Comments on: American Higher Education: Failing, Entitlement

By: Audra

Audra — Tue, 18 Feb 2014 14:38:03 +0000

Without a doubt we are seeing a very ill society in that regard. The selfishness is just mental. Now that I’ve spent a couple of years living outside of the US and with friends who are dotted about Europe and the US, there’s such a stark difference in the way that we all view social responsibility.

By: lordtaltos

lordtaltos — Tue, 18 Feb 2014 05:02:48 +0000

The cross generational entitlement I meant is what we’re seeing with the generations currently on Medicare and backing the Tea Party: the “I’ve got mine, screw you young people” type of entitlement. Sure, the parental involvement type is growing, but I also think we knee jerk blame entitlement to the point that it covers up deeper issues.

By: Audra

Audra — Mon, 17 Feb 2014 10:42:06 +0000

Hi,

And thank you for your response — I couldn’t agree more with your assessment of the three causes of the “disease” (great way to put it). But as I am looking at the cultural elements — what it means more broadly to be and interact with people, I think this notion of entitlement is a bit different from what we’ve seen before. There’s always been the “I had it so much harder, had to walk uphill both ways to school through the snow” kind of rhetoric.

What I’m more bothered by is the increasing parental involvement in students and young adults lives — it’s now increasingly common for parents to come on job interviews, be an active part of the negotiation process, and for them to want access to HR information. Certainly, we’re seeing these behavioral issues in our classrooms and in the educational context absolutely have to do with the 3 factors that you bring up, but I also see it as being a much larger cultural shift in parenting and the continuing role that parents see in their children’s lives. This is fundamentally different from what we’ve seen with previous generations and seems to be having some significant developmental and psychological effects on kids.

Again — great comment!

By: lordtaltos

lordtaltos — Sat, 15 Feb 2014 16:39:08 +0000

Although entitlement is there, in my experience it is not so widespread (it’s also found in every generation). Actually, I think entitlement is a symptom, not the “disease” itself.

Rather, I’d say the “disease” has three fundamental parts:
1) Falling respect for educators in (American) society. This has been going on since at least the 1960s, but moreso in the last couple decades. When parents disparage educators in any of myriad ways, their kids pick up on that disrespect.

2) The “death” of expertise. This comes largely after the internet. With the growth of the internet, more people have a diminished respect for experts. Too many think that just because they can look up a few things online and present an uninformed or barely informed opinion, they know better than someone who has been studying the issue for decades. Too many think they are experts on everything without really knowing anything.

3) The commodification of education. After decades of being administered by business people, not educators, and corporatizing education (trying to treat colleges as companies), we’re reaping the results. Added to this is the increasing view of education as a commodity. It used to be that people went to college to learn, now most go to get a degree to get a job and don’t care if they actually learn anything so long as they get the paper.