Comments on: The truth about college

By: Parent2

Parent2 — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 19:09:25 +0000

It’s hard to see what the incentives would be for colleges to allow students to spend less time in school, and thus, spend less money, for the same degree.

Parents also collude with the four-year plan. Many parents see college as the time and place to gain social polish, and to network. Fraternities and sororities are, apparently, very popular–and they’re not primarily academic institutions.

By: bandit

bandit — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 19:02:24 +0000

As long as people are buying what they’re selling what is their incentive to improve/change? I drive thru the Boston College campus a couple of times a week and know a number of people who work there. They’re turning away kids in droves. Who knew 4 years at an overpriced Catholic country club could be so appealing?

By: Lightly Seasoned

Lightly Seasoned — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 14:00:49 +0000

That’s true, Jeff. Our state universities and colleges all accept AP credit for freshman comp, and that’s where most kids go. It’s dicier if they end up going out of state or to private colleges. This year a lot of my kids applied to and were accepted at big name schools, but when reality hit in the spring, opted for the the state university.

By: Jeff the Baptist

Jeff the Baptist — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 12:30:42 +0000

“Most of my AP English students are planning to go into engineering; they use my course to get the comp requirement out of the way. It’s a good strategy.”

Only if AP English actually lets them test out of Freshman Comp. Mine didn’t. I received an almost worthless elective English credit.

By: Education Maze

Education Maze — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 01:13:11 +0000

Maybe we should be thinking less about how to cut down the years students spend in high school and college and think about the ways we can better the college classes in order to push students towards achieving greater goals.

Colleges can ask students to be well rounded without making them take stock 101 courses that replicate high school. But are students willing to go that extra step? That’s the real question. Students need to be motivated to learn as opposed to simply getting through courses. Sleeping through large classes where the professor is a speck at the front of a large auditorium is no way to breed passion in students.

By: Cal

Cal — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 23:15:21 +0000

The reason college is a poor screener, and the reason why the best kids are bored in the first two years of college, go back to the same reason: we are sending too many kids to college.

And the reason we are sending too many kids to college has to do with the performance gap. Back in the 60s and 70s, the push to convince black and Hispanic kids to college, even though they were less qualified (by test scores) had an unintended consequence when coupled with the Griggs Supreme Court decision banning employment tests.

In order to compete with their equals (that is, minorities with equivalent abilities), white kids (and then Asian kids) who otherwise wouldn’t have had to go to college in order to get secretarial or bank teller jobs now have to go to college, since employers can’t test for relevant skills.

That wasn’t really part of the original plan by the well-meaning elites that wanted to convince URMs to go to college. They anticipated a world in which the elite whites would go to college, but not all whites.

In any event, we are busy downgrading college to become the new high school: a credential with little worth.

By: tim-10-ber

tim-10-ber — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 23:11:39 +0000

I wish all high schools were required to offer dual enrollemnt classes — even academic magnets. These classes are just coming to the default er zoned high schools in my city…bummer

By: Lightly Seasoned

Lightly Seasoned — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 22:34:40 +0000

Most of my AP English students are planning to go into engineering; they use my course to get the comp requirement out of the way. It’s a good strategy.

By: anon

anon — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 21:37:08 +0000

Charles said, “The college industry would collapse if employers had to justify requiring a BA for a job by the same standards applied to standardized tests of cognitive skills.”

Well said. This is why colleges fight so hard against any attempt to measure students’ learning and the employers use a college degree as no more than a screening tool. But, many employers know that a college degree is an increasingly poor screener.

By: Jeff the Baptist

Jeff the Baptist — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 20:29:59 +0000

Even in engineering, there is a lot of slop space. I could have skipped most of my freshman science courses. I did AP Physics and Chemistry in HS, but those exams only exempted me from the standard courses not the Science and Engineering versions. That’s 16 credits I had to retake. English 101 added another 3 credits. I’m sure there’s more I could find if I had a transcript. The majority of my freshman year was still a waste.