<p>interesting article</p>
<p>This is monumentally stupid. The study measured differences between freshmen and seniors on a test of general civic information. Practically everyone seems to have done badly, but some schools had especially bad freshmen, and so seemed to have taught their seniors a lot. </p>
<p>Rhodes seniors scored below eight points below Yale freshmen, but Rhodes is ranked first because Yale seniors scored almost the same as its freshmen, while Rhodes freshmen were 12 points worse than its seniors. The Yale freshmen had the highest average score (just below 70%) of all the classes tested in the study. </p>
<p>The premise for the study is that it's a university's job to teach high school civics. It isn't.</p>
<p>Anyway, here's the data in all its glory. If I were Rhodes College, I would be a little embarassed by my august company at the top:</p>
<p>(College) (Fr. Avg.) (Sr. Avg.) (Delta)
Rhodes College 50.6% 62.2% +11.6%
2 Colorado State University 40.6 51.5 10.9
3 Calvin College 49.5 59.0 9.5
4 Grove City College 59.0 68.4 9.4
5 University of Colorado, Boulder 39.7 48.6 8.9
6 Spring Arbor University 39.5 47.8 8.3
7 University of New Mexico 38.7 46.9 8.2
8 University of Mobile 40.6 48.1 7.5
9 Florida Memorial University 24.4 31.2 6.8
10 Central Connecticut State Univ. 39.1 44.1 5.0
11 George Mason University 50.9 55.9 5.0
12 Youngstown State University 37.6 42.5 4.9
13 North Carolina Central University 28.9 33.7 4.8
14 Utah State University 43.8 48.3 4.5
15 Lynchburg College 43.3 47.3 4.0
16 Catholic University of America 45.9 49.1 3.2
17 University of Massachusetts, Boston 42.5 45.5 3.0
18 Princeton University 66.0 68.8 2.8
19 Eastern Kentucky University 31.4 34.1 2.7
20 Baylor University 47.6 50.2 2.6
21 West Texas A&M University 41.0 43.5 2.5
22 University of South Alabama 39.7 41.7 2.0
23 University of Texas, Austin 53.8 55.8 2.0
24 Wheaton College 59.7 61.6 1.9
25 Harvard University 67.8 69.7 1.9
26 University of Washington 48.3 50.1 1.8
27 Appalachian State University 41.7 43.4 1.7
28 Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill 54.9 56.5 1.6
29 Capital University 44.0 45.3 1.3
30 American University 63.4 64.4 1.0
31 Stanford University 62.2 63.1 0.9
32 University of West Florida 42.1 42.8 0.7
33 Washington & Lee University 63.6 63.8 0.2
34 Dartmouth College 67.9 68.0 0.1
35 University of Michigan 52.1 52.0 -0.1
36 Ithaca College 48.8 48.6 -0.2
37 University of Chicago 64.5 64.2 -0.3
38 Massachusetts Inst. of Technology 63.9 63.5 -0.4
39 Williams College 69.1 68.4 -0.7
40 University of Florida 48.6 47.8 -0.8
41 Wofford College 49.2 48.3 -0.9
42 University of Virginia 63.7 62.6 -1.1
43 Georgetown University 69.1 67.9 -1.2
44 Yale University 69.8 68.3 -1.5
45 University of West Georgia 34.9 32.9 -2.0
46 Duke University 60.6 58.3 -2.3
47 Brown University 62.5 59.8 -2.7
48 Cornell University 59.4 56.1 -3.3
49 University of California, Berkeley 60.4 54.8 -5.6
50 Johns Hopkins University 61.7 54.4 -7.3</p>
<p>Actually, what is interesting is that the usual suspects ranked highest for freshman knowledge (above 60%).</p>
<p>I wonder if required courses and common majors has any correlation with these results. I know that at Rhodes all students are required to take one of 2 courses freshman year, with one course continuing into soph year, BUT I did not think that these courses American history and government.</p>
<p>(to marite: ) Yes. What's interesting about that? Isn't it sort of dog-bites-man news that Harvard and Yale freshmen score higher on some test than Florida Memorial freshmen?</p>
<p>I'd like to see the test. It IS a little embarassing that the seniors at lots of these schools seem to know a little less general information than the freshmen, and that no class averaged 70% on a test that was presumably designed to test things worth knowing.</p>
<p>The "study" is a joke. Don't believe for an instant that Rhodes will be crowing about this "victory". The results are as suspect as the methodology. The conclusions are also in error in that Rhodes doesn't require any civics courses. I doubt seriously that this is any more scientific in the testing of knowledge of civics than Leno's "Man on the Street" bit. </p>
