Co-sign this.

I think it's a fundamental societal failure that we see a lack of degrees as a comment on individuals, rather than on gatekeeping, bureaucratic, unfathomably expensive institutions.

It's a classic systemic problem posting as a personal one. https://twitter.com/gwensnyderPHL/status/1338915170802933760

What is true, IMO, is that degrees are "hard" not bc of merit, but bc they reward ppl who can 1) navigate or tolerate bureaucracies and 2) have no financial demands for 4 or more years.

We should make education accessible + far less time-consuming (4 years for undergrad? Why?)

Additionally, I think it's a myth that degrees confer mastery in all fields. History is marked by centuries of excellent writers and reporters, for instance, who had no degrees but top-notch mastery of language. MFAs and journalism degrees are notoriously full of educational gaps

In most journalism schools, for instance, very little time is spent on 1) ethics or 2) interviewing or 3) sourcing -- the three most important skills for being a good journalist. Students are expected to figure these out on their own; that's a failure IMO.

It would be great if we started moving into a world in which we don't assign prestige automatically to degrees, because that assignment is always going to patriarchal privileged systems that are notoriously hostile to POC, women and untraditional life paths.

I say this as someone who was brought up by parents with multiple degrees and always told that a degree was the only way to survive in the world. As a woman, that's perhaps a little true. But it also meant moving into an understanding of education from a fear-based mindset.

I've seen a lot of (extremely well-intentioned) tweets about how women should brag about their degrees. I get it, but let's not fall into that male trap of suggesting a woman needs to brandish credentials to get respect or credibility.

Men who are disrespectful or diminishing of women do so fundamentally bc you're a *woman*. It's systemic. It's about social hierarchies. Individual degrees do not change that. Additionally, we give a lot of respect and amplification to men who have no standing.

Normalize assuming women know what they're talking about, just the same way we assume men do.

Also normalize knowing that education is a lifelong process that doesn't start or stop with a diploma.

I'd rather take an opinion from someone who keeps reading and learning and growing than from someone sitting on their laurels who perpetuates whatever assumptions they learned in their field 5 or 10 or 20 years ago.

Anyway don't fall into the Joseph Epstein trap of defending your right to be heard and take up space, as a woman. Instead, question why men like Joseph Epstein assume they're the ones making the rules about who gets to be heard. He should be on the defensive, not us.

Also, instead of saying "HEY! I belong in this system," normalize questioning the system and who it benefits and what it costs, and what social incentives it creates. In the US the current educational system - lower and higher - is a failure.