Academia's emperor has dreadlocks (and likely a Claude account). Otherwise he's naked as a jaybird. No wonder students view their six-figure educations as a joke.
The problem with race hustlers like Arday is that they got high on their own supply. You can't be a crimefighter without crime ... and you can't be a race hustler without inventing all sorts of "systemic racism" (none of which actually exists; if anything, racism today is in favor of blacks, not against them).
More and more people are seeing through the ruse.
They know to ignore Arday when he claims that he is being forced to resign because of racism.
They know to ignore the black girl who mugged Sophie Cunningham and then claimed "WHITE PRIVILEGE" when the referee had the temerity to eject her from the game.
They know to ignore the Jussie Smolletts who completely fabricate instances of "racially motivated violence".
The Left had better find another dog. Their tired old mutt named Racism ain't gonna hunt any more.
That is all they have. The Marxists in Europe exploited economic and class differences to divide the people and attain power. The American Marxists/Democrats cannot divide us by economic class so they have used “racism” as the weapon. That and cobble together a coalition of more and more “victim” groups.
Look what the University of Michigan just did with removing GRADES for incoming freshman class because grading of course threatens their fragile coddled minds risking possible mental illness!
Bingo. If the elephants screw up the midterms, as they are so prone to grasping defeat from the jaws of victory thanks to so many RINOS (looking at you Thune), I don't think the country will recover.
Actually, not nearly enough people are seeing through it. There are a boatload of useful idiots who still believe the total excrement on mainstream media. And there is no way that a douchebag like Hasan Piker would have a million followers in a country with properly educated students. We are in trouble.
Among the true victims of DEI are legitimately qualified minorities whose achievements will often be looked upon with skeptical eyes. Many will wonder whether they got where they are because of preferences or lowered standards. By aiming to help minorities, those pushing DEI programs have actually penalized those who would have succeeded without the help of DEI.
This is the saddest part of the DEI scam. It has hurt most the people it was alleged to help. But I sincerely believe that was the actual goal. 50 years ago, when I got out of high school, if you saw a black CEO you knew he or she kicked ass. Now, from hard experience in the corporate world, when I see black leaders I am suspicious and can testify that in the end the vast majority will prove to be DEI and not quality. It is a bleeping fiasco. And, as mentioned many times here, you cannot say squat about it. You WILL be labeled a racist if you point out incompetence by any person of color or any woman. Oh yeah, let us not forget how many women have been shoved up the ladder. "Have tits will travel," we say in the corporate world; not out loud mind you. no, no, no. All women are amazing is the official line lmao. I am not saying that women or minorities are inherently unqualified. I am saying they are not inherently qualified. No superficial birth characteristic makes anyone inherently qualified. Therein lies the damage done by DEI. DEI says how you were born makes you automatically less or more and nothing could be more false.
Do you think they BANKED on a big % of students choosing the school just because of those football games? Or that it was VERY high on the list of preferred reasons.
I enjoyed reading this. It made me feel good about being 74 years old and how I benefited from a non DEI education. In fact a requirement at the Catholic Grade School I went to in the 60's was that at least one of your parents had to be Italian.
Alex as I read your missive I was reminded of how the Soviets spoke in the 60s,for those of you too young they could no wrong. I draw a parallel to left wing loonies today. If you think communists didn't have prisons read "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denosovich" Academia is so far out in left field it will never get back. The country is becoming a Franz Kafka book frankly. We focus on nonsense while the Chinese focus on taking over the world economically. Folks had better wake up cuz the Chinese are not obsessed with bathrooms.
This post mixes two things that are both affecting higher ed in different ways: DEI and AI. Each, individually, would be a crisis. Together they may be catastrophic.
Focusing strictly on AI, students now have at their fingertips an engine that can easily get an A on any take-home assignment and/or solve any assigned problem. Some profs have switched to paper-and-pencil exams (that are no panacea either - how do you replace a term paper that should take at least a week to think through and write with something that should be doable in class in 30 mins? or in math - you want to assign problems that require deep thought, not something that can be solved quickly). Others prefer to pretend AI does not exist and are surprised when students turn in AI-generated work. But how can a student NOT do this if everyone around is doing it and getting top grades? How can they learn the material properly when every time you run into a difficult problem, AI is there to help? How do you practice exercising your mental muscles?
