Percentage of Community Colleges Treated Unfairly by Old Graduation Rates In the article, "Revised Data Shows Community Colleges Have Been Underappreciated," the author, Kevin Carey, believes that the methods for rating college success are outdated and inaccurate. He also believes that the old system of calculating graduation did not properly represent every student. The system that was set in place only calculated freshmen with full course loads and students who graduated within a six-year period. This calculation made sense for the typical four-year university student. These students are considered traditional students and don't account for the non-traditional students, as Carey points out. These students are older, some are parents,
In his essay, "Why Colleges Shower Their Students With A’s,” Staples claims that student grades are increasing for the wrong reasons, causing college degrees to become meaningless. Staples provides evidence that average grades have increased significantly over the last several decades, but claims that it is not because students are working harder. The real explanation for grade inflation, he argues, is the effect of grades on both students and their professors. Teachers give more A’s to receive better evaluations and increase job security. Students give more importance to their grades as a result of the rapidly increasing cost of a college education. Staples argues that modern
The main point to Caroline Bird’s article is that college has never been able to work its magic for everyone (15). I totally agree with this statement. Many of the high school graduates today are not mature enough to attend college immediately out of high school. Since they have been in school for thirteen years, students are thinking of some “me” time after graduation. They are not ready to settle down in a serious academic environment. My oldest daughter graduated from high school in the spring of 2009 then attended her first semester of college the following fall. She dropped out after her first semester because college was harder than she thought. She was working part-time in addition to going to school full time. There was always an outside distraction to keep her from her studies. Her grades were positive proof that students must be serious about college to gain something from attending to college.
The author Charles Murray says there are too many people going to college without really saying it. The essay is written in a way that his audience will understand by the time they finish reading that he has many valid points. He Persuades his readers with facts and counters arguments to false stereotypes involving college and success. By questioning whether college is for everyone makes "you" the reader want to rethink if your time spent in college was really worth it in the end.
This makes the paper very ineffective because to parents and other adults, these facts would not apply to them. His article has the potential to become much more effective if he also targets parents, teachers, and counselors because those adults are major influences in a student’s life. If he targets the teachers and counselors, they can start teaching the students that it is okay not to go to college. By integrating this idea into the school systems, the social norm would begin to change and many employers would possibly start looking more closely into the individual potential employees, not just their
African- American males have been underrepresented among college students and degree earners for years, however the reason for this is often misconstrued. The percentages of white high school graduates “In 1998-2000 had jumped to 46. However, only 40 percent of African-Americans and 34 percent of Hispanics in the same age group were attending college” (McGlynn, Angela Proviteira). The question then to pose, is why minority students are not succeeding in college compared to Caucasian students, “Only 47% of Black male students graduated on time
Pascarella, E. T., & Terenzini, P. T. (2005). How college affects students: Volume 2, a third
...ege might not be for everyone, for one reason or another- college does benefit its students. It gives young adults a place to transition into adulthood, to have a support system of friends and professors, and balance responsibility. The value of this, to a certain extent, is more than that of the actual education. Though colleges aren’t perfect, they do benefit students, and in turn satisfy the ever changing economic needs. A degree does not equal success, and college is not perfect for everyone- but all college students’ benefit from their education one way or another, creating worldly, accomplished young adults.
...is better, the Monitor’s Editorial Board said three times the amount of A’s are given out than used to be, which makes employers question the student’s education. Maybe the search for schools should not be by ranking; maybe it should be by the months and months of research that way the student knows they are getting the education that is right for them. And more of the education that the Monitor’s Editorial Board and I think students should get, an education that is full of critical thinking and a love for what the student is learning. My ideal education is a hands-on education that will last me not just through my college education, but will last me my entire life.
It seems as though the majority of college students these days aren’t looking to further their education because it’s what they really want, they do it to please their parents, to be accepted by society, or because there’s nothing else for them to do (Bird, 372). These expectations have led to students being unhappy and stressed, and have pushed them into a school or a job that they don’t particularly care for.
“SAT I: A Faulty Instrument for Predicting College Success.” Standardized Testing. Ed. Cynthia A. Bily. Detroit: Greenhaven, 2011. 106-11. Print.
My junior year of high school was filled with high emotions, stressful moments, and tension about where to apply to college and where I would be accepted and ultimately attend. At a “Making the Most out of your Sixth Semester” forum that year, the entire junior class experienced lectures from the school’s college resource counselors about how to prepare for this arduous battle of college admissions. The way Sue Biermert, who is the College Admissions Counselor at my high school, opened the forum was by asking a question to the parents that put everything into perspective: “How many of you parents feel like you are successful?” Every single hand shot up from the 500 parents in the auditorium. Of those that had their hands up, she asked, “How many of you parents received an Ivy League education?” Every hand went down. I could see friend’s mouths sit there in awe that getting an Ivy League education is not necessarily the greatest factor at having a good life. Even though these shocked students were the ones hoping to be accepted by Yale and Harvard, they all simultaneously recognized that going to an Ivy League school is not a guarantee for success in life. The reality about American culture is that success is the result of individual experiences that suit the needs of each person, not necessarily the prestigious institution of learning that one attends.
to about 83 percent of high school graduates enroll in some form of postsecondary education, but only about 52 percent of students complete their degrees. Further, a very small proportion of students complete a degree in four years—“among students starting at ‘four-year’ institutions, only 34 percent finish a B.A. in four years, 64 percent within six years, and 69 percent within eight and a half years.” Colleges always want students to graduate and support their alma mater. However this begins with deciding what student are mentally readiness and determination for the task that lies ahead, college. In today’s society we struggle trying to find a proper definition for college readiness. This is the main reason statistics and graduation rates suffer in the way that they do. Just because a high school student reaches the age of 18, obtains a high school diploma, and has functional literacy, does that really make students college ready?
GPA, SAT, and ACT may not be accurate when testing which student will succeed in college. Robert Sternberg, former president of the University of Wyoming and former dean of the School of Arts and Sciences at Tufts, has invented a method of testing the true talents of college applicants. The policy he uses is called Kaleidoscope. The basis from Kaleidoscope stems from Sternberg’s WICS (wisdom, intelligence, creativity, synthesized) and his Triarchic Theory. The concept this provides is to measure first-year academic success. The program is for the students that were on the bottom end of the economic spectrum, students that have learned other skills than just memorization and analytical thinking.
There was a little privacy in a community, and people identified one another according to the social role. Statistics show that underlie many of the world’s phenomena and understanding statistics can help one make better decisions. It stands to reason that being in college becomes hard in many ways: financially, academically, personally, socially, and physically. Simple reminders of the reasons why people want to get a college degree. can help you on track when you feel like getting it
Exit Exams are an unfair way of determining whether a student should or should not receive his or her diploma. Most students work very hard throughout high school to receive good grades. This should be enough to determine whether a student should pass high school. There are many intelligent students which do not have good test taking skills, exit exams keep many good students from graduating and teachers have to narrow their lesson plans for these types of exit exams. These are all good reasons why exit exams should not be required in graduating from high school.