Teaching: To Profess with a Passion

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The bets are down: the U.S. is relying more heavily than ever on college education to shape its destiny. To get into college, kids claw for high marks even in grade school. Parents scratch for dollars, plunge into debt. State taxes soar. Yet how the bet comes out depends on solitary teachers in secluded classrooms—and the number of bored, hostile and inadequate college teachers adds up to something between a serious concern and an outright scandal.

Almost every college administrator is aware of what HEW Secretary John...