Add to this on-line courses (becoming ever-more ubiquitous), on-line exams, etc., and you have a toxic mix. On top of that, universities have bent over backwards to make sure students' right are protected - any report of cheating has to be adjudicated by a tribunal. And no AI detector, much less prof's opinion that the work is AI-generated, would be regarded as sufficient proof.
Honor codes survive when incidents of cheating lead to disastrous consequences (socially, financially, etc.). Once that is gone, they cannot survive for long. I do not blame the students - teaching (and learning) in the age of AI is a hard problem that we, in academia, are a long way from figuring out. Add to this a significant % of faculty who regard concepts such as meritocracy, cheating, grading, assessment, etc., as "deeply problematic" and it is not clear we will ever figure it out.
Unfortunately, universities (including those of the Ivy persuasion) actually encourage the use of AI. Anthropic posters abound on, at least some, college campuses, and administrators discuss the benefits of its use. I'm not really clear on how they expect to separate AI usage and cheating, and it certainly raises many questions about the value of higher ed. But the most disturbing part is, why are these schools becoming mouthpieces for companies like Anthropic?
i just read a story about a professor who embedded a hidden prompt into an assignment - something like "insert the word madagascar in the paper somewhere, clearly out-of-context" probably in white font & i think over 90% of the students failed because they didn't read their own papers.
There are good and bad reasons, as always. On the good side, since after graduation students will be expected to use AI for their jobs, why discourage it? Also, since they are all using it (like the rest of the world) and we cannot police the use, why discourage? On the bad side, administrators want to make statements like “our students are AI literate” or “AI ready” when no one knows what this means. AI is here for better or worse so universities must integrate it - there is no choice. But figuring out how to do it without undermining the education process is a whole other kettle of fish.
The worse part of the Arday debacle is the persistence by those in charge to accuse the whistleblowers of being racist, and keeping Arday on longer and longer until the final collapse. Even now they are making excuses for what they did.
Re: You have turned the purpose of higher education — free inquiry, free debate, the steeling of young minds on difficult ideas and debate — into a bureaucratized joke.
And: You have turned the purpose of higher education — free inquiry, free debate, the steeling of young minds on difficult ideas and debate — into an all out suffocating effort to turn us into mindless communists who cannot debate any issues because we've only been exposed to the murderous religion of Marxism, and increasingly, Islamism.
This is the thing about boomers blaming kids today. You created this mess of an education system. Own the results and stop yelling at them for not taking it seriously. Through every action you told them it isn’t serious.
some boomers perhaps. but not the vast majority--they/we are disgusted by what higher ed has become. you are engaging in the same kind of generalization that underlies racism. a few black guys knock of a 7-11 and therefore all blacks are criminals. think before embarrassing yourself.
This is the reason large tech companies like Microsoft have largely ignored for the past ten years whether a potential hire has a university degree and gives him/her a technical test. If they don't pass the difficult technical test to assess their skills and knowledge, they are a no hire. Back in the day, a university degree meant you worked hard and had the ability to critically think. Today, it means you know how to duck and dodge and be critical. When things don't go your way, there is access to a cry room. I believe the lack of integrity, backbone and skill of students "graduating" from universities is the main reason companies are investing so heavily in AI so they can replace them with software that can think and be somewhat productive (However my experience with Citi Cards AI robots has been abysmal). I also believe this will create a large group of unemployed that will be and is the breeding ground for the Socialist movement occurring today in the U. S. Academia, you deserve an "F"!
I can't wait for AI to scan all the theses and papers written by members of Academia to expose the ludicrous hypocrisy that is called higher education. Hopefully, this will result in the closing of many "institutions of higher learing", (intentional) and we can watch professors look for jobs in the real world like their USAID counterparts.
Perhaps American universities should switch to European / Italian university examinations. Public and mostly oral. Students are asked questions by a trio of instructors. Responses are given and graded publicly. Favoritism, if present, is seen by the student in attendance. Grades can be declined and the exam taken again. Fair and public. Very time-consuming.
