Well, of course.

Diversity departments (etc.) don't actually have to present any kind of verifiable metrics for what they claim to be accomplishments.

A physics department has a well established and independently verifiable metric that establishes what is being taught.

A diversity department always has a moving goalpost (whatever the cause du jour is, there's always another equally ephemeral pile of shit that needs to be expressed by some unqualified idiot with a chip on their shoulder).

As described, it's now a religious experience in that everyone should hew to the whining of a handful of damaged morons who can't actually contribute in a productive fashion, so they bitch and moan about their feelings (such as they are).

They need to be treated to the same outcome as the Golgafrinchans (being sent off planet to save the rest of us).

When these schools turn to shit and their students get serious in their resentment, enrollment will drop and that will be that, right?

This is why universities are so expensive: "UC Berkeley's new vice chancellor for equity and inclusion...has 17 people working for him. ... [His] base pay in 2009 was $194,000 [plus] a variety of possible add-ons... By comparison, the official salary for assistant professors at UC start at around $53,000."

Neither this so-called chancellor nor any of his 19 staff contribute to the school's core mission of educating students. Why do they exist? Why do they earn vastly more than the professors? And the big question: Would anyone miss them, if they were all fired?

Why is college education so expensive? Because there are too many parasites like the "chancellor for equity and inclusion".

Meanwhile the students get a degree in UBW (Underwater Basket Weaving) that are paid for by government backed student loans for thousands of dollars.

The tuition has gone up more than 400%. I bet that money is going to the administration and not the professors.

I believe it was on this blog that I first read the phrase "the cult of the multiculti". I think that now is a very apropos time to re-use it.

Interesting reading:

http://www.texastribune.org/library/data/government-employee-salaries/

-Julie

As a professor, I can say that I certainly haven't seen any of that increased tuition money. After 8 years there has been very minimal increase in my salary (despite tenure and promotion) and I do know how much our Deans and VPs etc are making...3 times my salary and up.

Professors earning middle-class livelihoods from their teaching are, I believe, a vanishing species. Administrations hoover up the cash.

"As a professor, I can say that I certainly haven't seen any of that increased tuition money. "

I don't doubt that either. As Reynolds and many others have documented, nearly all of the growth in universities over the past two decades has been in administration. American universities are rapidly turning into institutions of political indoctrination, with education being only an incidental function.

And people say I'm cynical when I say I'm not going to let going back to college interfere with my education.

A dear woman yoosta say "Holding your schools responsible for your education is like holding your grocery responsible for your diet."

I think identity history/issues are worth studying, but they should limit the number of slots for majors. They fall into what I call the cultural/decorative subjects... they make for interesting dinner conversation and make you a culturally aware person, but they dont need to be a major.

I hear you, a lot of these degrees are silly. But we are currently um, on the cusp of a wave of practicality. There may be a lot of taxpayer support for worthless studies. But when students ARE being required to pay of their educations, they should be allowed to study whatever they want. Soon enough, younger children will notice that older siblings aren't getting jobs with silly degrees.

On the other hand, I majored in Computer Science in the late 90s, and I worked in the field for a year before switching out, so I may as well have majored in something fun and lite.

Who knows, who knows. I learned to program at a hobbyist level in my 20's, and it's been useful as Hell... Both to communicate with those people in their preferred language, and to anticipate their weaknesses in the service they give to others.

Computer people may lack charm, but their field is indisputably rigorous. I understand that you weren't entirely serious ("may as well have..."), but I think a career experiment like that probably enriched your life much more than would a degree in queer studies or feminist history or whatever. (Ask me about the film studies emphasis in my CompLit minor: I've seen every Chaplin film, a survey of no value to the state taxpayers who built the University.)

Do you keep a list of things to hate Hollywood for? On my list, one of the top twenty is Hollywood's stereotype of the obscure scientist, an intensely antisocial guy who weeps and cries into his lab coat and says "My experiment is a failure!"

Experiments which correctly record outcomes are never failures. Whether they present the anticipated results is immaterial.

"On my list, one of the top twenty is Hollywood's stereotype of the obscure scientist, an intensely antisocial guy who weeps and cries into his lab coat and says 'My experiment is a failure!'"

In Hollywood these days, all scientists are evil, unless they are women or minorities. If they are, then they are good... but you won't actually see them doing anything scientific.

Engineers, on the other hand, simply don't exist in Hollywood-land. My wife is in the medical field and she likes to watch some of the medical-themed dramas and such (she's fond of pointing out the inaccuracies). She asked me once how many TV shows have regular characters who do engineering. "None", I told her. That set her back. She said, "It would be awfully weird if in a week's worth of TV I never saw a character who does anything related to what I do."

Yeah, Crid, I think you're right. It WAS an experiment, it did take me outside my comfort zone, but I think it did stretch my brain in ways French Lit wouldn't have, even if I wasn't all that serious after all.

Also, I liked telling people I was majoring in Women's Studies. I would say, "I'm studying computer science. I'm a woman and I'm studying it, that makes it women's studies". It amused me to do so.

"A dear woman yoosta say "Holding your schools responsible for your education is like holding your grocery responsible for your diet.""

Or McDonald's. But some people want that to be enforced by law.

When it is obvious that "popular wisdom" isn't wisdom, though popular, I think it's clear that steadily being informed that you are clueless by news media will ultimately result in lots of foolishness, like TSA theater, belief in the usefulness of statins, etc.