I found a Slate article that provides some entertaining commentary on this article:

"None of this is to say that we shouldn’t attempt to bridge socioeconomic and racial divides, or that we shouldn’t give more money to our struggling public colleges. But it’s unclear why we should expect undergraduate education to produce seismic shifts in perspective that Deresiewicz claims life itself largely cannot. “College is not the only chance to learn to think, but it is the best,” he writes. “One thing is certain: If you haven’t started by the time you finish your B.A., there’s little likelihood you’ll do it later.”

This is perhaps the most terrifying sentence about higher education ever committed to print, one that feeds into the anxious, competitive mindset that Deresiewicz decries. Every ambitious student who believes that college is their opportunity to shape themselves will do whatever it takes to get into the very best, most exclusive school they can. When their experiences underwhelm, as many necessarily will, they will indeed leave college “anxious, timid, and lost,” believing that they’ve missed out on a chance at intellectual development. Deresiewicz has simply traded careerism for another exalted goal, with similar results."

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/..._misguided_belief_that_universities.html

As I have said before, I wasn't sure what the point of college was or why I was there.

However, I did learn a lot while I was there. Granted much of it related to mysticism, religious fundamentalism, general criminality (in conjunction with sociopathic behaviors), and severe mental illness.

Had it not been for my college experience, I doubt that I would be to deal with the mentally ill on a day to day basis as I currently do.

Last edited by JonLaw; 07/23/14 09:57 AM. Reason: Adding link to slate article