Genevive Bjorn

Last week I argued the old college model is dead. This is what its death looks like from inside a seminar room. In 2024, The Atlantic published a piece whose headline did half the work: “The Elite College Students Who Can’t Read Books.” Rose Horowitch interviewed 33 professors, and their stories rhymed. Nicholas Dames, who has taught Literature Humanities at Columbia for decades, described students arriving “bewildered” by the expectation of reading multiple books in a semester.

Last spring, a professor friend told me she’d stopped assigning whole books. Not because she wanted to, but because her students couldn’t finish them. The same week, her university circulated its third AI policy in two years. Ban it? Embrace it? Detect it? Nobody knew. Nobody knows.

The 2023 Maui wildfires have devastated parts of the island, including leveling Lahaina and destroying hundreds of homes and businesses. As the death toll mounts, you may be thinking back to that amazing Hawaii vacation you took and wondering how you can now give back. Here are some ways you can skillfully help, including donating money, items, and your time. Many organizations are doing great work on the ground to provide relief from the Maui wildfires.