[Loughla]

Academia being viewed as a profit center and 'jobs skills' training center is just killing my spirit. Those dusty old PhD's who get to study one species of butterfly for decades are important because of the knowledge they create, not the jobs they create.

It's super frustrating to work in higher education right now because the focus of every student is 'what job can this get me'.

Maybe I'm just old. Maybe I'm just burnt out. Who knows.

[wly_cdgr]

I sympathize, but if your students stop focusing on that, how do you propose they pay rent after graduation? Working retail? Bartending? Commuting ten hours a week to adjunct at three local community colleges? None of those options exactly leave a lot of time or energy for fundamental research

You can't just handwaive or long-sigh this away...you have to have concrete, realistic, and actionable answers to these questions....otherwise you are literally just complaining about children wanting to survive

[lovelyviking]

>Maybe I'm just old. Maybe I'm just burnt out. Who knows.

or may be some just have lost their sight about what is really important and why academia exists in the first place.