<p>But , I don't see why you need to get snippy with Rhodes. They didn't ask for this, now did they? There are other equally reprehensible scores that I am sure are as inaccurate. And by the way, Rhodes is kind of pretentious and for good reasons. This just isn't one of them. ;)</p>
<p>At least the Florida Memorial kids learned something. These kids came in knowing not much and came out knowing even less. </p>
<p>45 University of West Georgia 34.9 32.9 -2.0</p>
<p>JHS:</p>
<p>The only interesting thing is that it confirms that the schools make good admissions decisions. I have not commented on the finding that seniors seem to regress at some schools.</p>
<p>I agree with posters--in particular Cur--, that the methodology and results are highly suspect. Just another worthless list.</p>
<p>Actually, there's lots of interesting nuggets in the study. Those Grove City kids show pretty well, comparatively!</p>
<p>(Curmudgeon -- sorry to pick on Rhodes. It was "first", and it is more fun to pick on than West Georgia.)</p>
<p>There's lots of info on the web site for the study (but not, unfortunately, the test itself). The methodology looks fine -- they spent years developing and validating the test. It's the central idea of what to study that's dumb.</p>
<p>Here's the link: <a href="http://www.americancivicliteracy.org/report/summary.html">http://www.americancivicliteracy.org/report/summary.html</a> The good stuff is in the Additional Tables.</p>
<p>There are some truly bizarre outcomes. The incredibly poor performance of similar schools to what has been referred to as the usual suspects (and by similar I mean Cornell, Brown, and Duke) . The state schools' performance is truly lackluster . Even the quality state schools. </p>
<p>Some of this is just goofy.</p>
<p>Someone needs to teach the writers of that article how to analyze accurately.</p>
<p>"Other poor performers in the study were Yale, Duke, Brown and Cornell universities."</p>
<p>-So the Ivys are poor performers since their freshmen classes had higher scores than the seniors of nearly everyone except other top-ranked universities?</p>
<p>"It is a crisis, the report warns ... A majority of students also could not identify the Baath party as the main source of Saddam Hussein's political support in Iraq."</p>
<p>-How does having an understanding of the Iraqi political system matter AT ALL?</p>
<p>"There may be real issues here about how universities should organize their curriculum, but there is a scandal-mongering aspect to the way this survey has been presented," said Professor David Hollinger, chairman of the UC Berkeley history department. "I would not assume that this is a credible survey without more scrutiny." </p>
<p>-Someone finally has the right idea, unsurprisingly he's from Berkeley, one of the "failures".</p>
<p>"But he said, it is true that Stanford focuses more on teaching theory and critical-thinking skills than facts. The teaching of facts and historical dates is considered "old-fashioned" in academe, he said"</p>
<p>-The teaching of facts and historical dates IS old-fashioned. Knowing that Independence Day is July 4th is fine, but knowing the exact date of even D-Day doesn't really matter much, except if you happen to be playing Trivial Pursuit (June 6th, 1944), which is funny since this survey is about as trivial as you can get.</p>
<p>If students are just randomly quizzed about the food pyramid, I'd bet people would find that students don't know enough about nutrition, or likewise with simple math problems (so many people can't even do basic percentages mentally), or vocabulary, or reading comprehension, or forming a decent essay.</p>
<p>Lets just face it, as a whole, everyone is lacking at everything. Harvard grads don't know enough rap artists, and Florida Memorial grads don't know enough about history. Despite being ranked 9th, they have the lowest scores, both freshman and senior, on the entire list.</p>
<p>What's the answer for colleges? Admit the stupidest students that you can, then hope they happen to learn something during their time at your school, which leads your school to be known as "amazing" by University of Connecticut researchers, whose opinions shake the world.</p>
