Colleges in Dire Financial Straits

[Stockmann]

...You may not think any humanities fields are worthwhile, but these are as rigorous as any other humanities program, and more interdisciplinary to boot. I think maybe it's time for academics to stop dissing any field that's not their own: "Those people are politically correct lightweights and their field of study is cartoonish!" We've got enough anti-intellectualism in the culture at large without the call coming from inside the house.

The calls may be coming from inside the house, but it's not just STEM folks making them. I've all too often encountered attitudes from humanities folks along the lines that STEM involves no critical thinking - or even thinking at all, that it's merely number crunching, and that creativity, imagination, etc are only found in the humanities.

[Ruralguy]

I can think of some "creative" suggestions for your humanities colleagues who diss STEM.

More seriously, I've occasionally said the same thing myself!

[spork]

What kind of "Whatever Studies" are you all talking about?  In the places I'm familiar with, we have Religious Studies, Theatre and Performance Studies, Medieval Studies, Asian Studies, Italian Studies, and Russian/East European Studies. You may not think any humanities fields are worthwhile, but these are as rigorous as any other humanities program, and more interdisciplinary to boot. I think maybe it's time for academics to stop dissing any field that's not their own: "Those people are politically correct lightweights and their field of study is cartoonish!" We've got enough anti-intellectualism in the culture at large without the call coming from inside the house.

Overall, I agree, but I've seen problems in programs like "Dance Studies," rather than, say courses of study entitled "Dance ethnology," or "Dance history" which have the potential to be fairly rigorous.

The conversation I had with one student was dispiriting, in that, rather than learning chrological dance devopment in various places and climes, she was allowed to study "Themes in Dance," without learning any of the dance techniques applicable to the culture in question; nothing of the history, literature, or visual arts of the culture; and no sense of how religion, politics or historical invasions might have influenced or inflected the dance she wanted to study.

That's very much the way it seems to work with things like "Health Studies" (as opposed to "Health Science") or "Computer Studies" instead of "Computer Science". It's apparently a short form for "We take out all of the hard stuff like math, but talk about the subject as though you were actually learning something, and hope that potential employers won't notice the difference." So "Dance Studies" not including much actual dance is right on point.

And disciplines run by activists often also have the "Studies" label, and are basically dedicated to promoting an ideological viewpoint rather than actually trying to discover the truth, whatever it may be.

At the small enrollment institutions I have worked at or am otherwise familiar with, "Studies" programs are usually:

1) attempts to get butts in seats (a) with a "Discipline Lite" option to prolong the survival of departments that no longer attract majors or (b) by capturing students that would otherwise be free to take courses in other departments (e.g., the 70+ credit programs in "international business studies" or "elementary education"),

2) attempts to build a quality interdisciplinary program with demonstrated student interest but whose creation is opposed by existing departments that lack majors, or

3) something that started with a curricular development grant that ended a long time ago and is now a hollow shell because no one teaches the required courses on a regular schedule.

I have never seen a "Studies" program dedicated to promoting the ideological viewpoint of its faculty, but then again I have never worked at a place like NYU where perhaps that kind of thing occurs. At institutions where departments often consist of 2-4 faculty members the major obstacle is getting gen ed courses to count toward "Studies" requirements because those are the courses that always meet minimum enrollment.

A "Studies" program with actual meat to it requires training in fundamental skills. Guilford College, which has been mentioned numerous times on this thread, had (maybe it still exists, I don't know) a minor in Japanese Studies that required two years of Japanese language and at least one other Japanese history or society course. Its Japanese Studies major required advanced Japanese language study and study abroad in Japan. In contrast, I would say that a Religious Studies program in which students are not learning a scriptural language like Hebrew, Greek, or Arabic, or a Data Science Studies program in which students are not learning statistics, is bogus in terms of content.

At my own employer, I have seen a proliferation of minors and majors that fall under the "Studies" umbrella. It's a faculty strategy of competing for a larger piece of a shrinking pie of students. But these programs, whether they are quality or non-quality, do nothing but lead to an even more over-worked faculty and the hiring of more adjuncts, which drives up the costs of instruction and reduces the financial viability of the university. What really needs to happen is for some programs/departments to be totally eliminated.

[reener06]

[/quote]
At my own employer, I have seen a proliferation of minors and majors that fall under the "Studies" umbrella. It's a faculty strategy of competing for a larger piece of a shrinking pie of students. But these programs, whether they are quality or non-quality, do nothing but lead to an even more over-worked faculty and the hiring of more adjuncts, which drives up the costs of instruction and reduces the financial viability of the university. What really needs to happen is for some programs/departments to be totally eliminated.
[/quote]

This right here describes my university very well. The problem is, no one has figured that out, so these programs limp along. In addition, since most of my department are joint appointments with these study areas, that means those faculty are overworked and the non joint appointed people are overworked as well. We look like we have a lot of faculty, but most in my area of study are half-time. It sucks all around.

[mamselle]

I do want to go back, though, to reinforce Hegemony's overall point, which is that it needn't be as woeful as we've been describing it.

I benefitted from two out of three programs that were defined as Independent Study Majors: both were rigorous, made me work hard, and I'm still gratefully working on spin-offs from the research I did in them. The third was poorly thought-through, had few adequate advisors for the subjects they said they could cover, and omitted major elements of study that would have been useful.

