There was a comment from a Swedish professor on an Upshot article . He taught here and in Sweden, and his children went to college here. I will post what he wrote and my replies. I think what is important is that he felt he saw better education here, but he retired 20 years ago. I suspect his daughters graduated at least 20-30 years ago. We have seen dramatic change in education here. I think that is what he testifies to.
(I’m only including the comments that I think are pertinent to this post.)
Larry Lundgren
Linköping, Sweden
We are three in a family of dual citizens (I not yet official) who have extensive experience in every university role on both sides of the Atlantic – I write from Sweden.
The two of us who have been professors (both in the US, one in both, and I also visiting researcher in Sweden) strongly support Professor Pellegrini’s position and strongly question yours. If we simply were to start citing professors at the University of Rochester who were very fine researchers and known for their teaching we could come up with a lengthy list. We would not be able to do this for the departments in the Swedish universities we know best.
Let’s hear from the students also. A standard question I ask any student I encounter here who attends a Swedish university is “Can you name a professor who really had an impact on you and perhaps even your future?” Answer “No”. Then ask American students including the dual citizen daughter who has degrees from Univ. Vermont and Univ. of Gothenburg but studied at Linköping Univ for 2 years also. The usual reply is an enthusiastic yes from the USA side.
The two professors of this dual-citizen trio still get letters from students from very long ago telling us how we changed their life.
Mark Feldman
Kirkwood, Mo
Your later comment that you have been retired for 20 years makes it clear how we can have different views of American higher education.
Though the warning that I quoted from David Riesman was from 1980, that was just the beginning. The data supports this.
The place to look is Arum and Roksa’s seminal “Academically Adrift”. Here is some of what they find.
Students are reguired to study 44% less than in the 60′s, and 30% less than in 1980. (20 hours a week in 1980, 14 now, and 25 in 1960’s) Their gain in critical skills is almost zero. That gain used to be one sigma. Their results are independent of the university’s selectivity.
You mention Swedish high schools (in another comment). That is important. As higher education goes, so goes high school. That’s because high school teachers are supposed to learn their subject in college.
We are on a slippery slope. We need to stop praisng higher education based on the success of previous generations; and, we need to realize that the salary differential between a HS grad and a college grad is just another symptom. Otherwise, we will continue sliding downhill in every area where education matters.
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