What's the Value of Education?
Perhaps it isn't as positive as we thought?
Could it be that American education, heretofore viewed as a panacea has instead become a problem?
During the Clinton years there was a feeling that higher education was something of a magic pill that would simultaneously resolve several problems. From an economic perspective, it seemed that a college degree was the key to entering the middle class. On matters of policy, these new graduates would tend to support the government policies that had elevated them and, politically, they’d tend to vote for Democrats who embraced such programs.
Considered broadly, this seems an echo of the approach John Dewey advanced more than a century earlier with his suggestion that education – particularly civic education– was a key ingredient in the creation of a stable and successful democratic society.
And there remain neo-Deweyians who argue that education remains the answer, but that the diversion from classic education in civics and the humanities to computer science and economics is responsible for today’s disarray. But reversing today’s student preferences would be a very heavy lift. It isn’t clear that AI would or could move us in that direction.
Dewey’s hypothesis remains unproven. Donald Trump’s anti-intellectual populism has twice prevailed as our education level keeps increasing. His White House raises a basic question winning bipartisan interest as to whether education is a problem or solution. Those enjoying the elite education that traditionally provides our leadership seem to be unhappy promoters of our current instability, a bipartisan group ranging from Vice President Vance to the pro-Gaza demonstrators.
Members of this group appear to agree that higher education erodes nationalism although there’s sharp disagreement on whether this is a positive development and tracking loyalties gets very murky. On the one hand we have the anti-colonial oppression group and the high-tech entrepreneurs who seem to agree that national barriers impede progress. Recall that neither Elon Musk nor the most strident campus demonstrators were born in the United States. On the other is an equally diverse group who emphasize pride of nationality.
Until very recently the one-world gang seemed to be doing better in the economic world than the political one, but there now appears to be a growing realization that the two cannot continue on separate tracks. Simultaneously, education – or at least American education– has become increasingly dependent on internationalism with elite institutions creating satellites abroad and financially reliant on students from abroad who comprise a large segment of the student body paying the rack tuition rate.
At a time when the domestic appetite for higher education is actually declining, students from abroad comprise more than a quarter of enrollment. Diversity aside, reducing their numbers will have painful economic consequences.
Reforming and improving American education has been an important part of our history since the beginning, but the underlying belief that more and better education would lead to a better America confronts a tough contemporary challenge.