Here's one reason the Dems think they can succeed.

Gary K

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I've posted a few articles written by Walter E. Williams which he publishes on his mailing list, Something to Think About. This one is titled, Fraud in Higher Education. He makes a solid case with his argument that our educational system is a fraud on the American public. A very destructive fraud at that.

Fraud in Higher Education

This year's education scandal saw parents shelling out megabucks to gain college admittance for their children. Federal prosecutors have charged more than 50 people with participating in a scheme to get their children into colleges by cheating on entrance exams or bribing athletic coaches. They paid William Singer, a college-prep professional, more than $25 million to bribe coaches and university administrators and to change test scores on college admittance exams such as the SAT and ACT. As disgusting as this grossly dishonest behavior is, it is only the tiny tip of fraud in higher education.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, in 2016, only 37% of white high school graduates tested as college-ready, but colleges admitted 70% of them. Roughly 17% of black high school graduates tested as college-ready, but colleges admitted 58% of them. A 2018 Hechinger Report found, "More than four in 10 college students end up in developmental math and English classes at an annual cost of approximately $7 billion, and many of them have a worse chance of eventually graduating than if they went straight into college-level classes."

According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, "when considering all first-time undergraduates, studies have found anywhere from 28 percent to 40 percent of students enroll in at least one remedial course. When looking at only community college students, several studies have found remediation rates surpassing 50 percent." Only 25% of students who took the ACT in 2012 met the test's readiness benchmarks in all four subjects (English, reading, math and science.)

It's clear that high schools confer diplomas that attest that a student can read, write and do math at a 12th-grade level when, in fact, most cannot. That means most high diplomas represent fraudulent documents. But when high school graduates enter college, what happens? To get a hint, we can turn to an article by Craig E. Klafter, "Good Grieve! America's Grade Inflation Culture," published in the Fall 2019 edition of Academic Questions. In 1940, only 15% of all grades awarded were A's. By 2018, the average grade point average at some of the nation's leading colleges was A-minus. For example, the average GPA at Brown University (3.75), Stanford (3.68), Harvard College (3.63), Yale University (3.63), Columbia University (3.6), University of California, Berkeley (3.59).

The falling standards witnessed at our primary and secondary levels are becoming increasingly the case at tertiary levels. "Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses" is a study conducted by Professors Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa. They found that 45% of 2,300 students at 24 colleges showed no significant improvement in "critical thinking, complex reasoning and writing by the end of their sophomore years."

An article in News Forum for Lawyers titled "Study Finds College Students Remarkably Incompetent" cites a study done by the American Institutes for Research that revealed that over 75% of two-year college students and 50% of four-year college students were incapable of completing everyday tasks. About 20% of four-year college students demonstrated only basic mathematical ability, while a steeper 30% of two-year college students could not progress past elementary arithmetic. NBC News reported that Fortune 500 companies spend about $3 billion annually to train employees in "basic English."

Here is a list of some other actual college courses that have been taught at U.S. colleges in recent years: "What If Harry Potter Is Real?" "Lady Gaga and the Sociology of Fame," "Philosophy and Star Trek," "Learning from YouTube," "How To Watch Television," and "Oh, Look, a Chicken!" The questions that immediately come to mind are these: What kind of professor would teach such courses, and what kind of student would spend his time taking such courses? Most importantly, what kind of college president and board of trustees would permit classes in such nonsense?

The fact that unscrupulous parents paid millions for special favors from college administrators to enroll their children pales in comparison to the poor educational outcomes, not to mention the gross indoctrination of young people by leftist professors.
 

quip

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Here is a list of some other actual college courses that have been taught at U.S. colleges in recent years: "What If Harry Potter Is Real?" "Lady Gaga and the Sociology of Fame," "Philosophy and Star Trek," "Learning from YouTube," "How To Watch Television," and "Oh, Look, a Chicken!" The questions that immediately come to mind are these: What kind of professor would teach such courses, and what kind of student would spend his time taking such courses?

Professors of philosophy; philosophy prerequisites for underclassmen.

These are serious philosophical studies...made more trendy and interesting ....for what many current young students would consider otherwise dry, ancient and boring.

Learn your facts before posting please....you look like a cranky, old crack-pot

PS The rest was more/less a disorganized non seq.
 

