https://caspercollege.cvlcollections.org/files/original/47f740b684322b2b7479c3b22f91830e.pdf 54f7e7239dfcdb58e82f51104c48e28c PDF Text Text EDUCATION Ivory Tower Blues: A University System in Crisis, by James E. Cote and Anton L. Allahar. Toronto, CA: University of Toronto Press, 2007. 251pp. $60.00 doth. ISBN: 0802091814. Chad Hanson Casper College chanson@caspercollege.edu Authors Cote and Allahar suffer from a case of the blues, although they also stand upon Contemporary Sociology 37, 3 �280 Education summits of personal achievement. Both au­ thors are professors of sociology at the Uni­ versity of Western Ontario. They enjoy social and economic privileges only dreamed about by most of the world’s inhabitants. Yet, in the course of their work they are forced to per­ form the most unpleasant of tasks—they teach undergraduates. Ivory Tower Blues is a treatise on the trou­ bles associated with widespread access to post-secondary schools. According to Cote and Allahar, the root of the crisis lies in the level of emphasis placed on baccalaureate education in nations such as the U.S. and Canada. Gone are the days when crafts­ people apprenticed their way to appropriate stations in society. Here in the twenty-first century, people from all walks of life are finding their way to the doors of universities, and for these authors, therein lies the prob­ lem. In sections of the book titled, “The student as reluctant intellectual,” and “Learning to live with student disengagement,” Cote and Allahar document their displeasure with the students they face in their classrooms. They use anecdotes to make the case for the idea that their pupils are ill-prepared for academ­ ic work, and they also reference U.S.-based studies of student engagement to bolster ±e claim that undergraduates are not making the most of the university experience. The picture of ill-prepared and disen­ gaged students will seem familiar to teachers. Complaints of student indifference are a part of everyday life on our campuses. Even so, I doubt if a generation has ever entered mid­ life or old age without looking down upon young people with some level of antipathy. In Ivory Tower Blues, readers will find long ruminations on the dismal state of North American youth, but I could not help notic­ ing the book is missing a discussion of teach­ ing methods or the dynamics of the class­ room. When presented with underprepared or disengaged students, good teachers take stock of their pupil’s needs, they listen care­ fully to their interests, and they devise new strategies to fill in where old tactics fail. Cote and Allahar mention none of the above. Instead, ±e authors yearn for the "hard-sorting” systems characteristic of Euro­ pean nations, systems that limit opportunities for students that fall short on standardized aptitude tests. The line of reason gives the Contemporary Sociology 37, 3 impression that university faculty presuppose that their skills are wasted on large numbers of undergraduates, and thus most chapters read like tired cases of ivory tower egotism. Furthermore, when you consider the author’s “crisis” in the context of other institutions, the problem and its potential solution turn dis­ tasteful. For example, in the field of medicine, what would happen if physicians decided their skills were too valuable to waste on pa­ tients with serious illnesses? With respect to the law, what if counselors limited their cas­ es to merely those that present a minimal set of challenges? In Ivory Tower Blues, Cote and Allahar suggest as much for educators. De­ spite a closing chapter replete with platitudes extolling the virtue and necessity of liberal arts education and the formation of wellrounded citizens, the book’s central thesis hovers close to the notion that loo many stu­ dents earn bachelor’s degrees, and on that I point I could not disagree more. In the minds of a growing number of higher education scholars, a consensus is forming around the thought that public edu­ cation ought to be extended to include levels K-16. That said, Cot^ and Allahar are proba­ bly right to point out that universities are not good places to pursue the last four years of a K-16 education. The authors stop short of is­ suing policy statements, but the tenor and logic of the book lead one to believe that un­ dergraduates should be directed to other in­ stitutions—colleges, perhaps. Colleges have the luxury of hiring generalists with back­ grounds in the study of leaching methods, as opposed to technicians trained in narrow sub-fields of disciplines. Technicians with limited pedagogical skills should not be forced to educate under­ graduates, in particular those in need of inspirational teachers. Although Cot^ and Allahar make no mention of their teaching methods, astute readers can draw their own conclusions, given that the authors’ experi­ ence in the classroom has resulted in a perennial case of the blues. Ironically, if you like students and care about the quality of baccalaureate education, you will see red if you decide to read this book. � Text A resource consisting primarily of words for reading. Examples include books, letters, dissertations, poems, newspapers, articles, archives of mailing lists. Note that facsimiles or images of texts are still of the genre Text. Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. 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Chad Hanson Journal Publications, CCA 04.ii.e.2025.01 WyCaC US. Casper College Archives and Special Collections. Identifier An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context CCA 04.ii.e.2025.01_ChadHansonPapers_69 Format The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource Searchable PDF Publisher An entity responsible for making the resource available <em>Contemporary Sociology: A Journal of Reviews</em> is published by Sage Publishing