But is being poor the new sexy? And what happened to the old sexy? (Oh, here I am.)
If you didn't already know that this post was - and is - about academia, I could probably get away with a few off-colour metaphors about the sex trade before you twigged.* It almost seems a shame to waste 'em, but now the cat's out of the bag...
Last week, Richard Vedder gave a lecture at Hamilton College in New York on "The Coming Revolution in Higher Education". God, I loathe it when people arbitrarily hurl the word revolution into a lecture title, don't you? It raises so many false hopes and expectations - as though the thinly-disguised nightmare scenario being sketched out might actually contain a few grains of goodness. Naturally, this is working from the somewhat shaky premise that revolutions are generally positive, healthy affairs, and not ghastly, riotous, bloodthirsty historical blackspots wherein all the pretty people get massacred, and ugly, know-nothing thugs seize power, and hopelessly balls things up.
Anyway, you probably missed Vedder's lecture. So did I. Fortunately, there's a PDF version you can peruse. Possibly whilst eating cake...
http://www.centerforcollegeaffordability.org/uploads/Revolution_in_Higher_Ed.pdf
Oh, and yes - look at that URL: http://www.centerforcollegeaffordability.org Try not to be put off by the American spelling of "Center". You can bet your bootlaces that we're following developments on the website over on this side of the Pond, too.
*For anyone out of the loop, this harks back to the kerfuffle in March (http://www.milkround.com/news-careers-advice/221397/Cash-strapped-students-turn-to-sex-trade-to-fund-degrees), which was briefly reignited during the recent London (and Dublin - hello, Miss Sullivan) demonstrations. Not that it got much coverage with everything else going on...
Last week, Richard Vedder gave a lecture at Hamilton College in New York on "The Coming Revolution in Higher Education". God, I loathe it when people arbitrarily hurl the word revolution into a lecture title, don't you? It raises so many false hopes and expectations - as though the thinly-disguised nightmare scenario being sketched out might actually contain a few grains of goodness. Naturally, this is working from the somewhat shaky premise that revolutions are generally positive, healthy affairs, and not ghastly, riotous, bloodthirsty historical blackspots wherein all the pretty people get massacred, and ugly, know-nothing thugs seize power, and hopelessly balls things up.
Anyway, you probably missed Vedder's lecture. So did I. Fortunately, there's a PDF version you can peruse. Possibly whilst eating cake...
http://www.centerforcollegeaffordability.org/uploads/Revolution_in_Higher_Ed.pdf
Oh, and yes - look at that URL: http://www.centerforcollegeaffordability.org Try not to be put off by the American spelling of "Center". You can bet your bootlaces that we're following developments on the website over on this side of the Pond, too.
*For anyone out of the loop, this harks back to the kerfuffle in March (http://www.milkround.com/news-careers-advice/221397/Cash-strapped-students-turn-to-sex-trade-to-fund-degrees), which was briefly reignited during the recent London (and Dublin - hello, Miss Sullivan) demonstrations. Not that it got much coverage with everything else going on...