from 1947 to 1958. Great man. And because of his amazing contributions, the National Education Day is celebrated every 11th November on his birth anniversary. The successors to his post were all brilliant, educated men frequently with direct experience in this sector. But not always.

Karan Singh was the minister till 1980 and then the rot started…Take for example, SB Chavan, who was in office for 18 months 1988-1989, he had his degree from Osmania University…good heavens. Shela Kaul had a degree in teaching so that’s good. KC Pant also was good in terms of education, but no experience. Narsimha Rao, good education and well intelligent, but no experience. P Shiv Shankar, educated but no experience. VP Singh, educated but no experience. Arjun Singh, no information on education or experience, but guess none. Scindia has had a good reputation but no experience. ABV, educated but no experience. Bommai, educated but not experienced. MM Joshi, well educated and experienced. Kapil Sabil, educated but no experience. MMP Raju, educated but no experience. And then we have the current minister, Smriti Irani, who is not educated nor experienced.

Tragic. Weep for Indian Students you lot, weep. Such is the future of the country – in the hands of these career politicians who are, by and large, educated but not experienced. And now we have literally hit the bottom with a minister who is not educated nor experienced. 

Master's degrees are as common now as bachelor's degrees were in the '60s

Kannu
This was a very interesting article, albeit from the perspective of USA.

http://www.vox.com/2014/5/20/5734816/masters-degrees-are-as-common-now-as-bachelors-degrees-were-in-the-60s

Two graphs tell the story. I couldn't copy the 2 graphs, but the graph which shows the popularity of the subjects in 2012 is good, shows that business degrees are great. Also another graph clearly indicates that the masters degree student will earn more than a bachelor's degree.

Also fascinating is the rate of growth. I couldn't believe my eyes when i read that law enforcement and leisure/fitness studies are the fastest growing segments. Ok, so they might be growing from a very low base. I can understand law enforcement as it becomes more and more granular, scientific, technology based. But leisure/fitness studies? And that too a masters degree? Bloody hell. Very strange.

No wonder people in that area aren't getting proper jobs, i wonder what are the earnings of a masters in bloody fitness studies gets compared to an MBA>?

I have copied Diya in here, she is still a bit young, but she may like to know this as well..

Love
Baba

The hard graft of finding a graduate job in the City of London

Note the point being made by the chap who says that he should've applied for internships son. And also look at the competition, 135 applications for every position. I get weekly requests to meet at least 2-4 students every week and do try to meet them.
Even with an internship it's challenging. By the time you graduate son, the banking industry will be even more competitive and shrunken.
So next year, besides you having fun, do try to get an internship. Start looking for these roles son. Otherwise you'll have regrets. Like this chap did. It's very very corrosive son. Avoid. Plan ahead. Be slightly paranoid. Remember you judge yourself with what you think you've done while others judge you by what you're done.
Let me know if I can help in any way.
Love
Baba

 

The hard graft of finding a graduate job in the City of London
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By Emma Jacobs
--
Two Londoners with degrees in Maths took a novel approach to the jobseekers’ market by touting for work in a public square….

Competition for graduate- level jobs is fierce. According to figures released by the Office for National Statistics last month, almost half the UK’s new graduates are working in non-graduate jobs. Forty-seven per cent of those who had finished their degree in the past five years were working in roles such as sales assistants and care workers. Recent analysis by the Financial Times showed that people who graduated this year are earning 12 per cent less than their counterparts before the financial crash.

Typically, positions at investment banks or fund managers are highly contested. These industries receive 135 applications per job, according to the Association of Graduate Recruiters…..However, they believe that it was perhaps a mistake not to have applied for internships when still students. “I wanted to focus on my degree. I got the chance to study in Hong Kong for a year and I wanted to do well,” says 23-year-old Mr Abbas.

