Dubious master's degrees

[lightning]

I don't want to beat up too much on the example that I gave. I now regret posting the Patrick Clement example.

I can't remember whether I saw this posted in the fora or in the comments section of the original article:
college degree ≠ job success;
college degree + application + professional mindedness (e.g. networking, etc.) = job success

Having benefited countless times (mainly through the professional networking that is facilitated with a degree from AND through the networking experiences available to students from a luxury brand name university), and seeing how just about every committee I have ever served on puts the candidates with no-name-brand degrees, at the bottom of the pile, I understand the motivation to go into debt for the Columbia name and others like it. We were recently guffawing to SNL's video of University of Westfield Online. Who wants to be that guy that everyone is making fun of because they went to a no-name school. Who wants to be the holder of that no-name degree if and when introduced to an important professional circle? Certainly not Patrick Clement and others like him who just want to escape their humble roots and move up.

We really should not be beating up on Patrick Clement. Instead we should be beating up on the universities who want to exploit his dreams and beating up on a job system that will only consider someone for a job or opportunity if they come from a privileged background.

[apl68]

We really should not be beating up on Patrick Clement. Instead we should be beating up on the universities who want to exploit his dreams and beating up on a job system that will only consider someone for a job or opportunity if they come from a privileged background.

Yes, this is the deeper problem here.  It's far too often the case that people with many kinds of aspirations can't even get a look-in if they don't have privileges that only lots of money can buy.  If a Columbia education is so important in some fields, then Columbia ought to at least give a few more scholarship slots to people who wouldn't otherwise have a chance.

[dismalist]

The source of the problem of dubious master's degrees is the same as the source of the problem of dubious bachelor's degrees. The master's degrees are mere additional weapons in the educational arms race.

Much of higher ed is signalling. It is for that reason that while masters degrees are dubious, people are willing to pay.

The solution is to stop privileging higher education with funds.

[mleok]

Well, the real solution is for the maximum loan amounts for the federally backed graduate school loan programs, with their income indexed repayment plans, and loan forgiveness after 25 years of payments, to be limited in some way by the likelihood that graduates from the program fully repay these loans. Another way is to remove a graduate program's eligibility for federal loan programs if too large a fraction of their students fail to pay off the principal after the loan period.

[kaysixteen]

This wouldn't work with private schools like Columbia, necessarily, but has anyone conceived of the notion of means-testing tuition and fees for university education, giving automatic (without having to apply for 'financial aid', taking loans, etc) fees reduction, up to and including $0, for students with demonstrated need.

[jimbogumbo]

The source of the problem of dubious master's degrees is the same as the source of the problem of dubious bachelor's degrees. The master's degrees are mere additional weapons in the educational arms race.

Much of higher ed is signalling. It is for that reason that while masters degrees are dubious, people are willing to pay.

The solution is to stop privileging higher education with funds.

I would add slightly to your post.

1. We need the business world to stop requiring degrees where they are not needed.

2. Public money that is invested in some forms of post secondary support should be reallocated to apprentice programs.

[Durchlässigkeitsbeiwert]

It looks like the MFA takes up to five years to obtain, but only the first two years involve formal instruction, and the last few years are a bit like the thesis years of a PhD.

For those who don't know, the MFA in the arts is a terminal degree.

After that, the scope and depth of your own specific works (measured by critical acclaim and other yardsticks) yield your credentials.

An MA in an "Arts/Dance/Theater/Lit Studies" is often a 'lite' program, so one wants to beware of those if one is hoping for a gallery, dance company, symphony, or publisher to pick you up based on that, alone.

M.

Interesting. In this case, the MFA program looks to be quite similar to a self-financed PhD - a definite no-go in most circumstances.
Are there "free" (i.e. with tuition and living expenses covered) MFA options? It would look strange if notoriously non-lucrative career (for most people) would require an expensive degree just to have a shot at a promotion.

[mamselle]

We ARE talking about the arts, right?

One gets to make all kinds of claims for the sciences--they save lives, they offer alternatives to prevent climate change, etc.--but the arts don't have that kind of cachet. I believe they're essential to quality of life--the sciences can extend its length, but they can only go so far in filling it meaningfully.

But that doesn't carry much weight in the real world. If you're lucky you get a scholarship, or loans, or private assistance, or a special grant.

Having worked on both sides of the divide--as an EA in the sciences, and a researcher/instructor/presenter in the arts--I know how deep that divide is, and how little those on either side of it really understand about its variations in strata.

