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Tuesday, August 22nd, 2023

What Just Happened at West Virginia University Should Worry All of Us

Author:     Leif Weatherby
Source:     The New York Times
Publication Date:     Aug. 20, 2023
 Link: What Just Happened at West Virginia University Should Worry All of Us
Stephan:  

A few says ago Arkansas Republican Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders gutted the educational system of her state. She followed up the equally repulsive Gregg Abbott in Texas, and Ron DeSantis in Florida. But this is the worst one yet. I do not understand why Red state Americans don’t seem to understand that the education of their children is being degraded to the point where it is more about indoctrinating docile peasants willing to work as they’re told, than educating children to best equip them for their future. Basically, the Republican Party is doing what they do in North Korea. You would think this would become a national priority issue, but Red state Americans just don’t seem to get it. Or, maybe if they do, they just don’t care. Either way the quality of wellbeing in Republican controlled states is deteriorating day by day.

Illustration by Shoshana Schultz / The New York Times

In proposing last week to eliminate 169 faculty positions and cut more than 30 degree programs from its flagship university, West Virginia, the state with the fourth-highest poverty rate in the country, is engaging in a kind of educational gerrymandering. If you’re a West Virginian with plans to attend West Virginia University, be prepared to find yourself cut out of much of the best education that the school has traditionally offered, and many of the most basic parts of the education offered by comparable universities.

The planned cuts include the school’s program of world languages and literatures, along with graduate programs in mathematics and other degrees across the arts and pre-professional programs. The university is deciding, in effect, that certain citizens don’t get access to a liberal arts education.

Sadly, this is not just a local story. Politicians and state officials, often with the help of management consultants, are making liberal arts education scarce in some of the poorest states in the union. This trend, 

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1 Comment

  1. Albus Eddie on Tuesday, August 22, 2023 at 9:30 am

    Sadly, it appears that the only accountability that the proponents of these types of short sighted changes will understand is the law of natural consequences. The results will be painful, and may take years to kick in, but the effects will be dispositive: poorer economic performance, a fleeing of the best and the brightest, and a downgraded future. this will be in contrast to those States who have invested in education. The bright side is as the populations effected increasingly lose control of their future prospects there will be motivation for change. The only question will be: will the leaders who arise in these communities be willing to resolve any ambivalence toward change in a positive direction?