Monday, May 26, 2014

“Borrowing to attend an American college may be hazardous to your dreams.”

From The trigger warning we need: “College is a scam meant to perpetuate the 1 percent” by Thomas Frank:
 Yes! Elite university students must be warned about “classism”! Not on course syllabi or the cover of a book as though it’s comsymp lit or something. No, they need to see it in big red letters inscribed on those elite universities themselves — stamped on every tuition bill and financial aid form and diploma they produce, spelled out in the quadrangle pavement, flashing from a neon sign above every dormitory so no one can miss it:

“Warning: This place exists to enforce class distinctions.”
[...]
 This power over admission to the bourgeoisie is the reason why tuition goes up constantly even as the university successfully transforms professors into low-wage freelancers (the subject of last week’s column)—because what those professors teach doesn’t matter. This is also why people who fake their college degrees often lead long and successful corporate lives without being detected—because the stuff you actually learn to get a liberal arts degree isn’t important in the corporate world. Only the diploma itself has real meaning in the marketplace, and only the marketplace has real meaning in America. This is a situation that clearly requires highly visible warnings, and lots of them.
 Buyer beware.  If you can't pay for college without a loan, then get a trade, save your money and go (or not).  Otherwise you risk being an indentured servant to a bank.