I'm still working from the materials I did in that program, too, but the process has been much harder, and I basically had to supply the rigor myself, by finding outside mentors to work with.

Two out of three's not bad, but the 1/3 that are "soft" are seriously problematic.

M.

[kaysixteen]

Hmmm,  it depends on how you define 'studies'.  Some 'classical studies ' majors, in departments that also offer a 'classics' major as well, are essentially just lit in translation-cum-history and culture of antiquity options that offer little if any Latin or Greek language reqs, but such are not sufficient for admission to  graduate school in classics and normally should not be enough for k12 Latin teacher prep.  'Religious studies', on the other hand,  could well encompass a program of decent, legitimate,  and effective study without requiring training in any language that various ancient religious texts were written in.   We could likely discuss and discern what such a Religious studies program might entail and prep students for...

[mamselle]

True, and "Religious studies" often has the specific meaning of "interfaith," or "non-Western/non-Christian" work in a school that already has a Theology Dept. where the implication is or has been the study of Christian theology.

Sometimes interfaith/non-Western departments came into existence later in a school's history, so the two sets of terms are intended to allay confusion without judgemental overtones.

And those programs can be quite rigorous, thinking of places like Chicago, the GTU schools, Harvard's World Religions programs, etc.

So, context is important.

M.

[marshwiggle]

Some 'classical studies ' majors, in departments that also offer a 'classics' major as well, are essentially just lit in translation-cum-history and culture of antiquity options that offer little if any Latin or Greek language reqs, but such are not sufficient for admission to  graduate school in classics and normally should not be enough for k12 Latin teacher prep.  'Religious studies', on the other hand,  could well encompass a program of decent, legitimate,  and effective study without requiring training in any language that various ancient religious texts were written in.   We could likely discuss and discern what such a Religious studies program might entail and prep students for...

True, and "Religious studies" often has the specific meaning of "interfaith," or "non-Western/non-Christian" work in a school that already has a Theology Dept. where the implication is or has been the study of Christian theology.

I think these illustrate the problem with "studies". On the one hand, it can mean "not JUST X", (such as "Italian Studies" meaning not just studying Italian, i.e. the language), but it can also mean "no specific minimum of X" , (so no specific proficiency in Italian is needed to complete the requirements.)

It's that ambiguity that causes the problem, and it's why the latter is used to fill up seats with the hope that people perceive the value of the former.

[Hibush]

I think these illustrate the problem with "studies". On the one hand, it can mean "not JUST X", (such as "Italian Studies" meaning not just studying Italian, i.e. the language), but it can also mean "no specific minimum of X" , (so no specific proficiency in Italian is needed to complete the requirements.)

It's that ambiguity that causes the problem, and it's why the latter is used to fill up seats with the hope that people perceive the value of the former.

The word "study" is central to the academic enterprise, so it is a shame that it's meaning become so ambiguous that is is not usable. This discussion shows that it is being used to signal less studying, the opposite of what it ought to mean.  We may have to abandon the term for a while and use an unambiguous term for the rigorous curricula.

[Ruralguy]

Considering the huge discrepancy in, say, Physics majors, across schools, its a little odd that people automatically assume "studies" majors are non-rigorous and wouldn't have similar issues more generally. You really do have to look at the specific major.

I get why people have this as their "go to" bugaboo: there are some "studies" programs that are politically agendized. There are some related to STEM programs that are sometimes just a diluted version of the same major labeled as "Sciences" (Say, Environmental Studies vs. Environmental Sciences). But you really do have to look at the specific situation rather than just blanketly say that "Studies" majors are unserious.

[spork]

Judson College will open for spring semester:

https://www.judson.edu/news/judson-to-open-for-spring-2021/.

[marshwiggle]

Considering the huge discrepancy in, say, Physics majors, across schools, its a little odd that people automatically assume "studies" majors are non-rigorous and wouldn't have similar issues more generally. You really do have to look at the specific major.

If you have some trends to look out for in comparing Phyics (or other) programs, I'd be glad to hear them. (For instance, programs with fewer labs are possibly of lower quality. Even if there may be exceptions, if there's a pattern it's worth identifying.)

[apl68]

But you really do have to look at the specific situation rather than just blanketly say that "Studies" majors are unserious.

It sounds like they really are all over the place.  That's a matter for concern, since it makes it necessary for prospective students to do due diligence about the quality of programs they're considering.  They're often not well equipped to do that.

[apl68]

Judson College will open for spring semester:

https://www.judson.edu/news/judson-to-open-for-spring-2021/.

Well, it looks like their appeal met with a strong response.  It's touching to see such a response.  And still hard to see where this is likely to do anything but postpone the inevitable, using up resources in the process that might have been better applied elsewhere.  as Secondem_artem put it above, "Starting a GoFundMe campaign is no way to run a college."

[apl68]

Pacific Lutheran University has declared financial exigency: https://www.thenewstribune.com/news/local/article247922835.html

This is after already cutting faculty in 2016 with 31 faculty positions lost.  A minimum of 40 faculty positions are expected to be lost in this iteration.

I am confident the major and minor in Criminal Justice they started this year will bail them out.

Sure.

Negative net revenue for FYs 2012, 2013, 2014, 2016, 2018. Form 990 for FY 2019 not available yet.

Wonder what all they're going to end up cutting?  That's going to be a big chunk of faculty at a school that size.  It's not looking good for them long-term.