"My readers ask me that question more than just about any other. So here's my question back: What is school for? (Click the link to get to the free download).

I've just published a 30,000 word manifesto, totally free to read, share, translate, print and, most of all, use to start an essential conversation. It took a lot to get it to you, and I'm encouraging you to take a few minutes to check it out. After you read it, perhaps you'll write one of your own."

"In their recent book Economic Anthropology, Chris Hann and Keith Hart write about one of their main goals:  “We hope to persuade economists with real world concerns to take an interest in what anthropologists have discovered about the human economy, and in the kinds of theories we have advanced to understand it” (Hann and Hart 2011:9).  However, they also make this point quite clear: “There is not much hope for dialogue with those who define economics exclusively as the application of an individualistic logic of utility maximization to all domains of social life” (Hann and Hart 2011:9).  Ultimately, they say, “The project of economics needs to be rescued from the economists” (Hann and Hart 2011:162)."

"…For all its pretensions to public importance (every professor secretly thinks he’s a public intellectual), the professoriate is awfully quiet, essentially nonexistent as a collective voice. If academia is going to once again become a decent place to work, if our best young minds are going to be attracted back to the profession, if higher education is going to be reclaimed as part of the American promise, if teaching and research are going to make the country strong again, then professors need to get off their backsides and organize: department by department, institution to institution, state by state and across the nation as a whole. Tenured professors enjoy the strongest speech protections in society. It’s time they started using them."

Until any of this becomes commonplace, it is up to prospective graduate students to enter a science PhD with their eyes open to the opportunities — or lack of them — at the end. Not all mushrooms grow best in the dark.

"Is it any wonder that the value of a college education is now being questioned more than it used to be? Perhaps a basic education in personal finance would help more people make informed decisions about college and how to handle the financing of that endeavor."

"The economy has started creating jobs—albeit at a slow rate—in recent months. But those with new master's degrees often aren't at the front of the line to get them, say experts. One reason: They frequently compete for jobs that require those advanced degrees with older workers who have the advantage of more work experience."

"Documentation also fails when people are so intimidated that they're afraid to sign anything. I can't tell you -- literally -- how many conversations I've had with faculty or staff in which someone makes serious complaints about somebody else's conduct, but refuses to write any of it down. They don't want to get "dragged into anything." From my perspective, this is worse than useless. I "know," but I don't. I don't have anything that the accused could even rebut. And the one who told me often walks away thinking that my lack of follow-through is a sign of a sinister agenda, rather than of a basic epistemological flaw. ("The Administration knows about it, but doesn't do anything.") I can't take anyone to task based on hearsay."

"The students were aware that they’re stepping into an uncertain world but they didn’t seem to grasp the finer points of the media business. Looking at the journalism department’s website later, I could see why. The curriculum lists 29 courses in the journalism program, and not a single one is about the economics of publishing or how to sustain a career as a journalist.

This university is failing it students. I suspect that so are a lot of others."

"How can we control quality on the Internet?"

"The point is that there was indeed a huge CA bubble in the 80s, which burst painfully. Nor was this an obscure bit of knowledge: in fact, people like Calculated Risk and yours truly were quite explicitly using the great California bubble of the 80s as a model for what was going to happen nationally.

This whole episode makes me think considerably worse of my former department head."