Smash the University: The Future of Study [6-weeks, $200 Suggested]

Instructors: Andrews, Dahiya, Hollis | Tuesdays November 2-December 14 | 9:00-10:30 PM ET (No class November 23)

We begin with a provocation: The university today is antithetical to study.

At its Western inception in the Middle Ages, the university was imagined as a community of scholars. Throughout the 1950s-1970s, the US saw the expansion of state university systems which democratized access to higher education and provided tools for upward mobility. But over the last 50 years, something else has happened. Today, universities are de facto business schools, churning out managers and bureaucrats, while cutting funding to the arts, humanities, and social sciences. Their upper echelons are bloated with overpaid administrators, and exploited adjuncts do the majority of the teaching labor. For most undergraduates today, the primary effect of university education is not a well-rounded knowledge-base or even a well-paying job, but an unpayable debt garnered by soaring tuition costs. How did we get to this point, and what can we do about it? Can the university be saved? Should we burn it to the ground? What are our alternatives? In other words, how and where can we study today?

 Over the course of six weeks, we’ll engage with scholars who offer us the history of the university and analyze its current state. We’ll also look at those who imagine alternatives within and outside of formal higher education. We will read authors such as: Tressie McMillan Cottom, Marc Bousquet, Christopher Newfield, Fred Moten and Stefano Harney, Paolo Freire, June Jordan, Nick Mitchell, bell hooks, and Virginia Woolf. The class will be co-taught by three Night School instructors for whom imagining the future of study is a central concern.

We depend on a mix of direct student donations and supplemental donations to make all classes pay-what-you-can. Please pick the pricing tier that corresponds with your needs and that you are able to pay now. If you would like to pay in installments, make your first payment now and make a note on your check-out form. If you would like to donate more later in the term, you can always come back and use the “Make a One Time Donation” button! To use a full scholarship, just pick the $3 tier to cover site/processor fees. 

If at any point up to 48 hours before your first class session you realize you will be unable to take the class, we will work with you to reallocate your funds to a future class, to another student’s scholarship, or refund it. After classes begin, we are only able to make partial refunds and adjustments.