By Professor
Doom
So, last year, Florida decided to fix the remediation scam in a childishly simple way: students
that didn’t want to take remedial courses no longer had to do so. Students are
customers, now, so shouldn’t have to do things they don’t want to do, or so
those who rule higher education believe. Now, it’s been long known that remediation doesn’t work, and instead screws students into
wasting years of their lives for nothing.
Trouble is, all those remedial students
greatly increase the rosters, and that means more of those sweet, sweet,
student loan checks that are responsible for administration’s grotesquely high
pay.
An institution with integrity would look
at a prospective student, one that all too frequently is only coming to campus
to pick up a check, and, once learning that the student is only able to think
at the 5th grade level, turn the student away, saying: “Accepting
you would be hurting you, and we can’t do that, because it’s wrong to take
advantage of you like this.” No, that never happens.
Instead, “Sign up!” says the
administrator, “Give us 3 months and we’ll totally make up all the work you
didn’t do for the last 7 years. It won’t be problem at all.” Years later, the
student is spit out, older for sure, but with nothing else to show for his time
but debt.
Because remediation is so useless, Florida
legislators got rid of it, but not via integrity. Instead of just not accepting
people who would only fail, the law was changed to allow the people to enroll
in college courses. Hey, if they were spending their own money, I’d be somewhat
ok with this, but if it’s taxpayer/loan money, I think it’s reasonable for
higher education to take the path of integrity.
Legislators clapped themselves on the
back for doing such a good job, while faculty (and common sense, to be fair) said
this would only increase the failure rate of college students, already rather
high.
That was a year ago, and now we have the
data. Enrollment in remedial courses dropped, of course. But what about those
pass rates in College Algebra? Recall, College Algebra was a remedial course
some 30 years ago, being basically the math students learned (and still learn,
at least in theory) in the 10th grade, but a stroke of an administrative pen
turned it into a college course. What happened when students that cannot perform at the 5th
grade level enrolled in the 10th grade course?
Now, that 55.7% is basically the national
average when it comes to pass rate. If you’re teaching a college course, and it
drops much below that, you get called by admin…and probably fired. Faculty know
this, and upon seeing the flood of unqualified students pouring into class,
reduced their standards…and still saw the pass rates drop sharply.
Folks, social promotion is a weak idea for
public schools, but makes no sense at the college level. If a student can’t do
the easy work, he’s probably not going to be able to do the hard work, either.
It’s not doing students any favors putting them in courses where we know
they’ll fail:
“The ramifications are multiple. In
the simplest case, the students retake the course, but retaking the course if
you still don’t have the proper preparation just means more money wasted.”
Taking a math
course you’re not prepared for is like taking an advanced course in Mandarin
when you don’t know the basics: you don’t know enough to get started, and so
you gain nothing from the course. Taking the course again isn’t going to help,
but that’s what students will do under the social promotion system.
“This isn't rocket science. If
students don't have the skills to complete a college course and you let them
take the course, there's a likelihood they'll fail the course,” he said.
“What did they expect? All along this legislation was questioned by experts in
the field.”
It’s queer that faculty aren’t quoted much
in this article, just administrators, who get to look real sharp with their
20/20 hindsight. Faculty were saying these sorts of things last year.
What also happens is students just decide
not to take the qualifying courses, and go through the whole college career
unable to the basic things; they cover up this fact by taking all the bogus
coursework administration offers, like Game of Thrones courses, or courses on Not Shaving, or Lady Gaga courses, among many other ridiculous
options. Then, after 5 or 6 years of strange coursework, these students become
stuck: they can’t take any courses that would let them get a good degree,
because they danced around the basic preparation courses:
And 47 percent of the students chose
not to retake any math at that time, which is one reason the college is
changing its policy on how long students have to retake a course, said
Patrick Rinard, St. Petersburg's associate vice president of enrollment
services.
Wow, that guy is “associate vice president
of enrollment services.” Goodness, what a fancy title for that fiefdom. I feel
the need to point out St. Petersburg’s college has around 30,000 students and
around 300 faculty…and yet they have so many vice presidents that they need associate vice presidents as well. The
United States has over 300,000,000 people in it, and still sees no need for an
associate vice president. Seriously, there are way too many administrators in
higher education. I probably should look at this place more closely later, since
they are “#1 in Online Education,” or so they say.
“One of the things we were noticing for those students was that a
certain percentage weren't enrolling the following term. They were choosing to
take other courses,” said Coraggio. “It's like their heads are in the sand.
They're putting it off.”
--Jesse Coraggio is “vice
president of institutional effectiveness and academic services” at St.
Petersburg College. The man’s title is five
times as long as his name. It’s amazing there are so many titles and
fiefdoms at this school. A town as big as this school would merit a mayor, and
not a busload of vice presidents…seriously, way too many administrators in
higher education.
One must appreciate the arrogance here.
“They’re putting it off,” says the high administrator. Students with no real
chance at college have been doing this sort of thing for decades, and only now
the administrator notices? Seriously, what’s wrong with saying “higher
education isn’t for you, would you please consider going to a vocational
school?” Not everyone needs to know the obscurities covered in higher
education…and the material is available online for anyone who wants it. All the
college offers is “credits,” slips of paper that assert…not much.
One must also appreciate the insincerity
here. The administrator is chastising students for “putting it off” when he
knows full well admin could, instead of screwing students into worthless
coursework, mandate that students must take the courses they need to progress
them towards a degree. You don’t need a state law for that, a single phone call
to the registrar’s office would fix it. Guess they don’t have a senior
associate junior assistant vice chancellor regent president provost deanling of
the Kingdom of Short Phone Calls who could handle that responsibility. Are
there really not enough administrators to handle this task?
Since faculty didn’t get the option to
speak about this (because it’s so easy to get it right after the fact that
administration took over), next time I’ll look at the comments section to
reveal some more obvious truths about the effects of social promotion at the
college level.
