| A strange loop.
| |
| A strange loop.
| |
Who needs to give it that old college try?From the May 27 New York Times comes this story about stagnant graduation rates at colleges and universities.
This is what caught my attention:
As growing numbers of Americans enter college, most colleges and universities have failed to ensure that those students will graduate, according to a study released Wednesday by the Education Trust in Washington.
When did it become the job of colleges and universities to ensure that students graduate? Isn't that the responsibility of the students themselves? And how does one ensure that students graduate? Is this a call for even more grade inflation? Should we just give students a degree and skip the entire educational aspect (such as it still exists) of college.
The trust also recommended that states link their financial support for colleges to the progress their students make and their graduation rates.
The practical upshot of this proposal would leave my questions answered with an emphatic yes. A college degree is quickly becoming meaningless as an indicator of achievement or ability.
Posted by Brian at May 30, 2004 03:32 PM | Link CosmosAs such, it's just following primary and secondary education down the path of "least common denominator", and thus college degrees will soon be as meaningless as high-school diplomas.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: there is an inherent conflict of interest when the institution that teaches a subject also certifies that the subject has been learned.
Honestly, college diplomas right now are probably the equivalent of what a high school diploma was a few generations ago. High school diplomas, on the other hand, mean absolutely nothing.
While I have abhorred the Marxist love fest that permeates many college campuses, in my early years I could get past that. Colleges, for all their faults, still largely had rigorous classes and high standards, and they were very proud of it. That has been rapidly changing, especially in my lifetime. It's a sad thing to see.
Posted by: Brian on June 1, 2004 08:35 PM