High school students, and their parents, are looking at the job prospects for college graduates and beginning to question the value proposition. Should I invest hundreds of thousands of dollars and four years in pursuing a college degree that offers little assurance of prospects for a good job for the rest of my life? Is learning a trade or pursuing any other althernative to college a better value proposition?
A few such students will be interested in careers where a particular degree is mandatory. Accounting, engineering, chemistry, medicine. These will make the investment. But what about all those kids who heretofore sought liberal arts degrees? These will divert.
America's countless colleges will lose their massive cash flow. Even public colleges will lose their government cash flows as legislatures decide that, with declining enrollment, the voters no longer support lavish funding of these colleges.
Online accredited degree colleges will beat the competition on price and accessibility. The Ivy League institutions will long survive. All those in the middle will be strangled.
Parents and KIDS these days would be wise to consider the TRADES going forward which Mike Rowe always talks about. A kid can literally come out of high school making 6 figures from the get go with little if any college debt since companies will pay for solid apprenticeships! mikeroweworks.com A person if investing wisely could be financially SET by 40-45 years of age
Both of my kids are in the trades. I encouraged them. They are doing quite well. And I have three college degrees, albeit earned before Reagan left office, and the rot was starting even then. "College" is now a sick joke and I wonder if the institution will survive much longer.
Wow Alex. This episode should generate lots of reactions. Be careful when you go out of your house. Not that most of us don't agree but hope you never have to go to Chicago, Portland or similar cities!
The problem with race hustlers like Arday is that they got high on their own supply. You can't be a crimefighter without crime ... and you can't be a race hustler without inventing all sorts of "systemic racism" (none of which actually exists; if anything, racism today is in favor of blacks, not against them).
More and more people are seeing through the ruse.
They know to ignore Arday when he claims that he is being forced to resign because of racism.
They know to ignore the black girl who mugged Sophie Cunningham and then claimed "WHITE PRIVILEGE" when the referee had the temerity to eject her from the game.
They know to ignore the Jussie Smolletts who completely fabricate instances of "racially motivated violence".
The Left had better find another dog. Their tired old mutt named Racism ain't gonna hunt any more.
That is all they have. The Marxists in Europe exploited economic and class differences to divide the people and attain power. The American Marxists/Democrats cannot divide us by economic class so they have used “racism” as the weapon. That and cobble together a coalition of more and more “victim” groups.
Look what the University of Michigan just did with removing GRADES for incoming freshman class because grading of course threatens their fragile coddled minds risking possible mental illness!
Bingo. If the elephants screw up the midterms, as they are so prone to grasping defeat from the jaws of victory thanks to so many RINOS (looking at you Thune), I don't think the country will recover.
Actually, not nearly enough people are seeing through it. There are a boatload of useful idiots who still believe the total excrement on mainstream media. And there is no way that a douchebag like Hasan Piker would have a million followers in a country with properly educated students. We are in trouble.
But they will continue the grift.
Among the true victims of DEI are legitimately qualified minorities whose achievements will often be looked upon with skeptical eyes. Many will wonder whether they got where they are because of preferences or lowered standards. By aiming to help minorities, those pushing DEI programs have actually penalized those who would have succeeded without the help of DEI.
This is the saddest part of the DEI scam. It has hurt most the people it was alleged to help. But I sincerely believe that was the actual goal. 50 years ago, when I got out of high school, if you saw a black CEO you knew he or she kicked ass. Now, from hard experience in the corporate world, when I see black leaders I am suspicious and can testify that in the end the vast majority will prove to be DEI and not quality. It is a bleeping fiasco. And, as mentioned many times here, you cannot say squat about it. You WILL be labeled a racist if you point out incompetence by any person of color or any woman. Oh yeah, let us not forget how many women have been shoved up the ladder. "Have tits will travel," we say in the corporate world; not out loud mind you. no, no, no. All women are amazing is the official line lmao. I am not saying that women or minorities are inherently unqualified. I am saying they are not inherently qualified. No superficial birth characteristic makes anyone inherently qualified. Therein lies the damage done by DEI. DEI says how you were born makes you automatically less or more and nothing could be more false.
