The answer to “What’s the purpose of college?” is longer than the 280 characters Twitter allows per tweet. But you can at least start a conversation in that amount of space.

Such a conversation was started last week when Sen. Bart Hester, R-Cave Springs, tweeted a picture of a University of Arkansas at Little Rock billboard featuring a dance major. He commented that higher education doesn’t need extra funding if this is how it would be spent. Instead of dance, the university should be encouraging computer science degrees and math teachers, he wrote.

The tweet drew a response from Savvy Shields. If you don’t recognize her name, you certainly recognize the title: Miss America 2017, and before that, Miss Arkansas. The art major disagreed, arguing that the arts can inspire people and change society. Rep. Bob Ballinger, R-Berryville, tweeted in support of Hester’s position, and then there was a minor social media firestorm that since has been forgotten.

College: Job skills or life skills?

Now that the Twitter argument has slipped into the recesses of cyberspace, the question remains: “What’s the purpose of college?”

You could answer, “primarily, to prepare students for a job.” That’s really what Hester and Ballinger were saying. There’s a great need for computer scientists and math teachers, but the job opportunities available to dance majors are scarce. Unfortunately, there’s often a disconnect between real-world jobs that earn a living and that benefit Arkansas, and the majors that students are selecting because they like them. A university education is subsidized by the state, and it’s not cheap for the students, either. Therefore, universities have a responsibility to produce graduates who can create a return on the taxpayers’ investment while earning a living and paying off their student debt.

Others, including Shields, would say, “to prepare students for life, which includes their job.” They’d argue that even if dance majors don’t dance professionally or teach, they learn lifetime skills while pursuing their passion. Dance majors can develop thinking processes and habits that will help them to succeed, professionally and otherwise, better than if they were just programmed into a slot. Many of us in our 40s work in jobs unrelated to the majors we selected at age 18. Moreover, the arts produce a more creative society with a greater appreciation for beauty. After all, we want America to be more than a collection of 300 million economic units.

By the way, I just gave each side 109 words exactly. How’s that for fair and balanced?

Obviously, college to some degree should prepare students for both a job and for life. Hester, Ballinger or Shields wouldn’t disagree about that. The only disagreement would be how much weight should be placed on each side of the scale.

Preparation = completion

Unfortunately, if preparation involves completion, they are doing an inadequate job. According to The Chronicle of Higher Education, less than 21 percent of bachelor’s degree-seeking students in Arkansas in 2013 graduated in four years, while less than 40 percent will graduate in six years – which means they’ll probably never graduate. Those numbers are far below the national averages of 33 percent in four years and 58 percent in six years.

That means neither students nor the taxpayers are getting their money’s worth. Instead, the students are dropping out with a lot of debt and little to show for it besides maybe some experiences – some of them not worthwhile. If I may allow my inner grumpy old man to surface, I’ll pay taxes to help students get an education, but not so they can party and then flunk out.

The good news is, in the past few years, the funding formula for Arkansas’ college institutions has been reworked to incentivize degree completion. The change was initiated by Gov. Hutchinson’s administration but accepted, and to some degree embraced, by the schools. It gives extra points for students in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) majors and in other high-demand fields, which is what Hester was talking about. But it also incentivizes the schools to help the dance majors graduate, too.

Previously, the formula was based simply on the number of students enrolled.

Another positive development in recent years has been the rise of online courses. They’ve made college accessible to older, nontraditional students who can’t move to a college town.

One reform I’d like to see become more common: the three-year degree.

That discussion also would take more than 280 characters. Unfortunately, newspapers  have limited space, too, and I’m out of mine.

By Steve Brawner

© 2018 by Steve Brawner Communications, Inc.

Is your organization looking for a speaker to talk about what’s happening in state or national politics? Steve Brawner is a syndicated columnist who appears in 10 newspapers and is a regular guest on AETN’s “Arkansas Week.” He’s cheap but not free.