Read the full article at: http://on.ft.com/1gIsit6

Thinking ahead

So Diya has now recently turned 10 and now she is going to move into the next phase of her education :)

I am starting off with her financial education like I did with Kannu, my target is for her to start operating her own stock brokerage account by the time she is 13 years of age and hopefully she will get sufficient money put aside for funding her own education for some time at least. We sorted our Kannu’s educational expenses this way :)

Career choices change dramatically when you are young. She previously wanted to be a doctor but then she said that it requires too long hours and she wouldn't have fun. So she wants to be an illustrator / graphic designer at the moment with second option to be a scientist. We have had some long conversations on this and she asked me to send her a list of universities which may be appropriate for her. I've got a monster at home..:) Here’s what I sent her.

 

Diya

As you requested, here are the top universities which offer undergraduate bachelor degree courses in graphic design, computer aided design, illustration. Etc. they all are in the top so doesn’t really matter which is number 1.

· Massachusetts Institute of Technology: http://web.mit.edu/

· Royal College of Art: (this only offers postgraduate courses, sweetheart, so you will have to wait) http://www.rca.ac.uk/

· Stanford University : http://www.stanford.edu/

· Oxford University: http://www.ox.ac.uk/

· University College London: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/

· Cambridge University: http://www.cam.ac.uk/

· Harvard University: http://www.harvard.edu/

We have some time before you enter but its good to start looking at the courses and read up on them, so that you can decide if or when you want to do these courses or something else J

And here is the web address for Caltech

http://www.caltech.edu/

if you wanted to do a PhD in Physics, again those universities above will allow you to do a bachelor and master’s degree J

and don’t worry about money, sweetheart, we will take care of it J

love

Baba

Herding Cats

Truly managing academic departments is like herding cats. I am involved in several universities in a management and/or teaching capacity and over the past few years, have seriously come to believe that there is definitely a dedicated God in charge of tertiary education. Because only through divine intervention can the results happen like teaching students. The level of confusion, incompetence, ego’s, administrative log jams, misaligned incentives, lack of strategic direction, planning, coordination, budgeting, risk management etc. etc. is simply gobsmacking and the fact that they keep on running and also end up educating our younglings is a miracle which can only be attributed to divine intervention.

So it was with interest that I read this paper. I quote the 2 quotes:

“There is a lot of difference in managing a group of employees in a plant and (managing) faculty
members,… Trying to manage faculty members is like herding cats”
“The reason why disputes in academia are so bitter is because the stakes are so low”

Truly herding cats indeed.

Here’s the abstract:

Using a tried and tested measure of management practices which has been shown to
predict firm performance, we survey nearly 250 departments across 100+ UK
universities. We find large differences in management scores across universities and that
departments in older, research-intensive universities score higher than departments in
newer, more teaching-oriented universities. We also find that management matters in
universities. The scores, particularly with respect to provision of incentives for staff
recruitment, retention and promotion, are correlated with both teaching and research
performance conditional on resources and past performance. Moreover, this relationship
holds for all universities, not just research-intensive ones.

When I see university management, I sometimes wonder. Just because you are a good teacher and/or a researcher does not mean that you are a good administrator. Specially here in the UK. Take a peek over the pond, there they have professional administrators and that’s what we need more of. Universities are complex beasts and they need professional trainers to train and perform. Specially the staff.

Colleges’ Stealth Tax on Family Savings

Its just recently that the UK (specifically England) has started charging for college education. Now its up to £9k per year (ouch!). But here’s an interesting perspective and connection to the savings rate in the USA. I quote:

Consider two young people who have identical potential for success in college based on high-school grades, test scores and so on. Let’s say both are accepted at an upscale private school costing $50,000 a year, or $200,000 for four years. Both kids come from moderately prosperous families with $125,000 in annual income. Student A comes from a family that saved a lot for college by scrimping, buying a modest $200,000 house and paying it off. This family has managed to accumulate $100,000 to defray much of their child’s college costs.

Student B comes from a big-spending family that has a $350,000 house with a big mortgage, and a vacation condo and nice cars, all bought with borrowed money. This family has no college-savings account as a consequence.