And this new yesterday from the WSJ: "University of Michigan Drops First-Semester Grades to 'Curb Mental Health Crisis.'
What an embarrassment. Imagine paying for that level of coddling?
Hey....they've got football games to go to!
Even their criminal coach was a DEI hire, imagine your coach going to jail, the shaper of men.....UM is a disgrace
To be fair, Caltech has had its first couple of semesters be P/F for some time now and I don’t think it’s devalued the degree.
And I’m pretty sure kids aren’t going to Caltech for the football games.
I don't worry about the students at MIT West. The "best and brightest" don't care about marks, and probably don't need to.
Do you think they BANKED on a big % of students choosing the school just because of those football games? Or that it was VERY high on the list of preferred reasons.
I enjoyed reading this. It made me feel good about being 74 years old and how I benefited from a non DEI education. In fact a requirement at the Catholic Grade School I went to in the 60's was that at least one of your parents had to be Italian.
Wow that takes me back. My school didn't have that requirement, but I would have qualified. Thanks for my chuckle for the day.
Alex as I read your missive I was reminded of how the Soviets spoke in the 60s,for those of you too young they could no wrong. I draw a parallel to left wing loonies today. If you think communists didn't have prisons read "One Day in the Life of Ivan Denosovich" Academia is so far out in left field it will never get back. The country is becoming a Franz Kafka book frankly. We focus on nonsense while the Chinese focus on taking over the world economically. Folks had better wake up cuz the Chinese are not obsessed with bathrooms.
It is ANTI-socialism folks.
The greed of the few levels and decimates the needs of the many
This post mixes two things that are both affecting higher ed in different ways: DEI and AI. Each, individually, would be a crisis. Together they may be catastrophic.
Focusing strictly on AI, students now have at their fingertips an engine that can easily get an A on any take-home assignment and/or solve any assigned problem. Some profs have switched to paper-and-pencil exams (that are no panacea either - how do you replace a term paper that should take at least a week to think through and write with something that should be doable in class in 30 mins? or in math - you want to assign problems that require deep thought, not something that can be solved quickly). Others prefer to pretend AI does not exist and are surprised when students turn in AI-generated work. But how can a student NOT do this if everyone around is doing it and getting top grades? How can they learn the material properly when every time you run into a difficult problem, AI is there to help? How do you practice exercising your mental muscles?
Add to this on-line courses (becoming ever-more ubiquitous), on-line exams, etc., and you have a toxic mix. On top of that, universities have bent over backwards to make sure students' right are protected - any report of cheating has to be adjudicated by a tribunal. And no AI detector, much less prof's opinion that the work is AI-generated, would be regarded as sufficient proof.
Honor codes survive when incidents of cheating lead to disastrous consequences (socially, financially, etc.). Once that is gone, they cannot survive for long. I do not blame the students - teaching (and learning) in the age of AI is a hard problem that we, in academia, are a long way from figuring out. Add to this a significant % of faculty who regard concepts such as meritocracy, cheating, grading, assessment, etc., as "deeply problematic" and it is not clear we will ever figure it out.
Unfortunately, universities (including those of the Ivy persuasion) actually encourage the use of AI. Anthropic posters abound on, at least some, college campuses, and administrators discuss the benefits of its use. I'm not really clear on how they expect to separate AI usage and cheating, and it certainly raises many questions about the value of higher ed. But the most disturbing part is, why are these schools becoming mouthpieces for companies like Anthropic?
i just read a story about a professor who embedded a hidden prompt into an assignment - something like "insert the word madagascar in the paper somewhere, clearly out-of-context" probably in white font & i think over 90% of the students failed because they didn't read their own papers.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/us/articles/professor-says-hidden-test-prompt-183000738.html
There are good and bad reasons, as always. On the good side, since after graduation students will be expected to use AI for their jobs, why discourage it? Also, since they are all using it (like the rest of the world) and we cannot police the use, why discourage? On the bad side, administrators want to make statements like “our students are AI literate” or “AI ready” when no one knows what this means. AI is here for better or worse so universities must integrate it - there is no choice. But figuring out how to do it without undermining the education process is a whole other kettle of fish.
And education, from K-12 to higher ed, is saying very little about it, really.