And having lived and worked on the other side of the Atlantic puddle, I know it's very different there as well.

But...

M.

[spork]

Well, the real solution is for the maximum loan amounts for the federally backed graduate school loan programs, with their income indexed repayment plans, and loan forgiveness after 25 years of payments, to be limited in some way by the likelihood that graduates from the program fully repay these loans. Another way is to remove a graduate program's eligibility for federal loan programs if too large a fraction of their students fail to pay off the principal after the loan period.

I don't really care what lenders charge on educational loans, I just don't want my taxes being used to subsidize borrowers or bail out insolvent lenders. Remove the subsidized interest rates, get rid of the federally-backed loan programs, and allow the debt to be discharged through bankruptcy as happens with every other type of loan. Then price will reflect risk. If a lender decides to extend a $100,000 loan to an illiterate high school graduate who wants to attend some "cosmetology" program in a strip mall, not my problem. But the more likely scenario is that the cost of a bachelor's degree will stop increasing faster than the rate of inflation, because the spigot of cheap money will have been turned off.

[Wahoo Redux]

Are there "free" (i.e. with tuition and living expenses covered) MFA options? It would look strange if notoriously non-lucrative career (for most people) would require an expensive degree just to have a shot at a promotion.

Yes.

Many of the "better" MFA programs are attractive because full tuition TAs or fellowships, living stipends, and actual teaching experience.

It was poverty, but my MFA cost me nothing.

Film is not usually included in these sorts of MFAs. 

[lightning]

The source of the problem of dubious master's degrees is the same as the source of the problem of dubious bachelor's degrees. The master's degrees are mere additional weapons in the educational arms race.

Much of higher ed is signalling. It is for that reason that while masters degrees are dubious, people are willing to pay.

The solution is to stop privileging higher education with funds.

I would add slightly to your post.

1. We need the business world to stop requiring degrees where they are not needed.

2. Public money that is invested in some forms of post secondary support should be reallocated to apprentice programs.

I've been yammering about that for decades. Here are some examples that come to mind right away. It's absolutely silly that a real estate office requires someone to have a degree in real estate or related business field in order to be a glorified receptionist at a real estate office. It's ridiculous for a retail chain to require a bachelor's or master's degree from someone who has worked for the company for many years, in order to get promoted to a middle management position. The same thing goes for non-profits and government. There are government and non-profit jobs which were done with someone in place for many years who only had a Bachelor's degree, and then, when that person retires, the degree requirements or preferred qualifications are upped to a graduate degree. The reasons for this are mostly nefarious, but that's a whole separate chunk of red meat, to be discussed at another time. My point, which only echoes jimbogumbo is that if businesses, non-profits, & government would take the time to actually screen candidates for their suitability for a job based on verified ability, competencies, soft skills, and experience, instead of simply upping degree requirements, there wouldn't be this desperate motivation for students to get degrees (or more prestigious degrees for the better jobs) that they don't really need to do a job.

[dismalist]

The source of the problem of dubious master's degrees is the same as the source of the problem of dubious bachelor's degrees. The master's degrees are mere additional weapons in the educational arms race.

Much of higher ed is signalling. It is for that reason that while masters degrees are dubious, people are willing to pay.

The solution is to stop privileging higher education with funds.

I would add slightly to your post.

1. We need the business world to stop requiring degrees where they are not needed.

2. Public money that is invested in some forms of post secondary support should be reallocated to apprentice programs.

I've been yammering about that for decades. Here are some examples that come to mind right away. It's absolutely silly that a real estate office requires someone to have a degree in real estate or related business field in order to be a glorified receptionist at a real estate office. It's ridiculous for a retail chain to require a bachelor's or master's degree from someone who has worked for the company for many years, in order to get promoted to a middle management position. The same thing goes for non-profits and government. There are government and non-profit jobs which were done with someone in place for many years who only had a Bachelor's degree, and then, when that person retires, the degree requirements or preferred qualifications are upped to a graduate degree. The reasons for this are mostly nefarious, but that's a whole separate chunk of red meat, to be discussed at another time. My point, which only echoes jimbogumbo is that if businesses, non-profits, & government would take the time to actually screen candidates for their suitability for a job based on verified ability, competencies, soft skills, and experience, instead of simply upping degree requirements, there wouldn't be this desperate motivation for students to get degrees (or more prestigious degrees for the better jobs) that they don't really need to do a job.

