Let's Ditch Gen Eds

[kiana]

Muddy? Just because people have different opinions doesn't mean they haven't been clearly expressed.

As has been noted, it seems that a certain rationale for gen eds is to fill in the gaps for poor high schools, here's an option, (which might fit some of the comments in this thread). Make a gen ed year, which is intended to be basically remedial, but have prospective students take tests which allow them to skip the "gen ed year" if they do well enough. This would allow the gen ed courses to be targeted at the level students need, and people who had a decent high school experience demonstratably wouldn't need them.

Would the year be an all-or-nothing thing? Or would someone who was missing only one of the components be allowed to enroll in other courses while remediating?

[marshwiggle]

Muddy? Just because people have different opinions doesn't mean they haven't been clearly expressed.

As has been noted, it seems that a certain rationale for gen eds is to fill in the gaps for poor high schools, here's an option, (which might fit some of the comments in this thread). Make a gen ed year, which is intended to be basically remedial, but have prospective students take tests which allow them to skip the "gen ed year" if they do well enough. This would allow the gen ed courses to be targeted at the level students need, and people who had a decent high school experience demonstratably wouldn't need them.

Would the year be an all-or-nothing thing? Or would someone who was missing only one of the components be allowed to enroll in other courses while remediating?

Good question. Maybe if they only need a course or two, it could be worked into their normal program. Of course if it were a specific prerequisite then it would delay any subsequent course.

(Or, in Jedi-mind-trick style, if there were courses they were exempted from they could take some of their program courses "early", during the gen ed year.)

[mleok]

The business model that struggling colleges have wedded themselves to requires students to pay for eight semesters of tuition (albeit heavily discounted from sticker price) and four to six semesters of room and board. They don't want to give up the program and auxiliary revenue they think comes from a year's worth of gen ed courses.

In an example of the Prisoner's Dilemma, I think that if only a small number of institutions do this, those institutions would make up for less years of tuition per student (but possibly at a lower discount rate per year), by having more students go through, as they would attract students that might otherwise have gone to institutions that require an additional year of general education. In the steady state, yes, there would likely be a contraction of the higher education industry, but we already knew that was going to happen. Having said that, maybe some of that shortfall would be mitigated by more students taking up higher education that might have otherwise pursued vocational training at for-profit institutions due to the lower opportunity cost.

[mleok]

I just did this because the conversation gets so muddy.

Muddied by literally everyone who disagreed with you? It doesn't matter how many threads you start, it doesn't change the fact that your opinion that general education in its current form is desirable and sustainable is rather isolated opinion.

[hazelshade]

In contrast, I have yet to come across any student who has told me they have chosen to enroll at any university because of their general education requirements.

Huh. Did you ever talk to folks who chose to enroll at, say, Chicago or St. John's?

[mleok]

In contrast, I have yet to come across any student who has told me they have chosen to enroll at any university because of their general education requirements.

Huh. Did you ever talk to folks who chose to enroll at, say, Chicago or St. John's?

I don't think Chicago still offers a Great Books program, although St. John's does. But, even then, that's a very prescriptive general education sequence, quite unlike the watered down "general education" requirements that most universities require. I think that if something is important enough to be required of every student, then well, it should be required of every student, as opposed to having countless possible ways of satisfying the requirements.

[Wahoo Redux]

What about 4-year unis offering associate degrees? 

Or allowing free "gen eds" from any department (someone mentioned this earlier).

Of course, all those would take all sorts of administrative, BoT, and HEC stuff, but maybe American colleges should offer a focused two-year degree?

Would the prestige of an associates degree suffer?

[hazelshade]

In contrast, I have yet to come across any student who has told me they have chosen to enroll at any university because of their general education requirements.

Huh. Did you ever talk to folks who chose to enroll at, say, Chicago or St. John's?

I don't think Chicago still offers a Great Books program, although St. John's does. But, even then, that's a very prescriptive general education sequence, quite unlike the watered down "general education" requirements that most universities require. I think that if something is important enough to be required of every student, then well, it should be required of every student, as opposed to having countless possible ways of satisfying the requirements.

To be clear, I was trying to give a few examples of institutions with the strongest versions of general education curricula, where the St. John's Program is perhaps ludicrously strong and Chicago's Core is unusually strong (though I suppose that any alum will tell you that it's way looser than it was when they attended). I wasn't calling out Great Books programs specifically, which Chicago's Core stopped being long before I attended.

[marshwiggle]

What about 4-year unis offering associate degrees? 

What would this improve?

Or allowing free "gen eds" from any department (someone mentioned this earlier).

