June 1, 2009 | Latest, The University & Academics, The University & America

When Higher Education Results In ‘Negative Learning’

The high cost of higher education is something most Americans assume is ultimately worthwhile in the long run. Indeed, the cost of college degrees are increasing under the rationale that the market value of a degree makes the debt incurred – an average of $20,000 per student as of last year – worth it in the long run.

What if, though, the college experience was actually having a negative impact on our nation’s young adults?

A college degree still represents probably the greatest level of accomplishment for a young American, a symbol of achievement that, fittingly, given our culture’s egalitarian sensibilities, can more or less be attained by anyone with enough grit and gumption.

The latest numbers from the U.S. Census Bureau indicate that roughly 20 million Americans were enrolled in some form of higher education as of 2008, the vast majority, some 17.1 million, as undergraduates.

Now, with more students than ever before in college, one would presume we must be improving across the board when we try to measure the intellectual depth, technical know-how and overall managerial competence of the average college-educated citizen.

Oddly, though, we’re not improving; we’re actually getting worse.

In searching for an answer to this puzzling phenomena, the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI), a think tank near the nation’s capital, devoted two lectures, each available free at www.isi.org, on the subject of “Our Fading Heritage.”

In one speech at the National Press Club last fall, T. Kenneth Cribb, Jr., ISI President, introduced the speakers by illustrating the results of a nationwide study, one which is critical to understanding the state of mind of the average college student and the overall failure of our nation’s vital institutions.

“In 2007, ISI partnered with the University of Connecticut’s Department of Public Policy … to once again conduct and corroborate the largest scientifically valid survey ever done to access what students learn in college.,” Mr. Cribb explains. “It was based on a carefully developed and extensively piloted 60 question multiple choice examination administered to some 14,000 freshman and seniors at a cross-section of 50 colleges nationwide.”

The point of the exam was to determine “whether colleges are increasing their students overall knowledge of America’s history and its integral institutions” by focusing on the four areas of study deemed vital to an informed and engaged citizenry: American history, government, foreign relations and the economy.

The results of the exam are revealing. “In 2007, the average freshman score was 51.4 percent,” declared Mr. Cribb, “and 54.2 percent for seniors; a paltry gain of less than one percent per year of college.” So the average graduate, entrusted with the future stewardship of the nation, can barely understand its foundations.

It gets worse.

“Even more disappointing, at many elite schools – Princeton, Duke, Yale, and Cornell, to name just a few,” laments Mr. Cribb, “the freshman did better than their seniors, a phenomenon that has been dubbed ‘negative learning.’”

And paradoxically, college demand continues to rise unabated, all in order to obtain a degree that has come to mean, at best, a mediocre grasp of the fundamentals of our way of life, and at worst, a measured depreciation in knowledge over the course of one’s schooling.

Young people are attracted toward college because it feels like the right choice to make, because our civilization has come of age as a result of the kind of intellectual pluralism and depth of study which we imagine that respectable colleges still foster.

Those choosing to step onto the campus today will desperately need the advice, guidance and attention of those of us who still care deeply enough about the American experiment in self-governing liberty to see it continue.

There are many groups, like ISI, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education, Minding the Campus, and the Center for the American University at the Manhattan Institute that can offer resources to stay current with campus goings-on.

No amount of academic study can compensate for an experience of America’s richness that isn’t actively felt at home, and lived by parents, family and neighbors, through exposure to and immersion in literature, art, history, science and faith.

With 20 million enrolled in some form of higher education, most are likely to know personally at least one or two friends or relatives enrolled, meaning that directly or indirectly, we’re all impacted by our colleges.

And here – in our mutual closeness – lies an advantage. If campus officials and Washington politicos have worked nationally to relegate public debate about the efficacy of higher learning to the backburner, then we can make real an education in our institutions by working locally to bring such debate and learning back to the fore.

With zero degrees of separation, we can engage locally with one another, building friendships, forming studying groups and travelling troupes that accomplish outside of the classroom what stopped long ago inside the classroom.

This is one mess that the average citizen can clean up all by himself.

Thomas A. Shakely can be reached at tom@tomshakely.com.