<p>Seriously though, people really do know very little about history; however, I don't think requiring it will do anything except annoy the history professors who must teach students that think the subject is boring. In other words, a repeat of high school history.</p>
<p>cangel, the courses you speak of at Rhodes are the "Search" and "Life" sequences. They would not be very helpful with American politics or American History. (One is a cruise through world civilizations, the other more of a cruise through the world's religious history. I have done a poor job of charectorizing but that is a basic answer. )</p>
<p>BTW, the top schools for senior scores are in order:
1 Harvard
Princeton,
Grove City
Yale
5 Dartmouth
Georgetown
American
Chicago
W+L
10 MIT
Stanford
UVA
Rhodes
Wheaton
15 Calvin
Brown
Duke
UNC
Cornell
20 GMU</p>
<p>The list of topics tested seems legit to me, and they had various panels of experts developing the topics and the questions. Some of the questions were taken from the national assessment test being developed by USDOE for high school seniors.</p>
<p>Actually, the kids seemed to have done pretty well on the foreign policy stuff except for the question about the Ba'ath Party. I think that's a function of the drumbeat of rhetoric over the past 5 years that would lead most kids to conclude that Hussein was simply a military dictator for whom political support was irrelevant. Our government institutions have not done a great job of "teaching" the American people the fine points of Iraqi politics, that's for sure, but I would hope that kids had picked up on the controversy over our policy of "de-Ba'athification" and its subsequent reversal.</p>
<p>At least they measured outputs - ANY outputs. That's pretty rare these days. They found some colleges wanting in civics "outputs". Big deal, I say, I'm not sure I care, but at least it was the right kind of measurement.</p>
<p>The "most improved" award? Don't you always hate it when you are the recipient?</p>
<p>Actually there is something to be said if the knowledge is acquired incidentally outside of classrooms. it speaks volume to a place where kids become more aware of history through other forms of engagement.</p>
<p>Where are Chicago and Columbia on that list? Those are the two schools most famous for demanding core currculums - it would be interesting to see whether or not their students performed significantly better.</p>
<p>I would think in the case of Rhodes that their "hotness" in fields surrounding IR is what gives them the "boost" in the value added category. But yes, most improved does suck.;)</p>
<p>(But not nearly as much as the results of some of the other schools. :eek:) </p>
<p>The bottom twenty for senior results is what most would have expected with a few surprises. </p>
<p>50 Fla Memorial
49 U of West Ga
48 NCCentralU
47 EKyU
46 S. Alabama
45 Western Fla.
44 AppState U
43 Central Conn
41 Capital
41 West Texas A+M
40 UMass-Boston
39 UNew Mex
38 Lynchburg
36 Spring Arbor
36 U of Florida
35 U of Mobile
33 Utah St
33 Wofford
31 Colorado
31 Ithaca
30 Catholic</p>
<p>Chicago stays basically flat and Columbia is not included.</p>
<p>On the top twenty senior results Williams should be 3. My methodology is suspect also.</p>
<p>If there is something worthwhile to gain from this study and I'm not sure there is, it would only be if you believed teaching civics and other tested subjects was valuable . Then you could use the raw data to determine that Rhodes kids were the 25th highest as freshman but scored 14th highest as seniors. They learned something that helped them on the test. That's about all I see. </p>
<p>I am at least somewhat curious. Why the drop at some schools?</p>
<p>""It is a crisis, the report warns ... A majority of students also could not identify the Baath party as the main source of Saddam Hussein's political support in Iraq."</p>
<p>-How does having an understanding of the Iraqi political system matter AT ALL?"</p>
<p>I don't expect college to teach current events, but you couldn't not know this unless you spent the last four years avoiding any news programs at all.</p>