I don’t often agree with the ACTA (American Council of Trustees and Alumni); in fact, to my way of thinking they are one of the best barometers of reactionary thinking in education. But I do agree with at least part of their December “Must Reads” (“Letting in the Sunshine“), in which the ACTA pays the Arkansas legislature a half-compliment.

It’s a good idea, the ACTA says, for universities to be completely transparent when it comes to administrative salaries; the legislature got that right. But the law is only necessary, they say, because the universities themselves haven’t stepped up to the plate. It’s the idea of a law that the ACTA finds so unnecessary. I think that the law is exactly the point, though.

In effect, the “Must Read” is a thinly veiled warning: either we (administrations) deal with the rising (or perhaps coming) public anger at the exploding costs of college in general, and the wildly inflated salaries of certain high level administrators in particular, or we will face increased regulation. The worry, of course, is that the legal regulations will limit administrative “flexibility.”

In the short term, in other words, universities need to deal with the public by going public. In the long term, this will help ensure that they can do whatever they want once the outcry subsides. That’s exactly why Sunshine laws that require public institutions make all salaries public are so important. We need more than superficial changes that allow administrators to get by. We need laws.

Anarchy– the Federal system– has served the U.S. education system well, helping to create a kind of hybrid vigor often squashed by centralized authority. On the other hand, it also makes the system vulnerable to certain kinds of economic and social pressures. Professionally, too, the lack of a strong labor movement in U.S. higher education means teachers don’t have much leverage when it comes to resisting or shaping change. In that sense, anarchy stifles innovation by sewing chaos.

That’s why I find discussions of ‘relevancy’ and, more specifically, ‘vocation’ both frustrating and depressing. Whatever creative energy schools direct at creating more effective curricula, it won’t likely be teachers defining relevancy. It’s more likely that the financial crisis will simply allow administrators to pursue their own ‘shovel ready’ agendas. In many places that means minimizing or eliminating those pesky liberals arts (aka Philosophy). Writing won’t suffer, but Literary Studies watch out.

That’s what’s bubbling along in the back of my brain when I read “Making College Relevant” this weekend. I think relevancy is important– the last chapters of my book are about linking writing more closely to the workplace– but it’s also a very slippery concept. In a writing class, in particular, relevancy can easily fall into a narrowly defined communicative competency. That’s important, of course, but empty if not accompanied by the existential challenges of authentic education.

I’m not surprised that the business leaders quoted in the piece seem old-fashioned in this sense. They know that creativity requires the wide and deep reading and thinking that, ironically, are associated with a traditional liberal arts-based degree. In the end, it’s not relevancy that needs to be sold to parents and students, it’s the idea of knowledge for its own sake. That would make relevancy relevant. As my dad used to say, first you get educated, then you pick a job.