Wouldn’t you want to the electrician you hire to be able to read things like the NEC and any applicable local electrical codes, in order to install or repair safe electrical work in your house? Wouldn’t you want police officers in your area to be able to read and understand the laws that they are paid to enforce, and be able to write coherent police reports describing the facts found at any given situation and what applicable violations of law any suspects may be charged with? Wouldn’t you want the mechanic doing maintenance or repair on your car to be able to read and understand the service manuals so that your car does not fall apart as you drive home?
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But those basic skills shouldn’t require a college degree, should they? Vocational training should be sufficient. No?
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Not saying that they should require a college degree (although all of these professions do require some education and training beyond a high school diploma). But would you be confident in people doing those professions if you know that the slackers you saw in high school (who were barely motivated enough to earn D grades in the minimum high school graduation requirements, including English and math) were pushed into them?
Of course, in reality, those professions have their own entry standards. For example, only about 30% of young Americans are eligible for US military service based on recruitment and entry standards. Any of them require passing whatever education and training they require before becoming a full fledged practitioner.
I believe different people are talented in different ways. Some in academics. Some in athletics. Some in hands-on work, etc. Even within academics, some are better as theorists and others as experimentalists. A slacker in an academic setting may not be a slacker in another line of work. Why force everyone to do the same thing or go through the same path?
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Thank you so much for posting this. Very relevant to the original question.
Purdue has been struggling with improving graduation rates over the years as well. They’ve got all kinds of programs similar to what was described in this article.
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And back to one of the original ideas behind this thread, effort would be better spent making sure more students actually have gotten a quality education when they graduate from high school. Obviously if we’re not giving more students the basics then it doesn’t help them or society. Better preparing students before HS graduation helps all students achieve more. Graduates are then better prepared for whichever path they take in life.
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Of course a 4 year degree is not necessary for a happy, productive, and successful life, but it makes sense to me that students see college as the most likely path to those goals. And it completely makes sense that parents want to encourage their children to pursue further education past high school.
In particular, I would never say to a young person of color that they don’t need college anyway. As a person of color, it is hard enough to face bias and discrimination in the workplace even when one has the credentials. Without some sort of academic credential or earning a certification through higher education stamped next to one’s name, it is even harder for nonwhite people to attain a livable income and gain social status. Not impossible, but it is a safer bet to get the credential if you can.
That. Was. FASCINATING!!!
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That quality education starts way before college comes into play. If primary and secondary schools aren’t providing a good education and or students aren’t doing their part then yes, the deck is stacked against people. In the end though, college isn’t necessary to not be poor. I work with numerous individuals with only a HS diploma that make $100,000+.
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Obesity is one of the biggest disqualifiers for service.
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But they offer Calc I, so there must be some students who haven’t taken it and need to take it once they are at MIT. MIT could require it, and could even admit students on the condition they take Calc I before they start (either in the summer or delay admission until they complete it) but MIT doesn’t do that, they actually offer it.
I hardly think taking Calc I in college is remedial math.
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The problem is that kids from wealthy families who are underperforming because they have weak academic skills will still get through college and be hired into higher paying jobs, while kids from poor families who are underperforming because they have no place to study, have to work, or are going to school without breakfast, are the ones who are being told “college is not for you”.
Yes, there re many many kids who would do a lot better in the trades, however, in the USA, preparedness for college is much more strongly correlated to income than to academic ability.
From having the ability to provide a better learning environment at school and at home, to having parents who advocate for their kids to the point of threatening teachers who give their kid low grades. From getting tutoring to getting accommodations for kids who need them, and sometimes for kids who do not actually need them. All of those mean that a kid with average academic abilities who is born in a wealthy family will likely end up with much higher than average GPA, and will be considered “college worthy”, while a kid whose family income is in the bottom 40%, with the exact same talents, will almost certainly be in an academic position that they would be considered “no, this kid really shouldn’t go to college”.
Again, there are many many kids who probably should be following careers that do not require a college degree, but instead require other types of training. However we must be able to differentiate those kids who are really not interested or talented at academics versus those difficulties with academics are due to their family situations.