The worse part of the Arday debacle is the persistence by those in charge to accuse the whistleblowers of being racist, and keeping Arday on longer and longer until the final collapse. Even now they are making excuses for what they did.
Re: You have turned the purpose of higher education — free inquiry, free debate, the steeling of young minds on difficult ideas and debate — into a bureaucratized joke.
And: You have turned the purpose of higher education — free inquiry, free debate, the steeling of young minds on difficult ideas and debate — into an all out suffocating effort to turn us into mindless communists who cannot debate any issues because we've only been exposed to the murderous religion of Marxism, and increasingly, Islamism.
This is the thing about boomers blaming kids today. You created this mess of an education system. Own the results and stop yelling at them for not taking it seriously. Through every action you told them it isn’t serious.
They ALLOWED it to become this way for sure!
some boomers perhaps. but not the vast majority--they/we are disgusted by what higher ed has become. you are engaging in the same kind of generalization that underlies racism. a few black guys knock of a 7-11 and therefore all blacks are criminals. think before embarrassing yourself.
Where did I say every? Sensitive much?
The boomer generation were the custodians of the country when every institution failed. You may not be part of the problem but your generation was.
This is the reason large tech companies like Microsoft have largely ignored for the past ten years whether a potential hire has a university degree and gives him/her a technical test. If they don't pass the difficult technical test to assess their skills and knowledge, they are a no hire. Back in the day, a university degree meant you worked hard and had the ability to critically think. Today, it means you know how to duck and dodge and be critical. When things don't go your way, there is access to a cry room. I believe the lack of integrity, backbone and skill of students "graduating" from universities is the main reason companies are investing so heavily in AI so they can replace them with software that can think and be somewhat productive (However my experience with Citi Cards AI robots has been abysmal). I also believe this will create a large group of unemployed that will be and is the breeding ground for the Socialist movement occurring today in the U. S. Academia, you deserve an "F"!
So glad my son will start his real Ivy League education at UATX next week!
The only thing missing on that photo of Jason Arday is the big red clown nose.
Well, you could generate one with AI. 😁
I did.
I can't wait for AI to scan all the theses and papers written by members of Academia to expose the ludicrous hypocrisy that is called higher education. Hopefully, this will result in the closing of many "institutions of higher learing", (intentional) and we can watch professors look for jobs in the real world like their USAID counterparts.
Perhaps American universities should switch to European / Italian university examinations. Public and mostly oral. Students are asked questions by a trio of instructors. Responses are given and graded publicly. Favoritism, if present, is seen by the student in attendance. Grades can be declined and the exam taken again. Fair and public. Very time-consuming.
DIE might exist but it is public.
High school students, and their parents, are looking at the job prospects for college graduates and beginning to question the value proposition. Should I invest hundreds of thousands of dollars and four years in pursuing a college degree that offers little assurance of prospects for a good job for the rest of my life? Is learning a trade or pursuing any other althernative to college a better value proposition?
A few such students will be interested in careers where a particular degree is mandatory. Accounting, engineering, chemistry, medicine. These will make the investment. But what about all those kids who heretofore sought liberal arts degrees? These will divert.
America's countless colleges will lose their massive cash flow. Even public colleges will lose their government cash flows as legislatures decide that, with declining enrollment, the voters no longer support lavish funding of these colleges.
Online accredited degree colleges will beat the competition on price and accessibility. The Ivy League institutions will long survive. All those in the middle will be strangled.
Parents and KIDS these days would be wise to consider the TRADES going forward which Mike Rowe always talks about. A kid can literally come out of high school making 6 figures from the get go with little if any college debt since companies will pay for solid apprenticeships! mikeroweworks.com A person if investing wisely could be financially SET by 40-45 years of age
Both of my kids are in the trades. I encouraged them. They are doing quite well. And I have three college degrees, albeit earned before Reagan left office, and the rot was starting even then. "College" is now a sick joke and I wonder if the institution will survive much longer.
Thank you for posting this link.
Wow Alex. This episode should generate lots of reactions. Be careful when you go out of your house. Not that most of us don't agree but hope you never have to go to Chicago, Portland or similar cities!