Colleges exploit this situation with the assistance of the federal government’s Free Application for Federal Student Aid form, which requires the student to give detailed family financial and other personal information -- income, debts, alimony payments, number of other dependent children and their age, and so on. The college uses this information to determine what the student will pay (up to the $50,000 sticker price).

Tuition Discounts

My guess, based on considerable anecdotal evidence, is that the student from the free-spending family will get a tuition discount of perhaps $25,000, while Student A will get only $10,000. Because that will probably apply for four years, Student A will end up paying $60,000 more than Student B -- solely because of the $100,000 in accumulated savings. The college is imposing the equivalent of a 60 percent tax on the income saved for college.

Moreover, to save $100,000 for college, Student A’s parents would probably have to earn about $150,000 because of taxes. So out of $150,000 in earnings, their child gets only $40,000 closer to paying for college than Student B.

Between real taxes and the private tax imposed by the college’s anti-savings policies, the financially prudent family has to pay more than 73 percent of earnings, a crushing burden that the free-spending family avoids by consuming, rather than saving their money.

But that isn’t all. Student B is forced to borrow more via the college-loan program, which the federal government subsidizes. The implicit value of that loan subsidy is greater to Student B than to Student A -- the federal government implicitly discriminates against those who are frugal and fiscally responsible. This doesn’t even include other anti-saving provisions in federal tax law, such as the impact of double taxation of income at the corporate and individual level.

I was kicking this around and it sort of making sense. This is an interesting situation. I am still struggling with whether or not I should fund my child’s education or let him fund it himself with his savings and debt. Leave aside the issue of means testing (which currently doesn't apply to fees but does apply to maintenance grants).  At this moment, the repayment rate is about inflation plus 3%. Say 5%. frankly, from a pure financial perspective, its better for him to go into debt and then use the investments to get a return which will generally be higher than this rate. There you go, arbitrage zindabad.

Celebrating Volunteers at Home Start Hillingdon

So we had the annual summer celebration of our volunteers at Home start Hillingdon. Its a wonderful occasion, we see the amazing ladies and gentlemen who have their own children but also take time out of their busy lives to help families in distress. More interestingly and very thankfully, we had the Mayor of Hillingdon who popped over to give the certificates to the volunteers. Along with his utterly delightful and fragrant lady wife, Mrs. Mayor who was wonderful. She just made sure we were all comfortable and both went around to each table making them comfortable.

As soon as I get the photo’s, I will post them. The stories they tell about the families we support. Wonderful people, all. Here’s a great story by a volunteer. We also celebrated the 10 year anniversary of our charity administrator. Wonderful lady, she is a quiet lady, but everything else is well managed and runs and hums smoothly. She is amazing, very impressed. We are going through a spot of recruitment for the charity. Are you interested to become a trustee? Let me know.

In other news, popped over to Manchester to lecture a wee bit. Also working on bits and bobs with Essex and Swansea. I realised that I didn't do much with Disha for some time now, but have asked Ma to find out if they need something, perhaps a library? that would be good. Also attended a mentoring session for start-up technology companies wanting to sell into the financial sector, I'm most probably going to end up mentoring couple of companies. What else? Mentoring of students from London, Essex, Manchester and Swansea goes on.

And I'm hoping we can do something with the abandoned animals at the Mayhew with the firm…lets see if I can arrange for a bit of a fund raiser at work..And here’s a great post on the Mayhew blog. See the eyes of this little doggie.

This is her story

Help Us Stop the Cruelty

 

It is generally said that Britain is a ‘nation of animal lovers’ but, sadly, The Mayhew feels we must question this claim in the face of growing levels of animal neglect and abandonment.

Instead of more animals finding happy homes we are admitting more stray cats and dogs, receiving more calls about animal abandonment and finding only a few microchipped animals that can be reunited with a caring owner.

Our Animal Welfare Officers and Clinic staff are helping increasing numbers of pet owners whose personal or financial circumstances have left them unable to care for their cat or dog and who need assistance with basic, preventative care.
This country’s financial difficulties touch all areas of everyday life and this is affecting innocent animals, with pets increasingly being considered ‘non-essential’ when it comes to spending money. The Mayhew strives to help both animals and their carers without judging their circumstances. We encourage owners to come to us for assistance to try and avoid devastating cases like Deirdre and Buddy; two animals who learnt first-hand exactly what it means to become surplus to requirement.