We should also be much more open to non-traditional students. There are also many students who have academic potential, but were really to immature at the ages of 15-17 to focus on high school academics, or whose life during those years made academics difficult.
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Anecdotes and outliers aside, low income Americans who earn colleges degrees are much more likely to escape poverty than those who do not.
But telling students that they just aren’t cut out for college stacks the deck further. And it is oftentimes just not true. Again, take look at the nytimes article on UT Austin. Shortly before the article was written, and before the various discussed initiatives, the graduation rate was around 50%. Now, about a decade later, it is above 80%. This wasn’t accomplished by discouraging those who might drop out from attending, and it isn’t accomplished by overhauling primary and secondary education in Texas. It was accomplished by improving the quality of the educational experience and fostering a sense of belonging among the students most at risk of dropping out.
The heart of the project is a portfolio of “student success programs,” each one tailored, to a certain extent, for a different college at U.T. — natural sciences, liberal arts, engineering — but all of them following the basic TIP model Laude dreamed up 15 years ago: small classes, peer mentoring, extra tutoring help, engaged faculty advisers and community-building exercises.
Sounds to me like it has paid off to give these students a small taste of what wealthy families take for granted at all educational levels
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If they have weak academic skills, why are they allowed to go through college in the first place? Is it because the college offers some pseudo “academic” fields of study so they could major in, since they don’t care (or need to care) about whether such majors lead to a job or career? Or is it because there’re just too many classes where a B is literally the lowest grade a student can possibly get?
I’m all for that.
Why not let them go to college when they’re ready?
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If we expect colleges to impart high school level skills, colleges should change their hiring models accordingly. Tenured research scholars are not particularly qualified to do so and more expensive to pay than secondary level teachers. We can focus more on social workers and learning disorder specialists who may be better equipped for that task.
I admire the UT plan and think it was effective given the situation of who they have to enroll per state law, but note that most public universities can’t afford to offer the small classes and intensive support UT has provided. Actually, I am not sure how much longer UT can provide such support and keep tuition at $10k.
A non-insignificant proportion of students retake calc 1 in college, hence why even a school like MIT offers it.
Not sure what this is about, I never said this, nor intimated it.
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Good point!
For example, our school counselor said that a lot of the elite colleges like Ivy League schools, MIT, CalTech, Harvey Mudd EXPECT the student to have taken the most rigorous courseload available to them at their HS…AND they expect that if you’re taking an AP Calculus class, that you’ll get a high score on the AP exam.
BUT…
They still want you to take THEIR calculus class.
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Caltech and Harvey Mudd “calculus” courses are proof and theory heavy, and assume a regular calculus course as a prerequisite. So taking a regular calculus course and then the Caltech or Harvey Mudd “calculus” course is not the same as taking a regular calculus course while in high school and then repeating the same material in a regular calculus course in college.
MIT’s basic single variable calculus course 18.01 is a regular calculus course that covers what is ordinary a year’s worth of material in one semester. The prerequisites are high school algebra and trigonometry, although it is likely that many MIT frosh take it because they have taken calculus in high school but did not pass the placement criteria to take a more advanced course.
Most colleges do not require calculus as an entrance requirement, do not require previous calculus in order to take basic single variable calculus, and do not require repeating regular calculus if one passes the advanced placement criteria they list.
Teh son of a good friend got into Caltech with one of their then-Founder’s full-ride schollies. (no longer offered). He was brilliant, breezing thru multi-variate the the local UC campus as a HS Soph, and upper divisions math classes at the same UC thru senior year of HS.
Called home one weekend and was stunned, got a low B on his Calc 1 midterm at Caltech. Said he never worked as hard in his life to pull out an A, even including his upper division coursework.
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That was exactly the point I wrote about non-traditional students - colleges, high schools, and society in general should not be so focussed on the idea that college is something that kid do within a year of finishing high school. There should be more routes for students who need a few more years.
Truth is that this route exists - community colleges accept all students, and many very good colleges have systems set up for accepting transfers from community colleges, based on their CC grades. This should be expanded to all public university systems. There should also be more financial aid set up for transfers - many of these resources today are only open to first year students, not to transfers.
I also think that there should be state-funded college counselors for students who are not attending college straight out of high school.