The Death of Higher Education

Friday, November 21, 2025

New reports out note that college students can’t do Math (arithmetic actually) and now Harvard admits “A’s” are normative, not exceptional (breaking the heart of this once proud straight-A student.)  We have a problem.  Our best and brightest aren’t and our university system will soon collapse as the financial cost of engaging in it seems less and less worthwhile.  Earlier this week Mary Katherine Ham told the host she did not know if college would be worth it for her children.  It is a big problem.

Reports are beginning to emerge about how bad covid policy was and just how off-the-cuff its formation was.  (“Follow the science” my Aunt Petunia!  It was an exercise in fear, bureaucratic power plays and media sensationalism.  Pardon my braggadocio, but I ought to collect all the posts I wrote at the time into a book and title it “Told You So!”)  There is no doubt covid is a proximal cause of this educational decline and a massive accelerator of it, but it is far, far from the ultimate cause.

Ready access to and the abundance of student loans are a huge part of the problem.  Not only has all that ready cash raised the cost of college exponentially; it has enabled people that have no business being there to be there.  Universities anxious to get that cash will do whatever it takes to accept those unworthy applicants.  But even that is not the ultimate cause.

The ultimate cause is philosophical.  We have a thousands ways of describing the problem.  “Everyone deserves an education.”  (No – they don’t – college admission must be earned through a combination of capability and hard work and financial planning.)  The idea that if a student of color does not perform as well academically it is because of racism.  (Maybe they just did not work as hard.)  The idea that if a student does not perform to the highest standard it is about the teacher, not the student.  (Hogwash – I had some awful teachers in my life.  A college bound student educates themselves, the teacher is a tool in that effort and if a particular tool is not working, there are always others.)  The bottom line is this – some people are smarter than others and college is for the smart ones, not everyone.  (And even the smart ones have to work hard.)

And once again. taking Christian thought out of the public sphere is a big part of this mess.  Christianity starts with a simple premise – “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”  All of us, every last one of us, is flawed.  Our equality comes in our flawed nature, not our capable one.  We lead with humility, not delusions of our goodness.  We do not deserve anything.

As the church comes together, another, what ought to be simple, notion is expressed – “Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit.  And there are varieties of ministries, and the same Lord.  There are varieties of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons.  But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.”  Once we move past our flawed nature, we are not all the same.  Some are good at one thing and some at another.  But all of it, every little bit of it, contributes to the common good.  The scholar and the ditch digger both contribute to the common good and are therefore both worthy of a place among us.

Which brings us full circle back to the fact that our equality is in our flawed nature.  The scholar seems more important than the ditch-digger without the understanding that it is our flaws that unite us.  The scholar is not more important, only smarter.  He is equally as flawed as the ditch digger and both make valuable contributions to the common good.  I said earlier, “We lead with our humility….”  But the scholar is often all too willing to act in accordance with his seeming importance.  Jesus, who had far more right to feelings of superiority than any of us, knew better.

Higher education is dying – rapidly.  There will be a million studies done – thousand of causes proclaimed.  All will have a point, but none will solve the problem.  The problem is far more fundamental than such studies can or will reveal.