Randall Curren – Philosophy professor at the University of Rochester
It will seem evident to many young people that they must go to college. It?s something their families and friends expect them to do and it?s a prerequisite for success in many occupations. In the United States and many other countries, college is a rite of passage into middle class respectability and a basis for pursuing many of the interesting and rewarding opportunities society has to offer. In financial terms, it might be possible to make more money at first by skipping college, but only at the price of passing up opportunities to do better in the long run. In short, there are social, occupational, and financial rewards to going to college. Many people would be satisfied with this answer. Why else would half of all Americans go to college?
As a philosopher, I?m not satisfied with this answer. It refers to advantages of going to college and getting a college degree, but not to the value of college education as such. Note also that the advantages of going to college that are mentioned are advantages that accrue to individual students. There is more to the value of a college education for the individuals who go to college, and also for society, than this answer suggests.
If you are a teenager and weighing your options, the answer outlined above almost certainly gives you enough reason to go to college, but it gives you reasons that may lead you to think you are better off if other people ? except your friends ? don?t go to college. If the best opportunities are limited, and the value of going to college is to ?get ahead? or have an advantage ? over others! ? in seizing those opportunities, then as long as you can go to college yourself it might seem to serve your interests if as few people as possible join you in going to college. You might not be happy that there are publicly funded colleges and public subsidies to help students from less wealthy families go to college. If public investment in higher education is a good thing, as most of us would agree, the benefits of college considered so far do not explain why.
Public investments in higher education seem to be predicated partly, but only partly, on the idea of making opportunities more widely available. A society that fails to provide all its citizens with reasonable opportunities to live well invites both moral condemnation and conflict arising from justified resentment. This is widely recognized by Americans, even as public funding for higher education continues to decline as a percentage of its cost. The charters and mission statements of our institutions of higher education suggest more than a concern with fair equality of opportunity, however. They suggest an appreciation of the value of knowledge, creativity, and independent judgment for individuals and for society, and an appreciation of the ways these can be protected, nurtured, and disseminated by the institutions. They represent a link to the historical understanding of higher education.
From the beginnings of higher education in the ancient Greek world and for at least two millennia thereafter, the overarching aim of education was universally thought to be good judgment. Ideas about the content of higher education revolved around different conceptions of the forms of learning that contribute to good judgment. It was assumed that good judgment was fundamental to living well in one?s private life and to participating constructively in the collective governance of one?s society, and not just to the practice of a profession. It was also assumed that the development and exercise of one?s intellectual and creative capacities is deeply satisfying and fundamental to being satisfied as a human being. Against this background, the question ?Why go to college?? suggests many further questions, such as: How can I develop good judgment in living my life? How can a serious study of literature, psychology, and the arts help me understand important facts about human nature, relationships, and life?s challenges? Will I be content to let advertisers and the commercialized popular culture tell me what will make me happy, or can research and the intellectual and artistic heritage of our civilization teach me things advertisers can?t or won?t? (Do advertisers even believe themselves that the life they are selling me is good for me?) How can logic and other tools of analysis and critical thinking help me think things through? How can philosophy, economics, history, political science, and the other sciences contribute to my understanding of the problems of public life, and strengthen my judgment in making what difference I can to my community and the fate of humanity? Is there anything in the intellectual and creative endeavors preserved and nurtured in colleges and universities that might capture my imagination and be worth devoting my life to?
It makes a difference to both our lives and society whether we pursue our careers as empty shells for acquiring wealth, or as commitments to public, intellectual, and artistic goods in whose fulfillment we can ourselves be fulfilled. Where but in college can we learn to understand these goods and what it means to have integrity in pursuing them?
It also makes a difference to both our lives and society whether we focus only on our careers and private affairs, as if the quality of the political choices that shape society were in no way a reflection of our own judgment and actions. This will be a fateful and difficult century for humanity, and the quality of our leaders and collective judgments will matter enormously. Where but in college can we acquire the understanding and judgment we will need to collectively confront the unsustainability of the way we live; the need to limit and possibly reduce the human population of the earth; the resource depletion and climate change that will sooner or later undermine the basis of the careers and families we would prefer to focus on?
In the background of the question, ?Why go to college?? is an important question of public policy, namely why colleges should serve as a rite of passage into middle class respectability and play the role of administering credentials that matter so much to occupational and financial opportunities. Why, from a collective point of view, should the American public (or any other public) send half its children to college? Why not rely on some alternative rite of passage such as four years of required national service? I?ve suggested an answer based on the historical understanding of the nature and value of higher education, and the premise that our colleges and universities are unique in providing such education. I think this is a good answer, but it would require a sizeable volume, if not several, to fully develop and defend the ideas involved. A deep and thorough answer to the question ?Why go to college?? requires a more systematic consideration of what it means to have a good life and the role of institutions and public policy in enabling people to live good lives.
Randall Curren, University of Rochester
For further reading on this topic, see:
Curren, R. (ed.) (2006) A Companion to the Philosophy of Education (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing). http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/book.asp?ref=9780631228370&site=1
Curren, R. (ed.) (2007) Philosophy of Education: An Anthology (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing). http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/book.asp?ref=9781405130226&site=1