Absolutely, people. Problem is that its risky for businesses to screen, for they can get nailed for disparate impact. The misery started with Griggs v. Duke Power (1971).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griggs_v._Duke_Power_Co

Degree requirements are a legal way to find more qualified people, qualified in the sense of being socialized, able to read and write, and so on.

[lightning]

The source of the problem of dubious master's degrees is the same as the source of the problem of dubious bachelor's degrees. The master's degrees are mere additional weapons in the educational arms race.

Much of higher ed is signalling. It is for that reason that while masters degrees are dubious, people are willing to pay.

The solution is to stop privileging higher education with funds.

I would add slightly to your post.

1. We need the business world to stop requiring degrees where they are not needed.

2. Public money that is invested in some forms of post secondary support should be reallocated to apprentice programs.

I've been yammering about that for decades. Here are some examples that come to mind right away. It's absolutely silly that a real estate office requires someone to have a degree in real estate or related business field in order to be a glorified receptionist at a real estate office. It's ridiculous for a retail chain to require a bachelor's or master's degree from someone who has worked for the company for many years, in order to get promoted to a middle management position. The same thing goes for non-profits and government. There are government and non-profit jobs which were done with someone in place for many years who only had a Bachelor's degree, and then, when that person retires, the degree requirements or preferred qualifications are upped to a graduate degree. The reasons for this are mostly nefarious, but that's a whole separate chunk of red meat, to be discussed at another time. My point, which only echoes jimbogumbo is that if businesses, non-profits, & government would take the time to actually screen candidates for their suitability for a job based on verified ability, competencies, soft skills, and experience, instead of simply upping degree requirements, there wouldn't be this desperate motivation for students to get degrees (or more prestigious degrees for the better jobs) that they don't really need to do a job.

Absolutely, people. Problem is that its risky for businesses to screen, for they can get nailed for disparate impact. The misery started with Griggs v. Duke Power (1971).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griggs_v._Duke_Power_Co

Degree requirements are a legal way to find more qualified people, qualified in the sense of being socialized, able to read and write, and so on.

Degree requirements (or the unwritten preferred qualification of degrees from fancy expensive schools) are also a legal way to screen out those who cannot afford to be "socialized" in the desirable manner that is in accordance with the company's unwritten & unspoken informal culture. Additional degrees replaced employment tests that did not directly measure candidates' abilities to do a job. Both allowed or currently allow a company the legal avenue of screening out those who were not born into privilege (either through biased test questions tangential to the job as in the case of 1950s/1960s employment tests or through putting up a financial barrier with a degree requirement that is tangential to the job).

Going back to the point about employment tests using verified ability, competencies, soft skills, and experience to select the best candidate for the job, a business can still do this, as long as the assessments are demonstrated to be true measures of the ability to do a job. Large tech companies can give programming tests to candidates vying for a software engineer job. Casting directors can hold auditions where the the candidates have to read the script in a convincing and compelling way. Sales managers, at an interview, can hand a random object to a candidate and ask "sell me this <random object>." The State Department does interviews and administers reading tests in the language of the field assignment. I think these evaluations are better than degrees for shortlisting the applicant pool, because the business can tailor the assessment to the specific needs of the business instead of relying on one degree program that is supposed be the passport control for multiple businesses. Of course, this takes work, and most businesses are too lazy to do this. And that's why we have degrees, including dubious degrees.

[dismalist]

Of course, this takes work, and most businesses are too lazy to do this.

This says businesses are throwing money away, something very hard to believe. No, fear of the threat of lawsuits, not laziness, is the operative motive.

[lightning]

Of course, this takes work, and most businesses are too lazy to do this.

This says businesses are throwing money away, something very hard to believe. No, fear of the threat of lawsuits, not laziness, is the operative motive.

Very true. I see that in HR. HR is more of a CYA operation than a unit that manages benefits and facilitates truly effective hiring that helps find the best employees for a job. So, yes, for a lot of businesses, resources are diverted to CYA, and finding the best employees is secondary. Maybe some would call it a different set of priorities. I call it lazy. If a business has to shift resources away from finding the best employees to staff line authority that would be in charge of throughput (the quality & efficient production and delivery of the company's product/service), and instead direct it toward CYA (overhead), then, yeah, it's lazy, especially when it is relying on degrees to staff a position that is in charge of throughput.