Bad Philosophy

How did you feel about the staff at your university when they enforced policy? When they told you that something wasn’t in your best interest? When they offered to help you through tough times? It’s been a while since we’ve visited the subject of Higher Education, and we’ve perhaps never approached it from quite the same vector as this episode. Student Affairs veteran and resident synesthete Shawn Brackett joins me and Kevin for an insider’s look at institutionalized paternalist / maternalist practices in public universities, historical precedents for them, and some questions around the ethics of their implementation. So settle in for some free pizza, free condoms, and free thought in this week’s BF.

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adulthood, alcohol, Alexander Graham-Bell, Arthur Chickering, autonomy, bachelor’s degree, childhood, drugs, economics, education, Fermat’s Last Theorem, high school, higher education, in loco parentis, Kevin, maternalism, paternalism, Reed College, sex, sex education, Stephen, student affairs, Texas Tech University, The Purge, The Simpsons, University of California System