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University should be about learning, not just finding a job

The hidden price tag of learning a second language

By: Kayla Morin
The Concordian

MONTREAL (CUP) — Why are

we here? It’s a question we all have
to deal with — not only as human
beings on this planet, but also as
university students. Some of us are
passionate about learning, some of us
want to get an excellent paying job
when we graduate, and some of us are
here because our parents said so. But
these reasons don’t share a common
goal; a clearly defined purpose for
attending university is seriously
lacking.

In the past, universities were
places of intense study. Upper-class
families with enough money in the
bank sent their most studious children
to learn at a higher level of education.
Students read books, compared and
contrasted different experts’ ideas and
eventually, if they became experts
in their field of study, a student
could compile their own ideas into
academic papers that would get
published and included in the ongoing

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cycle of academic discussion.

The whole point of stepping on
campus was the study of knowledge.
The traditional view towards
university has changed as more and
more people have access to higher

education, and more and more
subjects offered at universities train
you to do rather than to think.

The reality is, if you want to
make a solid middle-class living
for yourself, you had better have a
framed bachelor’s degree hanging in
your living room. Most jobs that pay
over minimum wage demand it.

Back in the day, people who
wanted to acquire a practical vocation
did not usually attend university,
nor were they necessarily expected
to. Nowadays you can go into film
production, journalism, applied
human sciences and more, not to
mention community colleges that
train cooks, nurses and mechanics in
as little as two years.

These programs are a wonderful
way to get qualifications for a job, but
developing your mind seems to have
become something to do in your free

time. There’s this ballooning pressure
to figure out what you want to do
with the rest of your life before you
turn 20. And it’s a problem.

Tuition fees are sneaking higher
every year and students are under
pressure to study something and study
it fast. This has resulted in a larger
focus being placed on the practicality
of any given field of study. What
were you going to do with an English
literature degree anyway, become
a teacher? Go into education! And
forget about that philosophy minor.

One could almost say that
university is no longer a place to learn
and shape one’s ideas but rather a
factory that produces capable workers
to continue fuelling the capitalist
machine. At least, that’s where we
are headed unless we do something
about it.

Philosopher Dean William Ralph
Inge said, “The aim of education
is the knowledge not of fact, but of
values.”

As the future leaders of the
world, or at least Canada, we need
to make sure we are learning how

   

  

to live, think critically and actually
understand our fields of study, not

just how to make money and feed the

system.

Students should be able to
study in any subject for several
years without graduating homeless
and without scary debt in their back
pocket. This is how we can support
new ideas about the way we want to
structure society instead of learning
ways to survive in how it is structured
now.

We need to take on the
responsibility of fighting tuition
increases and pressure our
universities to do the same. A
university should have its students’
best interests at heart: the pursuit of
knowledge and self-discovery rather
than the pursuit of dollars.

Only through engaging in the
debate of what university should be
about can we impact the future in a
positive way, and maybe decide what
we want to be when we grow up
along the way.