So, today I heard on Rover’s Morning Glory (replaced Howard Stern here in the midwest…) that this group called the American Institutes for Research published a study about college students and how they aren’t prepared for life after graduation; the full results of the study are published online. Here are a few highlights:
- Students in 2- and 4-year colleges have the greatest difficulty with quantitative literacy: approximately 30 percent of students in 2-year institutions and nearly 20 percent of students in 4-year institutions have only Basic quantitative literacy. Basic skills are those necessary to compare ticket prices or calculate the cost of a sandwich and a salad from a menu.
- There are no significant differences in the literacy of students graduating from public and private institutions. Additionally, in assessing literacy levels, there are no differences between part-time and full-time students. No overall relationship exists between literacy and the length of time it takes to earn a degree, or between literacy and an academic major.
- Literacy level is significantly higher among students who say their coursework places a strong emphasis on applying theories or concepts to practical problems, in comparison to students who say their coursework rarely touch on these skills.
Yeah, I’ve kinda wondered about this for awhile…? I mean, most college students (in my opinion) don’t think they really learn anything useful, or things that pertain to their career (for example, taking a class like LAS Calculus or Writing as Critical Thinking).? Personally, most of those “worthless” classes for me were silly because I had the same thing or better in high school, so I didn’t see why I needed to take the same thing again.? On the other hand, I consider Hickman High to be amongst the top high schools in the state, which is a far cry from some high schools with fewer resources to draw from in more rural areas.
I guess I’m not sure what I think about these results. I think it’s pretty dumb that you can graduate from college without knowing how to tell how many more miles you can drive when your car gets 30 mi/gal and you have 4 gallons of gas left (this study pointed out that there are college graduates who can’t figure that out…and it’s an unbelievably high percentage…). I guess that classes should try and incorporate more “real life” examples into their classes, or perhaps even have a required freshman-year course titled “Life: How to not be an idiot.”
On the other hand, I guess the best way to learn about life is just to live. There are some things you simply can’t learn from coursework…but seriously…if you don’t know how to figure out how much further you can drive on a half tank of gas, you’re an idiot and don’t deserve that degree…
This sounds like one of those “omg kids r dum” studies that bored insititutions put out to get their name in the media. Let’s take a quick look at the numbers, shall we?
From their release (linked above), “The study … is based on a sample of 1,827 graduating students from 80 randomly selected 2-year and 4-year public and private colleges and universities across the United States”
OK, so their sample size is a staggering 1,827 people. Woo. The most recent numbers I could find for the total number of enrolled college students in the united states was from 1999, from the Census Bureau (http://www.census.gov/prod/2001pubs/p20-533.pdf)
The total number of college students in the US in 1999? 15.2 million. 1,827 into that is what? One tenth of one percent? Wow, sweeping education reforms are surely needed. (the irony here being I probably screwed that calculation up, making me look like one of the dumb ones, but joke’s on them, I already graudated!)
I do think a “basic life skills” class in HS would be useful for about 99% of HS students, though.
Also, the idea that classwork alone is going to prepare you for a job is lunacy. Working with other people, networking, and talking to your profs outside of class, however, will (in my limited experience). If you want classwork that’ll prepare you for a job, go to a trade school.
Yeah, I typo’d graduated. Sue me.
Stu… while their numbers seem small, if you follow the link to the actual studies, you will note that their values are shown statistically to be significant, with a p value south of .02 …. a p value like that on a drug study and i’d swallow the thing.
Also, WACT made me no better a writer or thinker; Health didn’t make me healthier; Speech didn’t help me with a thing; Intro to philosophy, while fun, merely entertained me; Sociology bored me; American Institutional History was a joke; and by the time I graduate the biology and chemistry classes- those which I consider to be helpful to my major- could have been completed in a matter of half the time I’m spending here.
eh, statistics are for commies. 😀 (no, I didn’t read the actual study; I’m busy posting on the internet. The Internet!)
I didn’t have any interesting 100 level courses either. I did, however, have a number of really interesting upper level classes outside my major. One class was so awesome, the prof had us all over for dinner (20-30 some kids) near the end of the semester, which was way cool. If it’s not too late, pick out some random, interesting-looking classes and take ’em. Serial Killers was a popular choice, probably still is.
also, people who go to truman do choose the university being fully aware of the liberal studies program and all that it entails, including classes some may find boring (though how one can find sociology boring is totally beyond me!)….i do think, as compared to my fellow fontbonne classmates, that truman well-prepared us for more of the real-life issues addressed by the article than many other institutions of higher learning. also, i think this study isn’t a very good one, as it gives no basis of comparison for it’s stats-like against non-college students of the same peer group, people of other generations, etc.