Make a one-off donation to help us fight animal cruelty

Set up a small monthly donation to The Mayhew

Deirdre’s story
Deirdre arrived in late April after she was found struggling and alone on the streets of London. Our vets estimated that she was around 13 years old and in dire need of medical attention. Without identification, there was no one around to provide this elderly girl with the care and treatment she needed. Deirdre was very malnourished, extremely weak in both her back legs and reluctant to stand up or move around. She was distressed, confused and clearly in pain. Even after pain relief medication, some tempting food, a warm bed and plenty of TLC, she was still at rock bottom.

Our charity’s ethos is to help every animal we can and so, regardless of her age and poor condition, our vets carried out a thorough health check and tests to see if we could give this girl a second chance at happiness. Sadly, in addition to a range of other debilitating illnesses, Deirdre’s tests indicated that cancer was likely. Despite the security, safety and comfort she was given at The Mayhew Deirdre simply refused to eat. Already withdrawn she shut down even further and it became evident that she no longer wished to face the life that had treated her so cruelly.

Our round-the-clock care ensured that Deirdre was comfortable and given the palliative care needed for her condition. However in the face of her mental and physical deterioration and, with recovery no longer being an option, our vets took the decision to give a peaceful and dignified end to a life that had become engulfed in suffering and misery.

It is always hard for us at The Mayhew when we see cases like these and even harder to tell our supporters about them, however these are the realities that we are dealing with on an increasingly frequent basis. It is vital that we continue to be there for those who cannot help themselves, who need us right at the end in order to bring them peace and relieve their pain.
But it is not only those at the end of their lives that need our help. We must also be there for animals who have hardly been in this world longer than the blink of an eye but who are already struggling with debilitating pain.

 

criminal!

Graduate School in the Humanities: Just Don't Go

Children

An interesting article on doing a PhD in humanities. 3 down and 4th in planning, I can well recognise this situation. Nobody will pay you to teach others which really don't show clear economic value. 

You may not like it but the brutal truth of the matter is that your main piece of education is to ensure you get paid for the value you add. 

Take it forward as a teacher. If what you teach isn't valued then you won't get paid. As simple as this. When I became a professor, I got into trouble with my senior colleagues when I would say things like, ' if a student hasn't learnt then the teacher hasn't taught'. That kind of personal responsibility is unfortunately missing in quite a lot of teacher which is the reason why they tend to blame parents, universities, governments, students, porn, you name it. 

Bad. 

So my advise is to do a good first degree what will give you skills to earn a shed load of money and add huge amounts of value.  Then do a graduate degree to boost your earning potential. 

Then comes a PhD. Or two. Or if you are mad as me then more. Study for a PhD for pure pleasure and the fun of learning. Otherwise it's a bit dodgy. Of course the situation is better in economics and business PhD's :) but if you want to do a history or English lit PhD then forget it. 

Love

Baba

Graduate School in the Humanities: Just Don't Go - Advice - The Chronicle of Higher Education
http://chronicle.com/article/Graduate-School-in-the/44846

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By Thomas H. Benton

Nearly six years ago, I wrote a column called “So You Want to Go to Grad School?” (The Chronicle, June 6, 2003). My purpose was to warn undergraduates away from pursuing Ph.D.’s in the humanities by telling them what I had learned about the academic labor system from personal observation and experience.

It was a message many prospective graduate students were not getting from their professors, who were generally too eager to clone themselves. Having heard rumors about unemployed Ph.D.’s, some undergraduates would ask about job prospects in academe, only to be told, “There are always jobs for good people.” If the students happened to notice the increasing numbers of well-published, highly credentialed adjuncts teaching part time with no benefits, they would be told, “Don’t worry, massive retirements are coming soon, and then there will be plenty of positions available.” The encouragement they received from mostly well-meaning but ill-informed professors was bolstered by the message in our culture that education always leads to opportunity.

