There’s nothing evil or unnatural about a bubble or about the people who participate in one. Bubbles are an inevitable part of human nature and appear in almost every field of endeavor. When bubbles burst, it’s painful – but the sources of the pain lie not so much in the bust as in the poor decisions made during the preceding boom. Resources were allocated in ways that didn’t make sense, because the bubble made them seem to make sense for a while. The consequences of that misallocation account for the pain.
And it’s not the end of the world when a bubble bursts, either. When the tech bubble burst, people lost money (some people lost a lot of money) and some people lost jobs, but the Internet didn’t go away, and neither did Internet businesses. Likewise, the bursting of the higher education bubble won’t mean the end of higher education. It’ll just mean that there will be less “dumb money” out there to be harvested.
But inevitably, change will come, and that’s not so bad. This is the 21st century. It’s not shocking to think that higher education will go through major changes over the coming decade or two. What would be shocking would be if things stayed the same, when rapid change has been the norm lately in every other knowledge-based industry.
I don’t pretend to know how it will all work out, but I hope the thoughts in this Broadside have been useful to readers, and I encourage you to join in the conversation in the years to come.