What would this improve?

Of course, all those would take all sorts of administrative, BoT, and HEC stuff, but maybe American colleges should offer a focused two-year degree?

What does "focused" mean? What would this improve?

Would the prestige of an associates degree suffer?

Why would this happen? What is the source of the prestige of an associates degree?

Without knowing the rationale for these suggestions, it's hard to evaluate whether they make sense. (And for people from outside the US, the "associates degree" is unfamiliar.)

[spork]

Yeah, sure why not, and let's see what happens, BUT only if the much more useless things that a university harbors, gets ditched, too.

Good Point. Here controversy: How about we ditch the climbing walls/lazy rivers/high rise luxury apartment-dorms/empty buses cruising campus every 15 minutes/athletic departments/bloated administrative bureaucracy of assistants to the assistants of the assistants...

Downsizing to core operations is discussed in the last two sections here.

Given the high cost of post-secondary education, the best definition of "core operations," in my opinion, is "specialized training in knowledge and skills considered valuable, if not necessary, for particular careers." I.e., if an 18- or 24-month post-high school education in dental hygienist work is demonstrated to be sufficient for becoming a competent dental hygienist, then there is no reason to require 6 to 12 months of college courses that are unrelated to dental hygiene.

My alma mater had an approach very close to the above. The standard first year was spent acquiring the foundation in math, physics, chemistry, and biology that was common across nearly all the majors that students sorted into after the first year. There was a gen ed humanities requirement that students had to complete over the whole four years, but the student population was such that it was much more able and willing to benefit from those courses than the typical college student population.

The business model that struggling colleges have wedded themselves to requires students to pay for eight semesters of tuition (albeit heavily discounted from sticker price) and four to six semesters of room and board. They don't want to give up the program and auxiliary revenue they think comes from a year's worth of gen ed courses.

In an example of the Prisoner's Dilemma, I think that if only a small number of institutions do this, those institutions would make up for less years of tuition per student (but possibly at a lower discount rate per year), by having more students go through, as they would attract students that might otherwise have gone to institutions that require an additional year of general education. In the steady state, yes, there would likely be a contraction of the higher education industry, but we already knew that was going to happen. Having said that, maybe some of that shortfall would be mitigated by more students taking up higher education that might have otherwise pursued vocational training at for-profit institutions due to the lower opportunity cost.

I have long advocated the "shorten the pipeline to a bachelor's degree, but widen the pipe" approach at my own employer, and this argument goes nowhere.

[mythbuster]

I will mention again. Brown University. An Ivy League Institution that has no gen eds, distribution requirements, whatever you want to call them. This is one of the reasons they were the "hot" Ivy in the early 1990s. Doesn't seem to have hurt them in the slightest.

[Wahoo Redux]

What about 4-year unis offering associate degrees? 

What would this improve?

Or allowing free "gen eds" from any department (someone mentioned this earlier).

What would this improve?

Of course, all those would take all sorts of administrative, BoT, and HEC stuff, but maybe American colleges should offer a focused two-year degree?

What does "focused" mean? What would this improve?

Would the prestige of an associates degree suffer?

Why would this happen? What is the source of the prestige of an associates degree?

Without knowing the rationale for these suggestions, it's hard to evaluate whether they make sense. (And for people from outside the US, the "associates degree" is unfamiliar.)

Do you not have associate's degrees in Canada?

The degree signifies two years of college coursework.  The degree is usually conferred by a community college in America.

If the issue is cost because of time-to-degree, why not give students an option for the 2-year degree?  They can still get the university name and motto on the diploma just in half the time for half the cost.  I suppose we could also have certificates, which would be even less time.

My idea would be to have these associates degrees concentrated in the student's major.  So in other words, kid wants a business degree, just have the kid take two years of business courses (because I imagine this is who is complaining the most although I have no evidence of this).  Kid wants to be a writer, two years of creative writing.  Could we produce bona fide engineers in two years?  Whatever, you get the picture. 

Kids who just "want a job" can opt for the 2 year degree that qualifies them for "a job."  Just reduce the degree to the "core operations."

Kids who want to be "educated" can opt to do the 4 or 5 year degrees with all the "rounding" classes that make them "educated."

I suspect that, if my imaginary scenario took place, the associate's degree would be the "less prestigious" and maybe limiting degree (knowing how people think) and the bachelor's would be the more valuable degree, so maybe students with my imaginary associate's would suffer less financial burden but find themselves not as marketable as the students with the well-rounded bachelor's.  That's the way these degrees live now in the world.