All these years later, I still get letters from undergraduates who stumble onto that column. They tell me about their interests and accomplishments and ask whether they should go to graduate school, somehow expecting me to encourage them. I usually write back, explaining that in this era of grade inflation (and recommendation inflation), there’s an almost unlimited supply of students with perfect grades and glowing letters. Of course, some doctoral program may admit them with full financing, but that doesn’t mean they are going to find work as professors when it’s all over. The reality is that less than half of all doctorate holders — after nearly a decade of preparation, on average — will ever find tenure-track positions.

Princeton's Marriage Market Theory Worked for Me

From an aesthetic and romantic perspective it sounds cold blooded and far too planned. But there is truth in this article. Human behaviour can be modelled. Even if you are not interested in economics, your behaviour and the way society and fellow individuals act behave and are structured are based in economics. 

The benefits of marriage are many and are well known. So in terms of maximising your life's happiness, be on the lookout for a good partner at LSE or Oxford or Cambridge wherever you go. This is the best population for you to find your partner. After this, the chances drop dramatically. It's simple statistics and macroeconomics that you will never come across such watering holes with such high density of potential mates. Don't rely on blind luck son. 

So find a mate by the time you graduate in 20-22 years in uni. This doesn't mean you become celibate. Far from it. Explore. But when you find the one and the point is to find the one in uni. Be with them. Marriage around 25-28 and life will be good. Any changes to this timeline and your lifetime happiness will be reduced or be suboptimal. Simple economics. 

Of course shit happens but plan and aim for the best and prepare for the worst. 

Love

Baba

Princeton's Marriage Market Theory Worked for Me - Bloomberg
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-04-03/princeton-s-marriage-market-theory-worked-for-me.html

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Most of my research deals with the economics of cities, but I have a smattering of knowledge in the minor field of spouse-meeting at Princeton.

There is usually little demand for such arcana — the American Economic Association has never held a symposium on the topic — but the blogospheric explosion after an alumna’sletter to the Daily Princetonian advising female students to “find a husband on campus before you graduate” led my editor to urge me to weigh in.

While I don’t feel I can provide advice to young women, I am comfortable, based on both personal experience and the infallible majesty of economic theory, urging young male Princetonians to view your female classmates as prospective long-term friends and spouses (the qualifications for the two roles having much in common), rather than short-term amorous encounters.

The letter writer, Susan Patton, is surely right that for many people, college years provide the high point of intense exposure to a wide range of prospective life partners.       

However, my own finely tuned algebraic simulations of an optimal spousal-search model find that while college provides an ideal time to accumulate a large stock of good friends (prospective spouses), it is typically suboptimal to wed at age 21 because of preference uncertainty and the benefits of continuing to meet alternatives.

Lost in the Meritocracy

This is a fascinating personal account of how a boy learnt how to learn. For the first time. You will be leaving for uni next year. But that necessarily doesn't mean that you learn there son. I barely squeaked through my first degree. But it was only after my accident that I started learning. 

But do experiment in uni son. That's where you can make mistakes and not suffer too much. It's fun as well. It's the mistakes which we make which perhaps have the bigger learning potential.

Love

Baba. 

Lost in the Meritocracy - Walter Kirn - The Atlantic
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2005/01/lost-in-the-meritocracy/303672/

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Continue to the TheAtlantic.com

Advertisement

January/February 2005

How I traded an education for a ticket to the ruling class

Walter Kirn Jan 1 2005, 12:00 PM ET

On the bus ride down to St. Paul to take the test that will help determine who will get ahead in life, who will stay put, and who will fall behind, two of my closest buddies seal their fates by opening pint bottles of cherry schnapps the moment we leave the high school parking lot. They hide the liquor under their varsity jackets and monitor the driver’s rearview mirror for opportune moments to duck their heads and swig. A girl sees what they’re up to, mutters, “Morons,” and goes back to shading in the tiny ovals in her Scholastic Aptitude Test review book. She dated one of the guys a few months back, but lately she’s grown serious, ambitious; I’ve heard that she hopes to practice law someday and prosecute companies that pollute the air. When she notices one of the bottles coming my way, she shoots me a look of horror.

