Excellent Sheep

May 5, 2014
The kids are all wrong—especially the superachievers at the nation’s top universities—according to this stinging indictment of American higher education. Culture critic Deresiewicz (A Jane Austen Education) expands his notorious American Scholar essay into a jeremiad against elite colleges, the Ivy League and, in particular, Yale, where he taught English. Students, he argues, are “smart and talented and driven... but also anxious, timid, and lost”; narcissistic helicopter parents—Tiger-Mom Amy Chua gets lambasted—pressure them to trade fulfillment for money and status. According to the author, colleges with indifferent teaching and incoherent curricula offer no guidance on intellectual development or character formation; the whole system reinforces a class hierarchy that “equates virtue, dignity, and happiness with material success.” Entwined with his j’accuse is an impassioned, idealistic plea to reclaim the undergraduate years as a journey of self-discovery guided by engaged professors who challenge students to think for themselves instead of following the flock to Wall Street. Deresiewicz’s critique of America’s most celebrated schools as temples of mercenary mediocrity is lucid, sharp-edged, and searching, and if he sometimes too easily dismisses the practical expectations surrounding ruinously expensive degrees, he poses vital questions about what college teaches—and why. Agent: Elyse Cheney, Elyse Cheney Literary Associates.

Starred review from June 1, 2014
It might surprise the countless students competing for admission to Harvard, Yale, and Stanford that they could be fighting for a dubious prize. But in this probing indictment, a former Yale professor accuses America's top universities of turning young people into tunnel-visioned careerists, adept at padding their r'sum's and filling their bank accounts but unprepared to confront life's most important questions. Craven conformity, not free-spirited independence, is what Deresiewicz sees students learning in a campus world populated by hyperspecialized professors who pursue arcane research agendas and leave the teaching of undergraduates to adjuncts and TAs. The time has come, Deresiewicz asserts, for college professors and administrators to make students their first priority by giving them a challenging liberal-arts education. Grounded in the humanities, such an education would give students real intellectual and imaginative breadth, not just a professional credential. Besides pressing for this curricular and pedagogical realignment, Deresiewicz calls for radical reform of admissions policies, so reversing the trends that make the university an enforcer of caste hierarchies. Deresiewicz's controversial full agenda indeed means an end to rule by meritocracy and a beginning of fairness for the working class. An urgent summons to a long-overdue debate over what universities do and how they do it.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)

October 27, 2014
Culture critic Deresiewicz offers a hard-hitting critique of elite education. According to the author, colleges with indifferent teaching and incoherent curricula offer no guidance on intellectual development or character formation; the system reinforces class hierarchy. Reader Foster narrates Deresiewicz’s jeremiad with a deep and engaging voice that commands listeners’ attention and complements the weight of the overall argument. Yet his cadence is natural and manages to capture Deresiewicz’s tone while smoothing over the long passages where the author might otherwise be construed as condescending. A Free Press
hardcover.

June 15, 2014
An extended essay about how elite colleges and universities are failing to serve students and society.Deresiewicz (A Jane Austen Education: How Six Novels Taught Me About Love, Friendship, and the Things that Really Matter, 2012, etc.) received an elite education at Columbia University and taught at both Yale and his alma mater. The author uses his experience to deliver an indictment of top-tier higher education, especially regarding undergraduate students. Deresiewicz does not advocate that intelligent, motivated students eschew a college degree. Instead, he presents a program for how the students, their parents, government officials and the private sector can push college administrators and professors to graduate truly educated citizens. The author is unrelentingly critical of students who attend college just because it is expected or might increase their future incomes. In the author's opinion, most elite college educations are merely extensions of elite high school educations, with students more interested in good grades and resume padding than in finding their true passions. It's likely that the author will reach readers who confirm his dark critique of American higher education, but it's just as likely that the book will find detractors-not only due to its deep pessimism, but also due to the author's selective supporting evidence. When Deresiewicz states that elite colleges "do little or nothing to wake students up from the values and habits they bring with them from high school," he offers little more than weak circumstantial anecdotes. Many of the author's anecdotes are interesting case studies, but even those are often presented only superficially. Deresiewicz's desire for change is admirable, and he is not mistaken about the many problems of higher education. This book has its genesis in an essay published by the American Scholar, an essay the author describes as "cranky." While expanding that essay into a book, the author falls into repetition that might be construed as padding.An unquestionably provocative book that hopefully leads to productive debate.

COPYRIGHT(2014) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.