Summary: The Imperiled Promise Of College By Frank Bruni

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In Frank Bruni’s New York Time’s article, “The Imperiled Promise of College,” he argues that college is no longer a guarantee of success because students are not being properly motivated and guided into the programs that will provide them with jobs. Bruni begins by describing the golden promise of college as it appeared for baby boomers. In that time getting into college and completing a degree was enough to be successful. He acknowledges that this idealized vision of college may be inaccurate, however, he asserts that the issue is far more “complicated” than it once was. Bruni makes use of a recent (2012) debate over student loan interest rates in the U.S. to explore the issues surrounding college education today. While rising student debt is certainly part of the problem he suggests that the issue extends beyond that. College is now a “luxury item with newly uncertain returns” (Bruni). While rising costs make college a luxury item that not everyone will be able to afford, even those who can and do manage to go to college are not guaranteed success. The real problem, according to Bruni, is that a college education is now far less likely to result in gainful employment. While statistics suggest that the rate of unemployment for college graduates is far better than for those with only a high school education, Bruni argues that these statistics …show more content…

However, his argument that the most employable degrees are those in science and math is poor. If his argument was as compelling as he seems to think it is then he should be able to cite a source for his assertion more directly. Instead, he uses several roundabout arguments to convince the reader. Furthermore, his argument that we should incentivize these programs relies on the assumption that college should, primarily, result in employment. This involves very clear assumptions regarding what the value of an education

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