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We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

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Thursday, May 6. 2010

College graduation rates: Who cares?


"...four-year institutions of higher education (IHEs) graduate less than 60 percent of their students in six years..."



So what? Given how lax American higher ed has become in requirements and expectations, I am surprised it's below 60%. Apparently, historically, American graduation rates have never been very high.


Quickest way to increase grad rates would be to simply sell degrees, or to hand them out for free like the Wizard of Oz.


Now I do realize that a "college degree" no longer necessarily means a Liberal Arts degree as proof that one has mastered a language or two, calculus, sciences, masterworks of philosophy, theology, and literature, etc: many colleges today entail various combinations of remedial education, high-school level coursework, and job training. Flunking out is a thing of the past, so lots of folks must just figure it's not worth the trouble. They could be right.

Posted by The Barrister in Education, Our Essays, The Culture, "Culture," Pop Culture and Recreation at 10:57 | Comments (8) | Trackbacks (0)

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So, in your view is a "Bachelor of Arts" the only degree that one should have, because a "Bachelor of Science" degree is simply "job training"?
#1 cas on 2010-05-06 11:46 (Reply)
No strong opinion on the matter. Just noting that that is not what was traditionally considered college education.
#1.1 The B on 2010-05-06 11:59 (Reply)
Well, "was" is the operative word. Your definition of a college education sounds like it came out of the 1930s. Mind you, I'm not saying the content isn't desirable. Although I do suspect there are plenty of rich guys who got Ivy League BAs without achieving mastery of all the subjects you mentioned.
#1.1.1 D on 2010-05-06 12:37 (Reply)
The six-year mark is probably a reasonable standard but we should be a little careful evaluating dropouts. In my own case, I took my first classes in 1975-1976, got my first associate's degree in 1979, a Bachelor's in 1989, another Associate's in 1990, a Master's in 1994. I collected units from a lot of colleges along the way. So which of them counted me as a dropout?
#2 Geoff Brown on 2010-05-06 12:25 (Reply)
Well, I took 7 years to finish a nominally 4-year degree (B.S. - Mechanical Engineering). Primarily due to economics...for the last bunch of years I was in an Engineering Intern position, where I'd work full-time for a quarter, then go to classes full-time for a quarter. I'd also take a night class in my "work quarter", and worked part-time during my "school quarter. I couldn't afford the University any other way.

So maybe an increasing number of people are having to do the same thing, given the escalating costs of tuition, fees and books. Take some classes for a quarter, work for a quarter.
#3 Blackwing1 on 2010-05-06 12:30 (Reply)
I know lots of guys who are taking 6 years and more to graduate - because they keep getting deployed.

I trying to recruit engineering / statistics interns right now. Almost all Indian and Chinese applicants. Most of them are brilliant, but I'm just happy if I can understand their English.
#4 NJSoldier on 2010-05-06 14:52 (Reply)
I had a job that involved legal oversight and compliance work. We got a new manager in. She wanted us to do our work a lot better. She told us her goal would be to reduce the number of complaints we received.

When we stopped laughing, we tried to explain to her that the number of complaints received is the wrong metric. It doesn't actually tell you anything - for instance if you really improve self-reporting, you'll have a lot more complaints to handle, but if you decide to sanction retaliation by managers, that'll reduce the number of complaints received too.

Cf. college basketball graduation rates - there's a difference between players going 4 years and never graduating, and players attending 1-2 years and then dropping out to go pro.

Anyhow, the manager lasted longer in that office than I did.
#5 jim on 2010-05-06 22:53 (Reply)
One of your links above is to an article about an especially ridiculous associate professor's article decrying "gendering" and other patriarchal crimes. Someone in the hilarious comments section (worth reading, by the way) characterized this whole area of academia as "Angry Studies." There's a lot of this finger-painting and encounter-group nonsense going on in universities, none of it particularly conducive to a student's soldiering on to get a degree in four years and then getting on with his life in his field of training. Well, unless he wants a career teaching Angry Studies.
#6 Texan99 on 2010-05-07 09:16 (Reply)

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