Excellent Sheep
by William Deresiewicz · first published 2014
29% recommend64% neutral7% critical
This book is a groundbreaking manifesto about what our nation's top schools should be -- but aren't -- providing: "The ex-Yale professor effectively skewers elite colleges, their brainy but soulless students (those sheep'), pushy parents, and admissions mayhem" (People). As a professor at Yale, William Deresiewicz saw something that troubled him deeply. His students, some of the nation's brightest minds, were adrift when it came to the big questions: how to think critically and creatively and how to find a sense of purpose. Now he argues that elite colleges are turning out conformists without
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…who drive all the discourse. I don't teach at Yale and have never taught at Yale or schools with similar cultures, so I can't speak to the environment there, but William Deresiewicz did, and his book Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life came out of that and I recommend it. His book A Jane Austen Education (http://jakeseliger.com/tag/a-jane-austen-education-how-six-n...)…
on “The Yale Problem Begins in High School” ↗…for larger Trump support among people who haven't passed through the brainwashing machine of the US college/academia. I guess anti-individualism is the best way to call it. I always refer to excellent "Excellent Sheep" book by William Deresiewicz who succinctly described just what I experienced first hand during years of Ivy League un-education. 3. see 1. if we can't get free speech on BigTech platforms then we shall…
on “Ask HN: What are decentralized Twitter alternatives?” ↗"Excellent Sheep"[1] by William Deresiewicz is a great read on this topic. Also, his "Solitude and Leadership"[2] talk at West Point in 2009, which probably inspired to write the book. [1] https://www.amazon.com/Excellent-Sheep-Miseducation-American...…
on “Dealing with Hard Problems (2015)” ↗…constantly strive to do more and what to make of it when it seems never-ending. Plato's Republic goes deep into virtue in a way that somehow doesn't (and might need to) get explored more often today. Excellent Sheep is the book that got me to read the above books in the first place.
on “Ask HN: Any interesting books you have read lately?” ↗He also wrote Excellent Sheep, a good book about the state of higher education.
on “Why William Deresiewicz Left Academia” ↗safe spaces, gender studies, wokeness certificates, virtue signaling workshops, degrees in conformity & groupthink. read William Dereshevitz' "Excellent Sheep", it's the best book on the subject.
…Curate your entire life to be appealing to a bunch of humanities majors who couldn't get a job other than reading admissions apps. I completely agree with Mr Deresiewicz's characterization of that as "excellent sheep". As a person from the third-world who went to the Ivy League, I am also scornful of America's culture of self-congratulation. When I went to Dartmouth, I remember one of the first things during our…
on “The Ivy League, Mental Illness, and the Meaning of Life (2014)” ↗…(which used to be run by his wife, I'm not sure if it still is) selects for the best and the brightest, but inevitable in such a selection process is a tendency to pick what William Deresiewicz calls "excellent sheep"--kids who do (or appear to do) what they're told extremely well. When you pair that with an Office of Career Services (OCS) that acts as a funnel to Wall Street--many people in my class ended up destroying…
on “The Fall of Academics at Harvard” ↗…at the facts and think for yourself. Apparently critical thinking is what college-educated people lack this days after years of indoctrination into groupthink and compliance. Deresiewicz called them 'excellent sheep' for a good reason.
…and business select for conformity. * “Go It Alone: The Streetwise Secrets of Self Employment” by Geoff Burch. Great read, witty and savvy author. * “The E-Myth Revisited” by Michael E. Gerber. * “Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life” by William Deresiewicz.
on “Ask HN: Which book are you reading these days?” ↗"Excellent sheep" is same idea by another former Yale Prof, William Deresiewicz http://www.billderesiewicz.com/books/excellent-sheep
on “An alarm about the influence of standardized tests on American society” ↗…anti-intellectual but just a vague sense that the more prestigious one’s education the greater threat to society / less competent they seem to be. It is a generalization, but it comes specifically from this book: Excellent Sheep: The Miseducation of the American Elite and the Way to a Meaningful Life https://www.amazon.com/dp/1476702721 EDIT: Anker was a board member of Pando, a site of some integrity and which chose to switch…
on “Facebook thinks the answer to its fake news problems is Wikipedia” ↗Bill Deresiewicz made a similar point in his book Excellent Sheep. Students are rewarded for conforming and following the designated educational path. But is that really what we want? https://billderesiewicz.com/books/excellent-sheep/
on “Pentagon Planned for a Bitcoin Rebellion” ↗>universities tend to be research maximizing entities This really hit home for me reading "Excellent Sheep" by William Deresiewicz. At one point, a professor won an award for excellence in teaching and I believe the dean took the professor aside to reassure them that the award wouldn't negatively impact their…
on “High tuition costs mostly stem from the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act 1993” ↗…subsequently unable to get another academic job despite years of trying. Here's a recent podcast with him: https://www.persuasion.community/p/deresiewicz It may not be the best thing in the world to be an "excellent sheep," but perhaps it's better than being a lone ram.
on “Private equity bought out your doctor and bankrupted Toys“R”Us” ↗