Just submitted by first ever SXSW panel proposal. Once voting opens, I’m going to pull out all the stops to ask for your help. Here’s the solo presentation I’m pitching:
Higher Ed Crisis: Remaking The U.S. University
More people are enrolling in college than at any other time in U.S. history. While policy makers give half-hearted lip service to worries about a higher education bubble, they still pump money and incentives into increasing enrollment. High school guidance counselors are judged by how many students go on to college. And four-year, public and community colleges, which are getting the greatest influx of the new breed of students, play up the promised land myth: get into college and you’ll get a good job.
But the myth breaks down on the first day of classes. Academics see themselves not as providing job training but as living up to the university roles of research and turning students into well-rounded people. Those are worthy goals, but for the majority of students that means a fear of failure and a career in a cubicle. University career services help students polish resumes but not on how to start a business.
This talk offers a big-picture solution to the higher ed crisis.
Five questions this talk will answer:
- Should you send your kid (or yourself) to college?
- Why don’t more colleges encourage students to take risks?
- How can we reverse the anti-entrepreneur culture in higher ed?
- What does the perfect college degree for the new economy look like?
- Which schools/programs/majors are getting it right?
