Washington Post:
In an era when college students commonly take longer than four years to get a bachelor's degree, some U.S. schools are looking anew at an old idea: slicing a year off their undergraduate programs to save families time and money.
Want to reply to a comment? Hint: Click "Reply" at the bottom of the comment; after being approved your comment will appear directly underneath the comment you replied to
Wasn't there an article here just a couple of weeks ago about 2 year community colleges giving out 4 year degrees?
In America the true meaning of quality higher education has already joined the endangered species list. Now a day, universities and colleges have turned into a machine operating like a corporation where "outputs" (production rate) is more important than the quality graduates. In other words, it's all about "quantity" and very little about "quality" - if any.
Administrators at universities these days are more like politicians than educators. Their goal and mission have every thing to do with money and nothing to do with education. Let's take the University of Portland (Oregon) for example. My neighbor's boy went there and said it's a joke. He spent most of his four-year college education on ROTC, which paid for his degree (courtesy of taxpayers). A big chunk of dollars the University gets from the Fed (through ROTC) and to cement this relationship, the University brought onboard a retired Air Force colonel as the VP of Information Technology.
All in all, the US universities and colleges are operating more like a for-profit-business organization than an educational institution. For research universities, the faculty are pressured to bringing grants and funds, of which the majority ends up in the pockets of useless administrative and supporting "functions", like nice lawns.
For-profit businesses don't depend on tax dollars. The good ones, anyway.
Your statement is invalidated by the strong existence of Halliburton, Blackwater, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon and alike.
I'm not sure why you're making an issue of a retired AF Colonel becoming the VP of IT. A typical AF Colonel will have multiple master's degrees, possibly a doctorate, 20 to 30 years experience in the field, and management and leadership responsibilities for tens of millions of dollars of resources and hundreds of personnel. For a typical Army, Navy, AF or Marine O-6 stepping in as a manager at a major university would be a career step-down and a valuable pick up for the school.
The point was the University of Portland (a private institution) gets a large chunk of money from taxpayers through ROTC, which has little interests in the students education but rather the use of the students for military purposes. The appointment of the AF colonel for a high-paying position is undoubtedly a "kick-back" for his lobbying performance on behalf of the University.
The mission of education is no longer the focal point for many private (and public) universities and colleges in the US. Budget problem is a perpetuate excuse the administrators use to pay faculty low while keeping their own salaries (and their cronies') high. They insist on having a $10,000 mahogany office furniture for their own office while claiming no money to fix the leaking roof in the classroom.
Many of private higher-learning institutions function more like a very expensive "post-adolescent child care center" for the rich. Education takes the back seat while social connection and activities are promoted at these institution. George W. Bus h is the prime example and a product of such education. And look at the disasters he has brought us.
That is only if you think of a university as a boot camp (te rrorist camp) training students to be a bunch of ki!!ers. Only then the presence of 'retired' military officers would be "useful" in a higher-learning institution. As to your comment on "career step-down", it would be a "step-down" for any higher-learning institution to be con.tamina
Why is my first thought, this has nothing to do with students? The three year degree will allow the colleges to educate more students providing more revenue. Any cost savings to the student will be taken back with price increase and inflation.
A common say that comes to mind when this 3-year degree idea pops up: "GAR BAGE IN, GARB AGE OUT".
Education is a PROCESS. The concept of instant coffee does NOT work for education. No good education would materialized by just adding water and hope it'll work. The cost of college education keeps rising not because the teachers get higher pays but the college/university gets "f a t t e r". Yes, the personnel budget get wasted mostly on poor management and incompetence among the administrators and support staff. Take IT function as an example, I used to go to a university where those guys at IT were a complete waste of money: they were a collection of the most id iotic, arrogant, insecure, self-serving, laz iest group of people I'd ever seen. I felt like my tuitions get wasted on these people. Universities pay teachers low and charge the students high. If any one who pass first grade math would know where the 'f a t' concentrated.
So, to make education a meaning experience, the minimum of four years must be maintained AND the useless administrators and staff must be cut.
I respectfully disagree. I hated having to take courses such as Physics & Philosophy that had NOTHING to do with my major OR minor or prepared me in any way to prepare for a career in my chosen major. I found the courses to be a colossal waste of my time and very limited financial resources. I don't fancy the idea that for the next 20-30 yrs I will be paying back student loans for courses I learned NOTHING from and contributed NOT AT ALL to assisting me in preparing to find a job in my chosen field. A 3yr degree specific to one's major is a very good way to go for those of us who simply don't have the $$$ resources to waste on unnecessary courses.
Works only if you know what you want to do going in. College is supposed to be about self-discovery and examining areas that you might not know existed when you entered at 18. Some of the courses that had the greatest impact on my career and the way I think were those that had nothing to do with my major. The art courses, music courses, government courses made me a much broader thinker. I can't imagine what I would be like today if I had not taken them.
You sound like someone who would and should go to a trade school instead of a university.
University education is all about preparing for the FUTURE at a larger scale and to enable the students to learn how to learn. The curriculum is NOT to be designed by the students. It's like a child thinks he or she knows what's best for them during his or her infancy. Then again, the child can always spit out what he or she doesn't want to eat. But (s)he shouldn't expect to grow either.
There are students who spend more money on their shining chrome-plated wheels (on their shinny SUVs) than on their books. Yet they complain the lack of fund for their education. Also, there are lots of students who get high on drugs more often than "cracking" their books.
College education should NOT be for EVERY ONE.
So much for broadening your perspective and challenging yourself to grow some.