I'm completely spit-balling here since I don't think anyone important (or unimportant, for that matter) has suggested this----and I can only imagine the bureaucracy involved in designing said degrees----but I am wondering why we haven't done this yet.  It just seems like it would solve a lot of problems.

[spork]

I will mention again. Brown University. An Ivy League Institution that has no gen eds, distribution requirements, whatever you want to call them. This is one of the reasons they were the "hot" Ivy in the early 1990s. Doesn't seem to have hurt them in the slightest.

Perhaps there is evidence that the college students most likely to benefit from gen eds are those least likely to "need" them.

[mleok]

If the issue is cost because of time-to-degree, why not give students an option for the 2-year degree?  They can still get the university name and motto on the diploma just in half the time for half the cost.  I suppose we could also have certificates, which would be even less time.

My idea would be to have these associates degrees concentrated in the student's major.  So in other words, kid wants a business degree, just have the kid take two years of business courses (because I imagine this is who is complaining the most although I have no evidence of this).  Kid wants to be a writer, two years of creative writing.  Could we produce bona fide engineers in two years?  Whatever, you get the picture. 

Kids who just "want a job" can opt for the 2 year degree that qualifies them for "a job."  Just reduce the degree to the "core operations."

Kids who want to be "educated" can opt to do the 4 or 5 year degrees with all the "rounding" classes that make them "educated."

I suspect that, if my imaginary scenario took place, the associate's degree would be the "less prestigious" and maybe limiting degree (knowing how people think) and the bachelor's would be the more valuable degree, so maybe students with my imaginary associate's would suffer less financial burden but find themselves not as marketable as the students with the well-rounded bachelor's.  That's the way these degrees live now in the world.

I'm completely spit-balling here since I don't think anyone important (or unimportant, for that matter) has suggested this----and I can only imagine the bureaucracy involved in designing said degrees----but I am wondering why we haven't done this yet.  It just seems like it would solve a lot of problems.

Students don't want a 2 year associates degree with a university's name on it, they want a 3 year bachelor's degree that opens up exactly the same doors as a 4 year degree program. For reference, the UK and Europe have 3 year bachelor's degrees.

In the spirit of unbundling, universities should offer a focused 3 year program that concentrates exclusively on the major requirements, and then add a "general education" certificate program for those who want to be "educated." Only then can we actually determine if "general education" and so called transferrable skills are truly valued by students and employers.

[marshwiggle]

Do you not have associate's degrees in Canada?

The degree signifies two years of college coursework.  The degree is usually conferred by a community college in America.

Colleges issue diplomas; universities issue degrees. Colleges are essentially vocational. (In a couple of provinces, colleges can also offer pre-university academics.)

My idea would be to have these associates degrees concentrated in the student's major.  So in other words, kid wants a business degree, just have the kid take two years of business courses (because I imagine this is who is complaining the most although I have no evidence of this).  Kid wants to be a writer, two years of creative writing.  Could we produce bona fide engineers in two years?  Whatever, you get the picture. 

There's no way you could produce engineers in two years; there are course sequences of 5 or 6 courses.

(There are vocational programs like "engineering technologist", which are shorter, but those aren't engineers.)

Kids who just "want a job" can opt for the 2 year degree that qualifies them for "a job."  Just reduce the degree to the "core operations."

Kids who want to be "educated" can opt to do the 4 or 5 year degrees with all the "rounding" classes that make them "educated."

When there is a "college" (i.e. vocational) program for something where there exists a "university" (i.e. academic) program with a similar name, the first is not a subset of the second. Furthermore, the individual courses are different.

So, a vocational Basketweaving program and an academic Basketweaving program may both have a "Middle Easter Baskets" course. The vocational one will be more hands-on, probably requiring students to weave 3 different middle eastern baskets, but will not have much history of middle eastern basket making. The academic course, if it doesn't have a lab, may not even require weaving a single basket, but may cover historical development of baskets, regional variations, etc.

There are some "articulation agreements" which potentially allow a graduate of a college program to complete a university degree after in a shorter time. I've occasionally been asked to review the college course descriptions to see which of the university courses can be skipped because of the college courses.  It's never a 1:1 match, as illustrated by my example above. If a college course covers 80% of the material in a university course, that's great. 40%-60% is more common. If there's not a subsequent course, the college course may be OK. But if it's supposed to be a prerequisite for something else, it may not suffice.

In practice, very *few students take this path, because college and university serve different audiences. Again, using my example above

• college students will find the university course too esoteric and abstract
• university students will find the college course too narrow and specific

and they're both correct for what they're after.

*Honestly I only get one every few years in my courses.