[Slyfox]

I have been doing research on the early American colleges. The ones our Founders graduated from. Like Harvard.

They started out as essentially Bible colleges, but within two generations they became full liberal art institutions awarding only one degree and that was in philosophy. In order to be admitted you had to have a reading knowledge of Greek and a working knowledge of Latin. Your capstone class was moral philosophy (which is the study of ethics, virtue and vice) and on graduation day you were expected to debate your professor in Latin in front of your entire graduating class.

Half of our Founders graduated from a colonial college. The other half, like Benjamin Franklin, desired to go to college but was unable to do so. Our Constitution could have been written and debated in Latin.

Far cry from a bachelors at Harvard today. They would be absolutely appalled at this bribery case.

[Alberta's Child]

They would be absolutely appalled at this bribery case.

I think they'd be more appalled that people would actually pay $300,000+ bribes to get their kids into such mediocre institutions.

[wastoute]

IIRC our founders felt there were only two professions that required real education. Preachers and Lawyers. How I wish they had given that just a little more thought.

[JoeFromSidney]

Regarding languages. I went to a liberal arts college and majored in physics. I was required to study a foreign language. I chose French because so much of the scientific literature is written in French. Only once in my life did I actually read a scientific paper written FRench. Conversely, I have lived I both Thailand and Turkey. In each case I learned enough of the local language that I could read a newspaper. You never know whether l:earning a foreign language in college will be worth the effort.