“No, thanks,” I say.

My friends seem wounded by this—aren’t we teammates? We play baseball and football together. We go way back. In our high school class there are only fifteen boys, and every summer some of us camp out by the river and cannonball from the cliffs into the current. We talk as though we’ll be together forever, though I’ve always known better: Someday we’ll be ranked. Someday we’ll be screened and then separated. I’ve known this since my first day of kindergarten, when I raised my hand slightly faster than the other kids—and waved it around to make sure the teacher saw it.

My buddies give me another chance to drink.

“Put that away, guys. Today is a big deal for us.”

But they know this already—they just don’t like the fact.

“Come on,” one says. “A sip.”

“I’m sorry. No.”

And so I go on to college, and they don’t.

Percentile is destiny in America.

Sussex University Students stand up for stupidity

My mind boggles. First the story.

It is a dispute that has radicalised dozens of students, shut down sections of Sussex University for more than a month and won admiration and support from the likes of Noam Chomsky, Tariq Ali and the actor Peter Capaldi.

At issue are two clashing visions of the university experience – one that sees students as consumers and another that rejects the commercialisation of learning and everything that goes with it.

Other universities are watching as students and staff at the Falmer campus, near Brighton, flex their campaigning muscles.

The trigger for the dispute is what the protesters regard as creeping privatisation on campus. Sussex is one of several universities outsourcing key services such as catering and estate management.

Student campaigners, who have occupied the university's conference centre since early February, say the move will jeopardise employment terms and conditions. "Private providers won't be bound to provide workers with the same contract terms, so there's a danger positions may be undermined," said William Brown, a first-year English student. "The university has also been very unclear about the reasons behind the decision, which is incredibly hypocritical of an academic institution."

Plans to outsource services at Sussex were "the straw that broke the camel's back", said Theadora Jean, a master's student in critical and creative writing. "Even among people like myself who aren't taking part in the protests, there is a lot of support for the campaign. Across the country universities are becoming more and more like businesses … this is about making a stand against that. It's the principle that counts."

heh, where do they think all the funds come from to run the university? the money tree in the courtyard? or the public sector fountain of money? forget about that, who do you think constructed the university? the public sector constructors? how about the electricity they use? the little public sector gnomes? how about the water? how about the beer they drink? who do they think makes that? the department of beer making?

the mind shudders at the thought of the imbecility of these idiots.

College Essays Make Kids Stupid and Selfish

This was an interesting article.

Quick quiz: Which of the following is not an essay topic on the latest version of the common application to gain admission to U.S. colleges?

1. Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

2. Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure. How did it affect you, and what lessons did you learn?

3. Reflect on a time when you challenged a belief or idea. What prompted you to act? Would you make the same decision again?

4. Describe a place or environment where you are perfectly content. What do you do or experience there, and why is it meaningful to you?

5. Discuss an accomplishment or event -- formal or informal -- that marked your transition from childhood to adulthood within your culture, community or family.

6. Discuss a particularly significant Facebook status update. What prompted it? Where were you when you posted it? How did you feel when only four of your friends “liked” it?

The common application, which is now accepted by more than 500 colleges, is the best example of how the admissions process has become an exercise in encouraging 17-year-olds’ narcissism. Also new this year, rising high-school seniors will be allotted 650 words in which to indulge themselves. Was that because the 500 they have been given previously just didn’t do these topics justice?

Now as one can appreciate, one can ask other questions which the author refers to

What about a historical event that influenced you? Again, there will be plenty of opportunity for reflection on your own life when you reveal that the Emancipation Proclamation actually released your great-great-great-grandparents from bondage.

Or that learning about the Holocaust made you change your view of Judaism and whether God is good. Or perhaps that reading about the women’s suffrage movement turned you into an ardent feminist. But it won’t be all about you.

