I intend to join the MSA, and maybe the philosophy society, but it’s really quite concerning how much money and focus so many universities in this country put on sports, clubs and societies, activism, and things besides being trained and educated in whatever subject the student is studying. In other countries, there are athletics and extra-curricular activities, but they’re usually as important to school life as chess club is at American universities.
My brother goes to university in the UK, and he said that the only thing that comes close to the importance of football in the US is the National Union of Students chapter, which is essentially a trade union for students that organizes on the basis of tuition fees and other issues that affect students?
That seems a lot more relevant than fraternities and sororities and sports and all of the other things that American univerisities focus an excessive amount of attention on and an obscene amount of the students’ tuition fees on maintaining.
To add: “if you aren’t interested, don’t participate” isn’t really a valid response, because some percentage of the tens of thousands of dollars in fees that students who don’t participate, or even live on campus (like myself) pay to attend goes to funding those activities in some manner, from paying coaches’ salaries to maintaining football stadiums to paying out settlements after the school is sued for something happening at a fraternity party.
Not sure why activism is lumped in with the rest of your list. Trying to improve the community or world is surely a noble pursuit.
As the officer of a club on the same level as chess club – it costs nothing. We make no money and use no money. The only thing the university gives us is a classroom to meet in.
it’s because we aren’t mindless robots programmed with the single purpose of taking exams. If the purpose of getting an education is to gain employment for a wage, what do you think we want to spend that wage on? more education?
If you disagree philisophically with how your school chooses to spend its money, why not transfer to one that’s a better fit? Community colleges generally don’t have a lot of money to fund a bunch of ECs. There are probably some state schools that don’t have many activities to offer either. If you look, you’ll probably find something.