Sign of the Times?

by Jerome

Following the trend of news stories announcing philosophy majors disappearing or whole departments closing down, the headline on the Huffington Post this morning says that "Many College Students Failing to Learn Critical Thinking Skills." Yet the article blames students' social habits and lower expectations on the part of educators, making no mention of the absence of logic or critical thinking courses (considered an essential pre-requisite to eduction by medieval thinkers).

Is the problem the fault of individuals or institutions? Or is part of a larger problem, like the commodification of education, or a necessary side effect of the shift of our epistemic medium from a written culture to one that is visual and transitory?

What do you think?