Listen-Up People! BORN A LOSER, YOU'LL DIE A LOSER

Transfer Students
1

<p>According to a recent article poor performance in high school spells the end for us! (yes this group includes me) So get off this board and resign yourself to years of employment in fast food and manual labor, because it's over people! I guess it's lucky noone told my third boss out of high school (a job I got at 19) whose currently paying me 30K per year, and willing to front the bill for a portion of my education! I quess I might as well leave school and my 4.0, give up all dreams of medschool, and begin having the babies in the double-wide now!</p>

<p>AFT Home > Publications > American Educator </p>

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<p>Spring 2004</p>

<p>It's Time To Tell the Kids: If You Don't Do Well in High School, You Won't Do Well in College (or on the Job)</p>

<p>By James E. Rosenbaum</p>

<p>Every year I ask my college class how many students have seen a high school teacher cry, and most students raise their hands. When I ask what provoked the crying, most stories are about teachers who threaten to give students bad grades and students who do not care. When I ask my colleagues the same question about their high school teachers from one or two generations ago, virtually none can recall such tears. This is not a systematic survey, but it suggests a big change. </p>

<p>Today, nearly all high school seniors believe that they are going to college--and that bad grades won’t stop them. They are right: With the dramatic increase in open admissions colleges, it is true that they can go. </p>

<p>But as I report in my recent book Beyond College for All, students who perform poorly in high school probably won’t graduate from college--many won’t even make it beyond remedial courses. High enrollment rates and low graduation rates are well-known facts of life in most open admissions and less selective colleges (both two- and four-year). The tight connection between high school preparation (in terms of both the rigor of courses taken and grades received) and college completion are well known to statisticians, researchers, and policymakers who follow such matters.</p>

<p>But research suggests that students still do not understand this connection. Consider the following: Seventy-one percent of the class of 1982 planned to get a college degree. Ten years later, 63.9 percent of those with A averages had attained an A.A. degree or higher, but only 13.9 percent of those with C averages (or lower) had done so (Rosenbaum, 1998, 2001). (In a more recent cohort [the class of 1992], students with C averages or lower fared a little better; 20.9 percent attained an A.A. degree or higher within eight years of graduating from high school [Rosenbaum and Gordon-McKeon, 2003]). As of 1992, 84 percent of high school seniors planned to get a college degree (NELS, 1992); but data from the high school classes of 1972, 1982, and 1992 tell us that only 45 to 49 percent of students who enter college and earn more than 10 credits actually earn a bachelor's degree--many even fail to earn 10 credits (Adelman, 2004). For students with high school averages of C or lower, the chances that they will earn even one college credit are less than 50-50 (Rosenbaum, 2001). Do your students know that? Do your colleagues? Did you know that?</p>

<p>Despite the availability of open admissions institutions and increased student aspirations for college degrees--factors that increase college enrollment--the easiest-to-use predictor of a student’s likelihood of graduating from a two- or four-year college is still his or her high school grade point average.* Although any single grade is imperfect, when averaged over a high school career, the grade point average is an excellent predictor of how a student will do in college. This has always been true and there is no reason to expect it to change. Unfortunately, our well-intentioned efforts to encourage all students to go to college regardless of their grades inadvertently gives them the impression that high school grades don’t matter.</p>

<p>In this article, we will look at the facts, indeed the tragedy, behind the façade of widespread college entry--and at what we can do to change the picture, either by increasing the odds that college enrollment will lead to college graduation or by helping students find more productive, successful post-high school paths.</p>

<p>New Dreams, New Misconceptions
The past 40 years brought three radical social transformations that together have dramatically increased the percentage of students who want to attend college. First, the earnings advantage of college graduates has grown (Grubb, 1996). Second, college--especially community college (a minor factor in the prior generation)--has become much more accessible. In the past four decades, while enrollments at four-year colleges doubled, enrollments increased five-fold at community colleges (NCES, 1999). Third, and perhaps most remarkably, virtually all community colleges adopted a revolutionary policy of open admissions. Unlike many four-year colleges, virtually all two-year colleges opened their doors to admit all interested high school graduates, regardless of students’ prior academic achievement. Even high school graduates with barely passing grades are routinely welcomed because almost all two-year colleges offer a wide array of remedial courses. Indeed, in many cases, students do not even have to be high school graduates because most two-year colleges offer these students access to some non-credit courses, including GED courses. </p>

<p>These three transformations have dramatically altered the rules of college attendance and given students remarkable new opportunities. However, as with all revolutions, there are also unintended consequences. The revolutions spawned a set of myths--we’ll call them misconceptions--that combined to send a message to students: Don’t worry about high school grades or effort; you can still go to college and do fine. This message has not been sent to high achievers aiming for prestigious colleges, where grades and scores matter--and the students headed there know it. But it is the message that students who know little about college have received--particularly those whose parents did not go to college. These students (and their parents) are being misled with disastrous consequences. Their motivation to work hard in high school is sapped; their time to prepare for college is wasted; their college savings are eaten up by remedial courses that they could have taken for free in high school; and their chances of earning a college degree are greatly diminished. Further, the effect on many colleges has been to alter their mission and lower their standards.</p>

<p>This article reviews some of the misconceptions spawned by these three revolutions and rebuts them--and considers how schools can mitigate the terrible impact these misconceptions are having on individual students and, inevitably, on the overall school environment.</p>