How about an invention that most changed your life? You might write that it’s the cell phone or the iPad. You would at least have to reflect on why that is the case, know something about its development, what life was like before it, and even -- here’s the key -- construct an argument for why this particular thing was more influential than other things.

The navel-gazing essays require only telling a story, a “narrative” about yourself, as college administrators have it. Sure, there’s a beginning, a middle and an end. It could be in a “five-paragraph” format. But it doesn’t reveal much about how you think -- just how you feel.

given that we will be working with Kannu’s college entrance essay, it will be interesting to see what he wants to write about. He has selected a topic which is surprisingly close to my last PhD, what is the impact of war on economies. I promise, I didnt have anything to do with it, so its quite interesting…Here in the UK, you have a different system..so this kind of navel gazing or grazing is avoided..

Glut of Foreign Students Hurts U.S. Innovation

now here’s a different view…

In the old days, the U.S. program for foreign-student visas helped developing nations and brought diversity to then white-bread American campuses. Today, the F-1 program, as it is known, has become a profit center for universities and a wage-suppression tool for the technology industry.

International students are attractive to strapped colleges because they tend to pay full tuition or, in the case of public institutions, pay more than full price in out-of-state rates.

Last year, this was taken to a new level at California State University, East Bay, a public institution just south of Oakland. The school directed its master’s degree programs to admit only non-California students, including foreign students. Even before this edict, international students made up 90 percent of its computer-science master’s program.

The pursuit of foreign students by U.S. schools affects not only college access for Americans but also their careers. Back in 1989, an internal report of the National Science Foundationforecast that a large influx of F-1 doctoral students in science, technology, engineering and math -- the STEM fields -- would suppress wages. The stagnant salaries would then drive the American bachelor’s degree holders in these fields into more lucrative areas, such as business and law, after graduation, and discourage them from pursuing STEM doctorates.

i dont have special views on this but i never considered this impact. For example, in the business schools I am associated with in the UK, they are all gung ho for international students as they pay money – the full amount and are willing to study. The number of British students studying for business is falling so dramatically that its weird. The students who graduate put pressure on the job market indeed but the immigration rules are helping to squelch that pressure.

tough times indeed…

A Bit of Sarbanes-Oxley for Universities, Please

This is a very interesting and important view on the independence of trustees of a University Board. I quote:

The impulse to impose Sarbanes-Oxley on universities is tempting.  Indeed, formal legal mandates on conflicts of interest and the other attributes of good governance might be even more appropriate for universities than for public corporations, as universities lack many of the safeguards of good governance, such as the ability to measure performance through profitability and engaged  shareholders with incentives to monitor performance.

It has traditionally has been assumed that universities, as ostensibly charitable organizations, would be run with an eye on the public good, thus formal restraints on self-dealing, conflicts of interest, and rules that apply to private corporations would not  be necessary.  Today, however, universities are big businesses riven with self-interest.  And there is little evidence that charitable purpose plays any role in their behavior.  University president's salaries routinely reach into the seven figures--Dartmouth's recent president, for example, earned over one million dollars a year and demanded millions of dollars of renovations to the college president's house and access to a private jet as part of his compensation package, even while laying off dozens of staff members and issuing hundreds of millions of dollars in debt (to be financed by future generations of students and parents) to close a massive budget deficit caused when the endowment cratered in the wake of the financial crisis.

Go read the full article, its very interesting..I fully concur with this view, being in this situation, I am quite concerned in general about the lack of governance that universities have, specially on this side of the pond. Do trustees or board members really hold university management to account? Very doubtful, when was the last time you heard any kind of debate in the newspaper between board members and management in universities as one would frequently hear in the corporate world?

And dont give me that guff about board members not knowing about academics or university policies / procedures, that’s insulting and basically tells me that your cranial end is interposed in your anterior end.

