At this point, most institutions of "higher learning" in this country have been transformed into political correctness indoctrination centers. There is a reason why college towns have a reputation for being extremely liberal. The truth is that they are bastions for "progressive" thought. Each and every day, millions of young adults all across America are literally being systematically brainwashed.
In case you are wondering, I know what I am talking about. I spent eight years getting three degrees at public universities. And it doesn't even really matter what area of the country you attend school. The "education" that students are receiving at schools in very liberal states is virtually the same as the "education" that students are receiving at schools in very conservative states.
Our young adults represent the future of this nation, and they are receiving a level of indoctrination that is so comprehensive that it would make Joseph Goebbels proud.
Colleges and universities all across this nation spend an extraordinary amount of time and effort to alter the belief systems of their students. This even extends to teaching them what words are "appropriate" to use and which words are not. For example, just check out what is happening at the University of Michigan...
But this isn't just an advertising campaign. In fact, University of Michigan students are actually being asked to sign a pledge that they will use "inclusive language" from now on...Dozens of posters plastered across the University of Michigan caution students not to say things that might hurt others' feelings, part of a new "Inclusive Language Campaign" at the state's flagship public university that cost $16,000 to implement.
Words declared unacceptable through the campaign include "crazy," "insane," "retarded," "gay," "tranny," "gypped," "illegal alien," "fag," "ghetto" and "raghead." Phrases such as "I want to die" and "that test raped me" are also verboten.
If you think that this is just an isolated incident, you would be wrong.Students have been asked to sign a pledge to "use inclusive language" and to help their peers "understand the importance of using inclusive language," according to campaign materials.
One survey of 409 colleges conducted in 2013 discovered that 62 percent of them have "speech codes" that "severely departed from First Amendment standards".
Meanwhile, these "institutions of higher learning" are failing miserably at what is supposedly their primary task.
Today, the average college freshman reads at a 7th grade level. In a desperate attempt to get as many students through the system as possible, most college courses have been so "dumbed down" that the family dog could pass them.
If only parents knew. The amount of useful knowledge that their kids are actually receiving is very small. But most parents are utterly clueless and they just keep writing huge tuition checks semester after semester.
It would be hard to describe how utterly useless some of these college courses are. For instance, there is one college in upstate New York that is offering a course entitled "The Sociology of Miley Cyrus: Race, Class, Gender and Media".
Do you think that is going to prepare your child for the real world?
And here is a list of some other actual college courses that have been taught at U.S. colleges in recent years...
-"What If Harry Potter Is Real?"
-"Lady Gaga and the Sociology of Fame"
-"Philosophy And Star Trek"
-"Learning From YouTube"
-"How To Watch Television"
-"Oh, Look, a Chicken!"
Are you starting to get the picture?
No wonder so many students "graduate from college" but are still dumb as a rock.
The following are some numbers about the quality of college education in the United States that come from an article that appeared in USA Today...
-"After two years in college, 45% of students showed no significant gains in learning; after four years, 36% showed little change."
-"Students also spent 50% less time studying compared with students a few decades ago"
-"35% of students report spending five or fewer hours per week studying alone."
-"50% said they never took a class in a typical semester where they wrote more than 20 pages"
-"32% never took a course in a typical semester where they read more than 40 pages per week."
But even with so little being demanded of them, most college students in the United States still cannot manage to graduate from school on time.
Federal statistics show that only 36 percent of all full-time students receive a bachelor's degree within four years, and only 77 percent of all full-time students have earned a degree by the end of six years.
Instead of studying hard, most college students treat college like one giant party.
No wonder so many of them want to extend it for another year or two or three.
And when these kids get away from their parents, their morality tends to go into the toilet.
For example, just check out what one survey discovered about male college students...
These are the leaders of tomorrow?A third of male students questioned in a survey admitted they would rape a woman if they could get away with it.
The study found that 31.7 per cent of the mostly white American participants questioned admitted they would force a woman to have sex in a 'consequence-free situation'.
Academics quizzed volunteers on how they would act in a situation where they could have sex with a woman against her will 'if nobody would ever know there wouldn't be any consequences'.
Are you kidding me?
Our system of college education is deeply, deeply broken. Like I stated above, I speak from experience. I earned three degrees from "good schools", and I saw firsthand how pathetic the system is.
So what do you think?
Is there any way to fix our institutions of higher learning?
Please feel free to share what you think by posting a comment below...
Michael Snyder, you make reference to 'the real world' when asking if certain courses are useful to our children. Please, to put this into context, tell us what your 'real world' consists of because mine is made up of rocks and streams and trees and the underlying truth in that we are all interconnected. My 'pretend' world is made up of banks and industry, governments and bastions of higher learning.
My children were brought up and educated in my real world and have a low tolerance for the 'pretend' world in which they must spend at least some of their time.
I agree that public education has reached an extreme that I don't recognize and that post secondary education is heading in the same direction. 'We the parents' have let it get that way. We the parents have let society reach this point that I don't recognize and for that to happen on our/my watch is unforgivable.
You ask what 'we' can do about the education of our children and I suggest that it is up to the parents (you and me) to set the example and the tone of our childrens world view. If all you do is let your child watch television, play on the PC and eat crap then heck yea, those courses are perfect for your kids and you should quit bitching and replace the batteries in the remote.