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Comment by nradov | Hacker News Reader

"Peak College" has passed. The first and second tier colleges will still do fine but many of the third tier colleges are doomed. They'll have to reinvent themselves as trade schools or corporate training centers or something if they want to survive. The job market for tenure track professors will get even tougher.

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Maybe third tier colleges can start rebranding and advertising the “Animal House Experience”

It’ll be impossible to replicate the college experience without some kind of shared stressor like classes and exams. It’s the same deal in military training where collective suffering is used to instill a sense of camaraderie amongst recruits from various places and backgrounds.

I never felt that, we spent a lot more time partying than stressing about exams.

I have not really made lifetime friends there either but I'm not a team player. If I were in the military everyone would hate me (like they did when I was forced to play team sports at school).

This probably depends on what you mean by college experience. I think I was to fucked up the whole time to be stressed by classes. Until I got kicked out.

We really need to have alternate institutions that perform the same social function. It's too bad secret societies with mystic rites don't really exist anymore.

> secret societies

Maybe they got better at being secret

I think the freemasons are still around. Kinda awesome that it shares continuity with the freemasonry of some prominent figures, like Washington. Can't imagine joining now without it feeling like a massive larp, though.

It was always a massive larp. If you try to join they will tell you what they do is re-enacting certain "moral plays".

Does that make it function any less effectively?

> It's too bad secret societies with mystic rites don't really exist anymore.

They were, overall, strictly harmful. Yes, there is a point where it feels good to be in them. However, they are designed for abuse, for making it difficult to leave and for making it easy to pressure members to participate on harmful acts.

The stuff Epstien did and connection he had is the modern equivalent of that. A group of powerful people tied together due to shared infraction and shared need to protect each other. It worked well for them, helped their careers, made them have social connections and friends.

I am reminded of the quote “Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect.”

Hasn't that experience been long over? Recent generations are much tamer.

I like it, but can you imagine the liability issues with that business plan?

Why do we think trade schools will fare any better?

The USA is going to have to reindustrialize whether we want to or not. Someone needs to train the workers.

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