The purpose of college is to get a job
According to DeSantis, and so many others
DeSantis wants to put colleges and universities, rather than taxpayers, on the hook for student debt. If universities graduate students with degrees that do not result in a job that pays well enough to pay back their debt, that's the university's problem, not the taxpayers, according to DeSantis. I understand the perspective. I took out government loans for my post-secondary education, but, in hindsight, I don't think the government should have been issuing me, or any other student, loans in the first place. Setting aside that argument, and who ought to help low-income students—at this point, middle-income students as well—pay for school, what sticks out to me with this and other arguments like it about the value of a post-secondary degree is the emphasis on the economic usefulness of the degree.
The last part of this quote by DeSantis encapsulates this argument:
"I think the universities should be responsible for the student debt. You produce somebody that can be successful, they pay off the loans, great. If you don't, then you're gonna be on the hook. That will cause a change in the type of course programs that a lot of these universities are offering." [emphasis added]
He is essentially arguing that if a course of study does not lead to, or result in, a job than the university ought to rethink whether they should offer it.
I want to acknowledge from the outset that the cost of a four-year degree is so high that students, their parents, and nearly everyone else understandably expects that a graduate can get a job as a result of the learning that's (supposedly) tied to their degree, and that it ought to be one that pays well enough to live comfortably, even if they have a loan they are paying back. I get it.
But, the hyper-focus on employability as a result of college assumes that the ultimate purpose of a post-secondary education is to get a job. Sometimes it is. An aspiring electrician will likely apprentice while taking classes that directly apply to their trade to train to be an electrician. They are receiving a professional education. A philosophy student attending a four-year liberal arts college, on the other hand, is not necessarily training to be a philosopher. Some will dream of becoming a philosophy professor at a university, but most major in philosophy because they find the subject matter interesting or because, for them, a higher education is about developing their mind, not gaining skills that can be directly applied to a job. And some choose liberal arts degrees because they know they will go on to receive their master's degree in the field they'd like to work. A colleague once told me that a bachelor's is for pursuing your interests, a master's is for job preparation. This struck me as a privileged position, but it was her family's mantra none the less.
The pursuit of truth, expanding one's store of knowledge, understanding the world around you, and learning how to think, analyze situations, and solve problems—supposed purposes of higher education—become secondary concerns of higher education when getting a job reigns supreme.
Certainly, one can get a good job if they know how to think and solve problems, and some liberal arts programs, in an effort to save themselves from the chopping block, do make this argument. During my undergraduate student orientation, a faculty member from the music school (which was a draw to my alma mater, Indiana University) stood up and made the case for choosing to major in French horn over business (another big draw to the university). Just like the business school, the music school had a rigorous program, and his argument was that the skills and disposition of a graduate of the music program would make the graduate stand out to employers.
When you make employability your focus, rather than developing the mind, everything a student does gets directed to that end. Thus, rather than taking courses that broaden your understanding of the world, a student takes courses that teach skills directly applicable to a career path they think they want at the time. Sure, a business student may be required to take liberal arts courses that are knowledge- rather than skill-based, but those courses are viewed as an obstacle to get through. They are taken less seriously than profession-oriented classes. They are not appreciated as a means to become educated, as in acquire knowledge to have a better understanding of the world.
The world shrinks when employability is the ultimate goal.
Again, in the midst of the student loan crisis that's currently playing out and the unmanageable cost of higher education, questions still loom about return on investment and who ought to pay, and how much, but we need to get clear about the purpose of pursuing a post-secondary education. And, of course, not all liberal arts classes expand one's knowledge. Like anything else, some aren't all that good.
K-12 education is part of the problem.
I have written extensively about the purpose of a public school education, and I have claimed that, historically, there have been three purposes of public education: social efficiency (preparation for the workforce), social mobility (preparation for higher social positions), and democratic equality (preparation for self-governance in a democratic society). And that a fourth purpose has emerged: social justice (emancipation of the oppressed). Another, perhaps fifth, purpose that I neglected to point out is: preparation for college.
Certainly, preparation for college can be tied to, and overlap with, the purposes of social mobility and social efficiency and, consequently, social justice. Some universities have stepped in to fill the gap in civic literacy, meaning democratic equality has become a purpose (or, as some argue, has always been a purpose) of higher education, extending from K-12.
Although there is overlap with the other purposes of K-12 education, the intense focus on preparing students for post-secondary education has become a purpose that stands separate from the others. Some districts and charter school networks go so far as to classify their students by their college graduation year, not their high school graduation year. For example, "the class of 2028" are the group of students who will graduate from college in 2028. And this mantra starts in elementary school.
I understand that schools want to signal to their students that a college degree is possible for them (whether all students are well-suited for college is beside the point or, more often, never acknowledged), especially students who don't have family members who have gone to college. However, instead of "this is possible for you," the message becomes: you must go to college if you want to get a good job. Thus, when students step onto campus they assume that what they do there will result in not just a job, but a well-paying job.
The cost of a four-year degree is outrageous, and who ought to pay for it is a legitimate question. But when the worth of a college degree boils down to whether a graduate can get a job that matches the subject-matter tied to their degree, developing one's mind, pursuing the truth, and understanding the world, past and present, which were once held up as the purposes of the institution, are no longer the focus. Therefore, colleges and universities that direct their energy toward issuing professional degrees are training, not educating, their students.