Graduation Rates
While we are battling dropout rates and student achievement in middle and high schools across the country, colleges are beginning to have outrageous dropout rates that reach in to the 40 and 50% range. As of right now, colleges are awarded aid based on enrollment. In the article, David Leonhardt states that colleges are packing in classes for freshman with 60 and 70 or more students in a lecture hall and making it cheaper to run these classes. However, as these students progress, the class sizes begin to dwindle as concentrations offer specific classes, which are much more expensive than freshman seminars. The colleges therefore prefer less classes offered and there is no consequence for colleges who have so many dropouts at the sophomore and junior level. Legislation is trying to be pushed through that would force colleges to tie financial aid and other monies to their graduation rates rather than enrollment. Many of the students are not prepared to take college classes because of their secondary education, but it does not simply mean they should drop out. Our work force is being pushed to be better educated than previous generations but yet the educational system is defeating students who are not able to pay or simply become frustrated and quit. Still, more issues remain in the need for improving the drop out rate. The article suggests many students do not apply to the best schools they could get into. An all A student, 1200+ SAT score, does not apply to a notable school, instead they apply to the state college or technical school that does not fully challenge them. Additionally, it has become the norm to not graduate with a Bachelor's in 4 years. Students now take 5, 6, or 7 years to complete 120 credit hours. This lack of oversight and pressure to reach the finish line produces students who take 1 or 2 classes a semester and sometimes fail them and keep taking classes that are not pertinent to their education. I remember from my undergraduate degree that several students in my business classes were professional students. They had accumulated enough hours to have 3 or 4 bachelor's degrees, maybe even a master's degree, but did not want to move on in life so they stay just because. This only increases the laziness of our generation and produces people who are not able to fully take care of themselves and must rely on others, usually parents, to live, which was not a goal of this country only 10 to 15 years ago. We must continue to encourage our students every day to look at the long term and stop looking to the next minute, hour, or day. Tomorrow is never guaranteed but if we don't make the most out of today and prepare for tomorrow or next week or next year, our shortsightedness can kills us. Students must regain the focus of obtaining goals like going to college AND graduating and continuing on to do amazing things in life. If we want this next generation to be game changers, they must take responsibility and focus on finishing the race of high school, college, and life.
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Hello Cory,
ReplyDeleteI started reading your blog and thought, "O'man am I going to get blasted because I work a community colllege". In fact your blog points out some issues a lot of colleges are having. I am lucky that our graduation rate is pretty high, but for some that isn't the case. I don't think tying funding to it would serve a postive purpose because many community colleges are located in poorer areas of the cities were as you said the students foundation might not be as strong before entering.
As you know the difficult problem in college is making the students show up, I mean, if they want to skip they can. How can colleges with small staffs sit down with an adult and say, "Don't dropout". I mean they are adults and it is easy for them to drop classes and out of college via the internet in most cases so I sit down would be hard to do.
We know there is problem and as my boss says what is the solution. To me the solution is two things: 1) Better counciling services in all colleges and retraining of high school councilors so that they remember WHAT is needed to complete at the college level. Screen them or show an introduction video on college life. 2) Find one class that student is really interested in so he/she wants to come to class and have class building or college life building events.
We do this all the time and even within departmetns to make the students feel welcome on our campus. Lastly, the part about being lazy is somewhat true because as Seniors many of them took it easy and then going into college they have to relearn what homework is and test taking. They become fustrated and leave because it is work.
I too have seen the data regarding the number of students not graduating form college. I'm going to jump right in by asking the question, should they all have gone to college in the first place? Post secondary education has come to be viewed as a 4 year degree. There are other opportunites for young people to recieve training and career opportunities. We have a local electricians union that runs a very rigorous apprentice program. Students study in a classroom setting and recieve on the job training and pay. There are still campuses that offer 2 year degrees in healthcare support systems. Concerning the professional student. It is too bad that some people never seem to complete a program. I do feel that earning a degree in 4 years without taking summer sessions can be difficult. Scheduling and time constraints may make it necessary to stayat the college for more than 4 years. This was the situation during my undergraduate work as courses were not offered every semester and lab sciences occupied a considerable amount of time. It took a bit of juggling to meet the requirements without an additional semester.
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