[Gregory Palmerino]

Originally Posted by John Whitworth

People in Education, particularly Higher Education, vote for the status quo every time. Why? Because they are well paid (in the UK at least) and the job (in Higher Education at least) is not very onerous Why should they want change?

And of course they know sweet fanny adams about life outside the education bubble. In general of course.

John,

How I wish you were correct on both points. Sadly, the opposite is much too true. Over 70% percent of faculty in the US is part time or non-tenured, and I can tell you from direct experience that part time faculty are nowhere near "well paid." In fact, 25% of part time faculty receive some sort of public assistance. The situation in higher education in the United States is actually dire when it comes to pay.

On your second point, there was a time (maybe when you went to university, but maybe even earlier) that education was a retreat from the so-called "real world." When students sat in classrooms in front of an intelligent expert who knew nothing else in this world except his subject and no one in the classroom knew more than him. It was a time when education endeavored to educate the human as human. That quaint notion also is sadly no longer the case. Educators now have to be IT professionals, public officials, babysitters, admission counselors, advisors, politicians. And we have to listen to students tell us that we don't know what we are talking about because we sit in an ivory tower all day reading books and playing with words.

Which brings me back to the point of this thread. The great refrain from many of the Trump supporters that I have heard from in this country is that he is a businessman and that's what the US needs...

someone who can get this country working again. What kind of a voter would believe that a politician would be a good leader? We need someone outside of the establishment. Shake things up. Knock some heads.

Donald Trump became president in many ways because Higher Education is not the way you describe it, John.

As William Blake once famously said, "To generalize is to be an idiot." We are all generalist now, John.

Sincerely,
Greg