<p>FULL ARTICLE IN COLLEGE ADMISSIONS</p>

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<p>Oh, come on. The article didn't say that nobody ever would get good college grades and get a degree without good high school. It quite clearly spelled out the percentages. Saying "only 20% of those who get less than C averages in high school will get a degree", especially based on hard data, is very, very, VERY different than the "ANYONE WITH A 'C' AVERAGE WILL NEVER GET A DEGREE, EVER!!!!!!!!!" which seems to be what you got out of it. That's not what it said.</p>

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<p>What anisky said. </p>

<p>There are plenty of people who really grow during college, and then there are others who, due to poor habits in high school or whatnot, just can't focus. I know people from either side.</p>

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<p>I found the article to be informative, and I feel that most of it is probably true. There will always be exceptions to the rules! Hell, i'm a high school drop-out myself, went back to school at 21 years old when I finally realized that I didn't like my dead-end job (which, btw, wasn't McDonalds!, I make 35k/yr now, more than some make out of college.) I will finally be leaving said job to transfer to a Univeristy from comm. college this Fall. It amazes me all the time that i've come so far, but I am the exception. I stayed friends (until recently) with a few of the people I hung out with in school, who all also ended up dropping out as well. And, you guessed it, none of them have pursued further education. One is a drug addict, another is pregnant/starting a family, the third is a hippie-like roamer, not sure where she is.</p>

<p>So, the article is probably dead on. Just count yourself smart that you chose not to be part of the majority. :)
-A</p>

5

<p>I'm a high school drop out too!!</p>

<p>But I'm actually a fake high school dropout. I mean, I "dropped out", but I didn't spend any time away from school because of it. It's fun to tell people I'm a dropout, though.</p>

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<p>I think they're trying to use statistics to scare ppl...take the number of students enrolled in ever college/university across the nation and multiply it by .2...that's a pretty big number...but when ppl see figures under 45-50% it kinda freaks em out...scare tactics :-P</p>

7

<p>LMAO to above post. </p>

<p>im a dropout too, with only a equivalency degree to show for high school! lololol</p>

8

<p>hahahah, that article was hilarious.
I've personally made teachers cry and all that ****, and currently I'm in a great school and transferring to a even better one.</p>

<p>I was predicted not only to come last in my class, but also fail the diplomas. I ended up topping the school in the written exams in four of the six subjects I took for IB.</p>

<p>All that stuff is ridiculous, you can get somewhere in life regardless of how much you fooled around in High School.</p>

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<p>Damn. And I thought I was going somewhere...</p>

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<p>While Rosenbaum admits that such student are capable of success through remedial training, it seems clear he would prefer to keep such students out of post secondary education entirely. (Restricting them not only from 4-year path ways, but from 2-year colleges.) And it's funny how educators build doctrine around notion that life is just a larger version of high school. Personally I was shocked when I found out that it was a huge lie, one's drive determines success. I just wonder about those less fortunate than us, those that don't get a strong intellectual support system to validate their gifts. For every kid like me there are hundreds more that believed the crap that such teachers where spewing, they didn't try because they thought they were incapable of wining. Such teaching methods do more than take away opportunities, they take away hope itself.</p>

<p>James E. Rosenbaum is professor of sociology, education, and social policy at Northwestern University and a faculty fellow with the university's Institute for Policy Research. He is author of Beyond College for All: Career Paths for the Forgotten Half and Crossing the Class and Color Lines: From Public Housing to White Suburbia</p>

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<p>thas a bunch of baloney...many students who are unmotivated in HS turn their life around in college..</p>

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<p>I got C's in Highschool and I am getting a 3.5 at a community college because I am actually trying now. The article is only taking into acount those people who tried and failed in highschool, and not those who did not care. I actually turned down all the state schools I was accepted in out of highschool (california), because my parents would not allow me to go to a State school and will only pay for a UC school. Trust me I will not fail and niether will many other people who didnt do well in highschool.</p>

13

<p>Had a 2.4 in high school. Will be attending either USC(accepted) or UCLA(pending). born a loser die a winner bi***s</p>

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<p>I somewhat agree. I know a lot of people who have gotten poor grades in High School and have simply gone to a CC for many years and given up. </p>

<p>I often say I did bad in High School, but I suspose a 3.2 is not exactly struggling to pass my classes.</p>

15

<p>The article is probably very accurate. I mean think about it, all of you who claim to be another exception which proves the article false have turned your lives around and are working your way back to a good university and that's why you're posting on this board. You only see the cases of similar individuals who also are looking to go to nice universities. You dont see the majority of those students which could care less about some board like this and are leading their lives as they see fit and are nowhere close to a university.</p>

16

<p>when i arrived at the states, they thought i had mental problem</p>

<p>well, the HS ppl shut up when I claimed 4 & 5s on 7 AP subjects as a foreigner.</p>

<p>my dad was HELLA poor at first, making like 1 dollar a week.</p>

<p>now he makes like thousands times of that amount.</p>

17

<p>there is also a small percentage of hs students who didnt give a crap about high school.</p>

18

<p>of course this article is correct. thats like saying guns kill people. common sense. the dumb kids in high school arent pulling off straight A's.</p>