<p>Andrew Abbott in his hypothetical experiment posed an interesting alternative to the typical four year college curriculum, perhaps some one will try it.</p>
<p>"Our belief that college education has cognitive importance rests pretty completely on our belief that we can statistically solve the problems of selection bias and unmeasured variables, because the only nonstatistical way of handling them is controlled experiment. No one has ever taken 1,000 bright, ambitious young people and sent them not to college but to another, equally challenging, intellectual environment that did not involve classroom instruction, courses, or curricula. Suppose you could spend the next four years going through a structured rotation of working internships in businesses, not-for-profits, and government agencies, where you would be left to pick up skills the same way everybody else there does: by asking friends and coworkers what to do, by reading a manual, or by going to some organizationally sponsored classes on particular necessary techniques. You might still live in dormitories. You might still have an extracurricular life. But there would be no classroom instruction. I submit that in all but a few areas—the hard sciences and perhaps engineering— you would be every bit as ready for law school or business school or management consultancy or social-work training as you will be after your four years in classrooms… "</p>
<p>In the same article he goes on to suggest that there is little evidence for arguing that college provides much in thinking skills beyond what is learned in high school, prepares one for a particular occupation, or provides a vehicle for cultural transmission. He basically says that the aim of education is to be educated and experience being educated, other than that there is little evidence as to its value, particularly at “elite” universities.</p>
<p><a href=“http://magazine.uchicago.edu/0310/features/zen.shtml[/url]”>http://magazine.uchicago.edu/0310/features/zen.shtml</a></p>