A nice internship letter

This was a nice letter. I quote

From: BLOCKED
Sent: Monday, January 14, 2013 1:14PM
To: BLOCKED
Subject: Summer Internship

Dear BLOCKED

My name is (BLOCKED) and I am an undergraduate finance student at (BLOCKED). I met you the summer before last at Smith & Wollensky’s in New York when I was touring the east coast with my uncle, (BLOCKED). I just wanted to thank you for taking the time to talk with me that night.

I am writing to inquire about a possible summer internship in your office. I am aware it is highly unusual for undergraduates from average universities like (BLOCKED) to intern at (BLOCKED), but nevertheless I was hoping you might make an exception. I am extremely interested in investment banking and would love nothing more than to learn under your tutelage. I have no qualms about fetching coffee, shining shoes or picking up laundry, and will work for next to nothing. In all honesty, I just want to be around professionals in the industry and gain as much knowledge as I can.

I won’t waste your time inflating my credentials, throwing around exaggerated job titles, or feeding you a line of crapp (sic) about how my past experiences and skill set align perfectly for an investment banking internship. The truth is I have no unbelievably special skills or genius eccentricities, but I do have a near perfect GPA and will work hard for you. I’ve interned for Merrill Lynch in the Wealth Management Division and taken an investment banking class at (BLOCKED), for whatever that is worth.

I am currently awaiting admission results for (BLOCKED) Masters of Science in Accountancy program, which I would begin this fall if admitted. I am also planning on attending law school after my master’s program, which we spoke about in New York. I apologize for the blunt nature of my letter, but I hope you seriously consider taking me under your wing this summer. I have attached my resume for your review. Feel free to call me at (BLOCKED) or email at (BLOCKED). Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

BLOCKED.

Interesting, eh?

The Myth of American Meritocracy

Kannu

A fairly long but very important article son. The long and short of it is that you have Asian ancestry and you have brown skin and you studied in a comprehensive and your parents aren't landed rich. So that means that you have to work that extra bit harder (which you are already doing, and I'm proud of you) to get into an Oxford or Cambridge.

But from a historical and economics perspective, do read the article because you will be faced with and working with people from this background.fascinating.

Love
Baba

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-myth-of-american-meritocracy/

Just before the Labor Day weekend, a front page New York Times story broke the news of the largest cheating scandal in Harvard University history, in which nearly half the students taking a Government course on the role of Congress had plagiarized or otherwise illegally collaborated on their final exam.¹ Each year, Harvard admits just 1600 freshmen while almost 125 Harvard students now face possible suspension over this single incident. A Harvard dean described the situation as “unprecedented.”

But should we really be so surprised at this behavior among the students at America’s most prestigious academic institution? In the last generation or two, the funnel of opportunity in American society has drastically narrowed, with a greater and greater proportion of our financial, media, business, and political elites being drawn from a relatively small number of our leading universities, together with their professional schools. The rise of a Henry Ford, from farm boy mechanic to world business tycoon, seems virtually impossible today, as even America’s most successful college dropouts such as Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg often turn out to be extremely well-connected former Harvard students. Indeed, the early success of Facebook was largely due to the powerful imprimatur it enjoyed from its exclusive availability first only at Harvard and later restricted to just the Ivy League.

During this period, we have witnessed a huge national decline in well-paid middle class jobs in the manufacturing sector and other sources of employment for those lacking college degrees, with median American wages having been stagnant or declining for the last forty years. Meanwhile, there has been an astonishing concentration of wealth at the top, with America’s richest 1 percent now possessing nearly as much net wealth as the bottom 95 percent.²This situation, sometimes described as a “winner take all society,” leaves families desperate to maximize the chances that their children will reach the winners’ circle, rather than risk failure and poverty or even merely a spot in the rapidly deteriorating middle class. And the best single means of becoming such an economic winner is to gain admission to a top university, which provides an easy ticket to the wealth of Wall Street or similar venues, whose leading firms increasingly restrict their hiring to graduates of the Ivy League or a tiny handful of other top colleges.³ On the other side, finance remains the favored employment choice for Harvard, Yale or Princeton students after the diplomas are handed out.⁴