College - What Is It Good For?

A recent issue of The New Yorker included an article titled "What Is College Good For?". Evidently, the author's college experience was not "good for" learning not to end a sentence with a preposition.

College has changed since I matriculated (sounds obscene, doesn't it?) some 46 years ago. The article notes that:

1. More than twice as many degrees are awarded every year in Parks, Recreation, Leisure, and Fitness Studies than in Philosophy and Religion. This is not surprising in an era when every strip mall houses an LA Fitness or a Curves as opposed to a Philosophy Center. Better yet, undergraduates who find Fitness Studies a bit strenous (All that sweating, yuck!) can take extra Leisure courses. Napping 101 or Advanced Couch Potato 305, anyone?

2. The University of Nevada - Las Vegas offers a degree in Culinary Arts with an emphasis on Beverage Management. Do Beverage Management courses include Keg Tapping 101 and Fundamentals of Mint Muddling 400 for those popular mojitos? Actually, UNLV requires that Bev Man majors take courses in Philosophy, Political Science, and Economics. UNLV turns out bartenders who can converse on topics more advanced than "How about them Iggles?" with inebriated patrons.

3. More than half of undergraduates report that they read less than forty pages of assigned text per week and that they write less than twenty pages of original work per semester. They spend an average of twelve hours per week on schoolwork, but forty-three hours socializing and pursuing various forms of entertainment. Not counting Sundays, today's undergrads spend a brutal two hours per day on schoolwork. Fortunately, they have seven hours per day to recover from that strict regimen with socializing.

Despite these academic demands, roughly two-thirds of high school graduates go on to higher education. It's a tough choice:

A. Get a job after high school. Continue living at home because you can't afford your own place, food, car, etc.

B. Go to college. Break free of parental control to a wonderland of booze and babes with lodging and vittles paid for by those same parents who view it as a privilege to support "My son the college boy".

Actually, it's not a tough choice.