Universities are broke. So let’s cut the pointless admin and get back to teaching | André Spicer "As students have been celebrating their exam results, pundits from across the political spectrum have been commiserating the state of British universities. Andrew Adonis, an education minister during the Blair years, has excoriated universities for offering costly courses while jacking up the pay of their senior leaders. Nick Timothy, Theresa May’s ex-advisor, thinks UK universities are an unsustainable “Ponzi scheme”. The universities minister, Jo Johnson, has written about the need to put further pressure on seats of higher learning so students get good value for money." More below. Behind the political point-scoring are more serious issues. The university sector has been growing for decades, but now that growth is going into reverse. The number of undergraduates applying to universities has fallen by 4% this year. Although close to 50% of the population goes through higher education, only about 20% of jobs require an undergraduate degree. One US study found that 46% of students showed no improvement in their cognitive skills during their time at university. In some courses, like business administration, students’ capacity to think got worse for the first few years. And after they graduated, many struggled to find full-time work while being loaded down with debt. Nearly a quarter of graduates were living with their parents or relatives."
Only 20% of jobs require a college degree, and about one-half of the 50% of high school students who go through higher education (that is the bottom half of the college cohort) show no cognitive, intellectual improvement. What a disaster. The problem is that only about 20% of the population has the intellectual capability to benefit from college. Another 5% or so are wealthy idiots for whom it does not matter if they can benefit, they are protected by family wealth. For the other half of the kids attending college, it is an expensive waste of time and money. The problem for these students is they do not have the intellect to take rigorous courses, so they are forced to take courses in majors with little future economic benefit, like majors in Gender Studies, Psychology, Sociology, English, Journalism, and Education. Worse yet, while colleges have been growing the growth has been in do-nothing administration, not education, or research. "Universities have been growing for a decade, but most of the resources fuelling that growth have gone into expanding university administration, not faculty. One US study found that between 1975 and 2008, the number of faculty had grown about 10% while the number of administrators had grown 221%." Colleges need a come-to-Jesus about these facts. They need to build a solid reputation as institutions which excel in teaching. Administrative bloat needs to be cut to 25% of what it is today. Except for research Universities, research and publication should be viewed as less valuable than excellence in teaching. Further, nonsense majors need to be culled, and colleges need to rethink their mandate. A final change would see the 4-year college degree shrunk to 3, with some transferable credits for high school students with specific AP, IB or college equivalent course work of up to 0.5 years, shrinking the total college experience to as little as 2.5 years of full-time residential college. There is little reason for students to spend the money on a four-year education today. The model we should adopt is the British model which combines a 3-year degree program with the school teaching students while the University conducts the testing once or twice per year. What this means is teachers cannot teach and then test course materials based only on what they believe to be important. The test materials can include all materials included in the syllabus requiring the teacher to teach the entire course material to the best of his ability. The British model has many benefits; the most important are it alters the relationship of the student and teacher. Today in the US the relationship is that students want the teacher to dumb down the courses, and test as easily as possible. Students pay much but learn little in this arrangement. It also means that teachers are pressured by student ranking schemes to make the course work and testing simplistic. The result is low-quality graduates with poor prospects in the work world. By shifting the testing to the University, the students are more likely to rank teachers based on how well, and thoroughly they taught the material and prepared the students for the test; this is how it should be. Further, students are more likely to find out teachers who are rigorous and who will work them hard to prepare for the test. It is possible to reduce a students college costs in some ways. Modern States offers one route: Modern States – Freshman Year for Free Another is for a student to complete the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme. Some Universities award up to a full year of credit for students completing these courses. AP courses often qualify for college credit. And some students can complete a year or two of high school at Community College or Univerisity. Obviously, these courses, if full college level or above will qualify for college credit. For the striver, University of London's International Programme offers a high-quality college diploma for about $10,000. A three year bachelors degree is a terrific idea The University of London International Programme choice is not for everyone, but about 60,000 students are enrolled in the program, and many will get the diploma.
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