Subject: Re: Higher Education: The Mission Is Money
At the University of Arizona, it was reported in the "Wildcat" (school paper) that the 'new' president of the university had said the university would run much better without students. There was something of an uproar. I was a grad student at the time. As a grad student, I was valued. The professors needed assistants to do their research. So we received good training. I don't think I would have wanted to be an undergrad there.

But I digress. The mission of a lot of universities today is grants. Even in the early 90s, it was grants. My favorite professor had tenure, and loved to teach. But he was always being hassled by the administration because he brought in near the minimum funding acceptable. Which is how I learned that it's not only "publish or perish", and also "bring in money".

That's not to say the universities do not have value. They do. They broaden peoples' experiences, and there is an education to be had if you are willing to take it. (If you don't take it, they don't care. It's on you whether you do the work or not.) You're exposed to different ideas, different people from different cultures, and (at least at that time), those ideas were not stifled. If they were good or bad, they were on display for you to see and ponder and make up your own mind.

I was unaware of any discrimination regarding women (two of the ~10 physics grad students were women...we all had the same required classes, and so we were pretty much the same group in every class). I think that disparity of women to men was mostly because for a variety of reasons, women tend not to go into physics. Or at least at that time they didn't. OTOH, I wouldn't be surprised if such discrimination still occurs. Admissions is a weird thing, with "legacy" priority and such. It's not always clear who's making the decisions...maybe a bunch of white-haired old men?