hour of the first day was devoted tonvacuous speeches celebrating then100th meeting of. . . The NationalnCouncil on the Arts itself! The blasphemingnof Christianity in annEndowment-supported project merited,nnot a single word. Clearly thencurrent controversy alerts us to problemsnin the system, for the Arts Councilnshould have discussed the issues andnadvised the chairman in an informednway.nThe season of reauthorization of thenEndowments has come again, as itndoes every five years. In the revisednlegislation for the Endowment for thenArts there should be these provisions:n1. The Council must hold all discussionsnof public policy in public — nonmore closed meetings;n2. The Council’s recommendation tonthe chairman, if adopted by a twothirdsnvote, may not be rejected by thenchairman;n3. The Council must supervise thenpanel process and undertake ongoingnscrutiny of the panels, instead of servingnmostly as a rubber stamp to whatevernthe staff tells the Council that thenpanels recommend;n4. Council members who never comento meetings must be replaced by peoplenwho want to do the work; and,n5. The Endowment may not supportnprojects that defame any national, ethnic,nracial, or religious group.nThese suggestions are meant tonstrengthen the Council as a publicnbody formed to nurture consensus, andnto secure a long future for the NationalnEndowment for the Arts as the onenfederal agency created to serve thenpublic interest in the arts.n1 REMEMBER sitting in an airportnbar with a few bemused travelers listeningnto the ads on TV. “America’snignored crisis,” Tom Brokaw blared atnus. “Children in poverty. Most peoplenbelow the poverty line are children.”nFirst one of us and then the rest brokeninto gufFaws. “What this countrynneeds is a national allowance policy,”none voice suggested.nThe ersatz crisis plays the role in theninstitutional life of official America thatndrugs play in its private life. It needsnthem for the highs and spurts of energynthat keep it going. The official Journalnof Approved Crises, alias The Newn8/CHRONICLESnYork Times, has discovered two crisesnin education and blazoned them on itsnfront page. On June 6, 1989, we werentold that people take longer to finishndoctorates in the humanities than innthe physical sciences (the averages aren8.4 years in the humanities as opposednto 6 years in the sciences) and longernthan people did in the 1960’s, whennthe average was 5.4 years. “Thousandsnof Americans spend year after yearnmired in dissertations, demoralized andnunable to start their careers. Campusesnbrim with legends about scholars whonspent years toiling in libraries and atntypewriters creating a definitive masterpiece,nor worse, simply going throughnbouts of angst while resisting librariesnand typewriters.” This is the rhetoricnthat 60 Minutes uses about the homeless:n”mired in,” “demoralized,” etc.nOn page 21 of the same issue, we hearnthe Voice of Reason, disguised as EllennBenkin, director of graduate researchnat UCLA: “People who are in doctoralnprograms have been in institutions ofnhigher education for 10 or 12 years,nand that is a very comfortable environment.”nDr. Virginia Fromkin ofnUCLA even gives the reason for thentime differentials. There used to benmany more jobs waiting for Ph.D.’s innthe 60’s. Without that incentive, peoplentake longer.nThen comes the good news, fornanyone but a confirmed crisis mongerer,nthat is. In the next decade retirementsnwill open up half a million jobsnin colleges and universities. Graduatenstudents will have a reason to finishntheir degrees and many fine scholarsnwho could not find positions in then70’s and 80’s will now have a chancenfor them. This is good news, right? Notnaccording to the Council of CraduatenSchools, made up of 385 deans of thennation’s graduate schools. They havenformed a special group to examinenalternatives to the dissertation. That is,nthey are looking for ways to eliminatenthe dissertation as a requirement fornteaching at institutions of higher learning.nA “crisis” in institutional America isnan excuse to attack standards. Thenpositions opening up in the next decadenwill mean a real opportunity fornthose with earned doctorates who havencontinued to publish. For whom is thisnsituation a crisis?n”Educators note,” the Times con­nnntinues, “that more than 70 percent ofncollege teachers never publish anothernpiece of scholarship after their dissertation.”nThese are the people for whomnthe coming wave of retirements representsna crisis. They have used the “upnor out” system of tenure as a mechanismnto keep creative people out ofnuniversity positions. Now they arenfaced with a situation in which it will benvirtually impossible to avoid giving positionsnto the best of those who havenreceived doctorates during the past twondecades. Their response is simple.nGive Ph.D.’s to the nation’s ABD’s,nthat large horde of ex-graduate studentsnwho passed their graduate classesnand examinations but never finishedntheir dissertations. (ABD is jargon forn”all but dissertation.”) It is no accidentnthat what amounts to a war againstnminimal standards in our educationalninstitutions is headed by the deans ofnthe nation’s graduate schools, not bynthe heads of our teachers’ unions.nThe same distaste for standards maynbe sniffed in another Times front-pagenstory from May 10. Despite successfulnfund-raising programs, the nation’snuniversities are discretely cutting backnon some programs. “Washington Universitynat St. Louis provoked protestsnfrom faculty members and studentsnwhen it announced last month that itnwas gradually shutting down its sociologyndepartment, which was widelynconsidered 20 years ago to be amongnthe nation’s best.” As Oscar Wilde saidnof the death of Little Nell, the mannmust have a heart of stone who cannread that sentence without laughing.n”Johns Hopkins has just begun a fiveyearnplan to reduce costs and eliminatensome programs in its arts and sciencesnschool, which last year ran a $7 millionndeficit. That came even though thenuniversity had embarked on a capitalncampaign that had then raised nearlyn$500 million.”nThe vicissitudes of university budgetsnare many and various, but nobodynis claiming that a major research departmentnis being eliminated. The universitiesndiscussed in the article, includingnColumbia, are shutting downndepartments that have long since givennup striving for excellence. Even $500nmillion is a limited sum of money. If itnis divided up equally among all programs,nnone of them will amount tonmuch. Washington University andn