8217;s logic is that he does not report whether the student population increased, decreased or stayed the same over the years in those particular schools. If Trinity College is private and exclusive, it is possible that the school did not increase the class size since the 1940’s to keep their same profile, but we do not know the truth because of Henry’s careless comparison. Therefore, Henry’s weak evidence does not directly compare the changes in “general standards” with larger class sizes, so his assumptions are invalid.As opposed to the arguments made by William Henry, Benjamin R. Barber takes a totally different view about the importance of higher education. Barber believes in the conventional American egalitarian view and discusses the need for mass education in our society in, “America Skips School.” He declares that the history of American democracy is based on creating a society of educated individuals who have the intellectual ability to live in liberty. Barber argues that public education will make our citizens more knowledgeable and allow them to become more involved in the politics of America, which will create a stronger democracy.Barber bases his egalitarian claims on evidence for the conventional American view. He uses history as proof that higher education is a necessity for all citizens recalling “Jefferson and Adams both understood that the Bill of Rights offered little protection in a nation without informed citizens. Once educated, however, a people was safe from even the subtlest tyrannies”(Barber 5). Barber understands the genuine purpose for educating a public and that it endows people “the competence to participate in democratic communities, the ability to think critically and act with deliberation in a pluralistic world, and the empathy to identify sufficiently with others and to live with them despite conflicts of interest and difference in character...
