Over the past decade or more, we have seen and heard a lot of duplicitous rhetoric about rhetoric: we have heard politicians speak about the importance of education as they cut the budget and increase class size and slash the jobs of teachers, librarians, social workers, and others. We have learned to live with cognitive dissonance as our “thought leaders” say one thing but mean something else, often the opposite..

Now it is happening to higher education. We hear that U.S. higher education is the best in the world, but the state and federal governments are demanding cuts that will affect the quality of education.

Timothy Pratt writes that “We Are Creating Walmarts of Higher Education.”

He writes:

“Universities in South Dakota, Nebraska, and other states have cut the number of credits students need to graduate. A proposal in Florida would let online courses forgo the usual higher-education accreditation process…