We have to be careful that our colleges and universities remain institution don't become trade schools. The requirement that students take a broad range of courses has helped our country produce generations of innovative and diverse thinkers which translates into this country still being the leader in technology, science, arts and a great number of fields. If we cut short the opportunity for student to learn we will cut short our nation's potential for success.
We could become like much of Europe where there is a 3/2 program. Students receive a very basic degree in three years and take more advanced level courses the last two years which will prepare them for higher positions and entrance into advanced degree programs.
If we cut college by a year we are going to create a new under/sub-class of students The most privileged and those destined for greater things will get more education and another class will get less. This will only serve to further stratify our society.
Most of the major innovators in our country didn't need to have a history of art class in order to invent light bulbs, cars, airplanes, telephones, or computers. A liberal arts education is great, but not necessary for people to be successful. More people in Europe go to trade schools than go to university because their education system is more practical and actually less egalitarian than ours. There is far more recognition of differences in ability, and their education system is tailored to meet that difference where most coursework in secondary education in the US is standardized across the board.
At a very early age European children begin taking tests that in large part determine their economic and social strata. The problem is that children mature at all different ages. So much potential is lost as bright children who don't perform well on the early exams are put into trades and not given an academic chance. Yes, there are people who become accomplished without an education, but those from the finest institutions are still the most fully represented at the top of society. Further education provides something more than just job training; it creates a diverse and enlightened citizenry.
A 3 year degree would only take Palin... 5.
Tuition has to come down. The prices are a joke.
The government needs to stop with the subsidized loans and scholarships. These programs cause tuition to increase by destroying the price optimization mechanism. If tuition prices increase, less people will demand to go to college at the new price. If people are given more money to pay for the increased tuition, more people will demand the education. If there is no negative pressure on the price, it will continue to increase so long as people are willing to pay it.
Agreed. If the government wants to subsidize education, they should only reimburse for the very cheapest college in the state, or at least the one that has the lowest cost structure. No subsidized tuition to attend high, priced gold plated institutions built with our tax dollars and wasted.
Nooooooooo
Bluto ... is that you ?
Looking at this article, the idea behind this is to model our schools on the Cambridge/Oxford 3-year plan. However, those English students have had a much more rigorous secondary education than the average American kid. They are also a little older when they enter university. So if this is going to work, and preserve the same level of academic achievement and maturity at graduation, high school is going to have to change dramatically, maybe get a year longer. That is not going to save states any money.
Further, the exams to get into Cambridge/Oxford are not SAT type tests that assesses "potential," but a series of proficiency oriented exams. You are absolutely accurate about the secondary education difference.
With a 3-year plan tuition will actually rise, not fall, because considerably more faculty will have to be hired to make sure courses necessary for the major are offered more frequently.
And the move to a 3-year degree plan is ultimately just an excuse for universities to raise the tuition rate per year. If you really believe hard-strapped universities entering an extended depression are going to settle for 3/4 of their current tuition yield you are hopelessly naive.
Just what college students need! To get thrown out into the dismal job market a year sooner. I would prefer to postpone it as far as possible--maybe even get a masters or PhD under my belt if possible. But all kidding aside, why not cut ALL of college out of the curriculum if you think it is a waste of time and money? These are the years when young lives need to learn as much as possible and have the ability to do so. Get as many college years as possible.
No one is forced to graduate, one applies to graduate. And one does not need to quit going to school after three years and a degree, nor should they. One simply does not necessarily need four years to accomplish the course work for some degrees. If the magic number is 128 credits, you enter with 18, take a few summer classes, you have it done in three years with a concentrated course load. It has nothing to do with learning less, just working harder.
This is just a scam, to make more money in the long run.
Simply another Republican conservative and neocon plot to reduce the education level of Americans. What do you think they want cut from the cirricula? Of crouse. They want to eliminate the broad liberal education and training in how to think. The more uneducated, unthinking, uncritical students graduate the better it suits the Republican agenda.
Did you read the article? This is a higher education program (which is not a requirement) and it will be optional. Sad, because students will lose some benefits of a liberal education but it's not some Republican plot either, come on.
you have a good point there. The GOP needs voters!
No one is forced to graduate after 3 years. People that want to continue college have that option. A student is required to apply for graduation when he/she is ready, not before. Does everything in your world involve a partisan bent?
I think it's a great idea to have a 3-year program as an option for some students. It will be a challenge to ensure a quality educational experience. In retrospect, it probably would not have worked for me when I started by college education -- I was too busy working and "finding myself" but there are certainly young people (and older people) who are more focused than I was. We need to keep searching for alternatives that might cost less or take less time without writing them off as unworkable.
One year is what it will come to. Real skills in a single area of interest.
College is a luxury that is fast becoming overly expensive and painfully unnecessary.
Spoken like a true Texan.
I was a student at Bates College in the early 1970's. I started out thinking I would go for the three year plan-but quickly found that the four year course of study was demanding enough. There were about 20 students or so if I am remember who were able to manage but it was no picnic and this is how it should be-we don't want the college degree to mean even less-no watering down.
Not really. The luxury is the military and war. Cost of college probably stable compared other costs for many, many decades. The escalating cost that is sucking money away from everything else is the military budget, war and the greedy, insatiable appetites of the war industry complex. Other escalating cost is that cost for government is increasingly being transferred down the economic scale to working families while corporations and the wealthy are paying less and less taxes.
Not sure about this. Yes, the 2 years of electives can seem like a bit much, but it takes 4 years for people who enter college at age 18 to grow up and mature, and be mentally ready for a job.
facepalm.j
Loading comments…
First Posted: 05-23-09 01:03 PM | Updated: 05-23-09 01:12 PM