Covering all types of schools, from large state universities to small private colleges, the author of Where the Buffalo Roam provides an intense look at how America's higher educational institutions are reinventing themselves. 20,000 first printing.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
Anne Matthews is a memorable campus tour guide. In Bright College Years she leads her reader into the privileged recesses of dorm rooms, classrooms, and faculty offices, later flopping down to hang out in the quad. As she wanders through Ivy League hallways and across middle American university campuses, Matthews creates a comprehensive portrait of the complex world of academia as it reinvents itself to suit society's interests on the verge of the millenium. Matthews explores issues related to the literary canon and political correctness and faculty-student relations. Matthews is a university insider (she was raised on the campus of the University of Wisconsin and now teaches at New York University), and this gives her the ability to convey her ideas with depth and clarity. Instead of espousing a particular viewpoint, Matthews chooses to provoke the reader by holding a mirror to the face of the nation's colleges and universities and pursuing the fundamental question that's reflected: what is going on in higher education today and what is it all for?
From Publishers Weekly
It would be hard to avoid concluding from this impressionistic report that learning and the life of the mind are all but irrelevant these days to the big business known as higher education, especially among pre-laws and premeds, who are highly competitive but "not very interested in ideas." Matthews, who teaches journalism at New York University, spent four years compiling the data for her book, interviewing more than 400 people at campuses across the country. Her observations are perceptive, and she doesn't miss the financial ironies of universities such as Vanderbilt, where students' allowances are often greater than faculty salaries. Interesting facts and observations abound here. Although getting into the Ivy League is as difficult as ever, the author reports, "95 percent of American colleges are not at all selective." We also learn that one-fourth of all college students major in business, 85% of undergraduates live on campus only for their first year and "nearly half of all American college students now qualify as binge drinkers." The author's anecdotal account generally sounds on target except for the occasional sweeping generalization, e.g., that male alums donate to preserve their alma mater and females donate to change it.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
As good a description of college life as you'll find,
By A Customer
This review is from: Bright College Years: Inside the American Campus Today (Hardcover)
This is a well written account of contemporary college life that is a breeze to read. It is one of the better books on higher education written in the last decade, and at least one to two notches above insider books by college deans and presidents like Rosovsky and Kennedy. It's strange to me that parents and prospective college students plunk down so much money for college and don't read books like this. It would extremely beneficial to them if they did.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Light-hearted but literate,
By A Customer
This review is from: Bright College Years: Inside the American Campus Today (Hardcover)
Bright College Years is one of the few books that caused me to laugh and cry simultaneously. Anne Matthews writes wonderfully, showing emotional brilliance both light-hearted and literate.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
great read,
By A Customer
This review is from: Bright College Years: Inside the American Campus Today (Hardcover)
Easy read with a bunch of insightful and funny comments; it was so delightful that I finished it in 4 hours without putting it down once. What I missed were solutions or answers to the increasing violence and substance abuse in American campuses today, but if the answers were that clear, we wouldn't be discussing them, would we?
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