NCH: An Unconvincing Idea

Try as I might, I just can’t get worked up over this private university thing – certainly not the extent of this rather embittered commentator or this jaundiced old Marxist rent-a-quote. I can’t help but think that if Grayling et al want to do this, they should feel free. And the whole project can fall into the category of stuff I don’t really care about.

So my point isn’t about defending or lambasting this institution – I’ll leave that to others who care more. What I would say, though, is that £18k a year (or a magnificent £54k for a degree) does sound like an awful lot, particularly when you can get a degree from Oxbridge for literally half the price. The counter claim is that with fewer students there will be a greater chance to have face to face interaction with your tutors. But that is only of benefit if those tutors are great teachers. Which, along with the cost, is one of the things that really doesn’t work for me with regard to this project.

The names mentioned are certainly big names – and with the likes of A. C. Grayling and Richard Dawkins, this college is probably attracting the closest the UK has to public intellectuals. But fame does not mean quality – after all, Ben Affleck and Tom Cruise are internationally famous actors, but that doesn’t actually make them any good. Grayling is a remarkably bland philosopher, Dawkins is a relentless dogmatist who shows the same zeal with regard to his atheism as many religious fundamentalists. Elsewhere, the other intellectuals involved that I’ve actually heard of are Ronald Dworkin (a kind of sub-John Rawls obsessed with a sort of intangible egalitarianism) and Niall Fergusson – a controversial historian at best with an unhealthy respect for imperialism. Sure, these people are visible, but that doesn’t make them (a) any good or (b) able to teach.

The whole thing comes across as a bit of a stunt – an injection of celebrity culture into the academic world. I dare say there will be some who will be willing to pay these exorbitant fees to end up with a degree from the University of London and the right to say that they studied under Grayling and/or Dawkins, but I suspect they will be few and far between. Furthermore, even if the college does take off then there are no guarantees that the institution will win respect even if it does gain students (a point that much of the criticism of this scheme seems to miss). So while I wouldn’t deny the right of Grayling and the others to found this institution, I would recommend that serious students look elsewhere. You can get a decent degree from a respected institution without the cost and the risk inherent in the NCH project.