“Intellectual growth should commence at birth and cease only at death.” - Albert Einstein.

And if you’re Utica College, that death will come in the ironic form of a “sunset” – a vague, inexplicable decision by its president to eliminate 15 majors, including philosophy, for reasons that remain confusing at best, and at worst, a harrowing indictment on the way the school’s brain trust values basic educational principles.

The decision to eliminate numerous fundamental programs comes just shy of a year mark of the “University” rebranding. But the school is much less a “University” today than it was when I attended from 2014-2017 – when students had the freedom to explore topics and studies that originated centuries ago, and have since served as the bedrock of explorative thinking which has shaped the decades that have come after it.

Administrators have failed to recognize the intrinsic value in having diverse learning opportunities for students, particularly for a school that once prided itself for smaller classroom sizes and dynamic teaching from professors who could – and by the way, will – find jobs teaching at any other major university in the country.

Those brilliant professors, and the 4.4% of the student body that chose to major in one of the many programs the administration will sever, comprised the heart of the school. The philosophy, international relations, sociology and anthropology students were often the most interesting – the gentler souls who had the stomach to research and consider life’s deeper meaning, and dovetail their education into future Ph.D. or Juris Doctorate programs. Hell, I was a journalism major at Utica College, but the lessons I was taught by a philosophy professor were, in part, a reason I chose to go to law school.

For those students, the administration is sending a message: your educational pursuits do not matter as much as others.

And for what, exactly? They have yet to firmly state their reason – or at least a rational one that comports with what it truly means to be a “university.”

To me, this ill-advised decision to cut the multitude of programs signals the administration’s desire to go all-in on what the “industry” is looking for – that being, “modern” programs with success that is only predicated on job placement statistics and steadily increased salaries.

But even if you were to consider that flawed rationale, you will quickly begin to scratch your head upon learning that programs such as philosophy have steadily grown over the last decade. It is almost as if the professors who built the program dedicated their lives to growing the programs from the ground up – by committing their free time, their evenings away from family, and weekends – only for the administrators to repay them by cutting the programs altogether.

Utica “University” can hardly call itself that when it is going out of its way to limit options for students who are willingly accepting financial debt for the sake of their higher educational goals. As someone who grew up a refugee in Utica, I never had any exposure to philosophical theory before stumbling upon the introductory philosophy class at Utica College.

I am not alone with that story — but what is becoming an unimaginable shame, I could end up being one of the last with it. To cut these programs is to burn entire sections of a library down because patrons don’t visit those areas as much as others.

The decision to “sunset” 15 majors should hurt the soul of any person who values the true meaning of what it means to have the ability to obtain a Renaissance education – one that Utica College was so lucky to offer.

Now, Utica “University” appears content with being just another school in upstate New York.

The school – once a symbol of hope and intellectual brightness – will choose to dim its future with a “sunset.”

Benjamin Mehic is a graduate of Proctor High School, Utica College, and the Albany Law School. He is now a practicing attorney in Albany.