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Professors of philosophy; philosophy prerequisites for underclassmen.

These are serious philosophical studies...made more trendy and interesting ....for what many current young students would consider otherwise dry, ancient and boring.

Learn your facts before posting please....you look like a cranky, old crack-pot

PS The rest was more/less a disorganized non seq.

So you're right and Walter E. Williams is wrong? Nope.
 

rocketman

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Professors of philosophy; philosophy prerequisites for underclassmen.

These are serious philosophical studies...made more trendy and interesting ....for what many current young students would consider otherwise dry, ancient and boring.

Learn your facts before posting please....you look like a cranky, old crack-pot

PS The rest was more/less a disorganized non seq.

Serious Studies! :rotfl: Please...More like ridiculous drivel disguised as actual academic studies, and it is absurd. Please don't try to make excuses for the absolute nonsense that our current acedemic community tries to pass off as actual education, the fact that you would attempt to defend it makes you look like the crack pot. :chuckle:
 

ok doser

lifeguard at the cement pond
Serious Studies! :rotfl: Please...More like ridiculous drivel disguised as actual academic studies, and it is absurd. Please don't try to make excuses for the absolute nonsense that our current acedemic community tries to pass off as actual education, the fact that you would attempt to defend it makes you look like the crack pot. :chuckle:

crack pot, probably

troll, definitely
 

quip

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so it's worse than I suspected - you not only can't read a well-written essay, you can't recognize one.

so sad

Well-written essay? :chuckle: it's an article: "I've posted a few articles written by Walter E. Williams which he publishes on his mailing list..."
An Opinion piece at best.

Walter is an economist, thus he's beyond his expertise in evaluating liberal arts courses.

As such, look at that spurious concluding paragraph:

The fact that unscrupulous parents paid millions for special favors from college administrators to enroll their children pales in comparison to the poor educational outcomes, not to mention the gross indoctrination of young people by leftist professors.

"Pales in comparison"....how so? (Unsupported ethical comparison, Apples/oranges)
"....not to mention".....not to mention this is an tangential, ill-informed comment.
 
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Gary K

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quip and Arthur Brain


I can't understand why you two are so eager to display your ignorance. An economist studies how human beings behave. That is the basis of economics for it looks at what people do in financial terms. How they spend, how they earn, their habits and practices of saving vs spending, etc.... It doesn't look at or presuppose motivations it just deals with behavior. The actual facts of behavior not suppositions.

This means only a part of an economics professors job is to teach math. The rest of what he teaches is based upon critical thinking skills and the ability to communicate clearly and effectively. Thus an economics professor is in a very good position to observe the skill levels of all the students that pass through his courses. And as Williams has been teaching economics now for decades he has had to watch this decline in the educational levels of his students deteriorating on a year by year basis.

That you guys think he's in no position to judge the critical thinking skills and ability to use the English language of his students is ludicrous. All you're doing by making the remarks you've made is demonstrate your own ignorance.
 

Sherman

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Reading op... Yes this problem is real. I run into young people that believe the silliest things. It is no small wonder that young adults can be convinced after watching a Youtube that the earth is flat. :noid: But that is a whole different discussion.
 

jgarden

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I've posted a few articles written by Walter E. Williams which he publishes on his mailing list, Something to Think About. This one is titled, Fraud in Higher Education. He makes a solid case with his argument that our educational system is a fraud on the American public. A very destructive fraud at that.

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Howe does the OP account for the large numbers of foreign students who continue to enroll in American colleges and universities - obviously the rest of the world doesn't share Walter E. Williams' views on the state of higher education in the US!

What is worthy of note is that for the first time in decades, the number of foreign students attending American universities and colleges has actually declined -
could it be in response to the rhetoric of the Trump Administration that makes them feel less than welcome!
 
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Gary K

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800.jpeg


Howe does the OP account for the large numbers of foreign students who continue to enroll in American colleges and universities - obviously the rest of the world doesn't share Walter E. Williams' views on the state of higher education in the US!

What is worthy kc note is that for the first time in decades, the number of foreign students attending American colleges and universities and colleges has declined = coinciding with the Trump Administration and its rhetoric than make foreigners feel less than welcome!



Julia Ward Howe? William Howe? Gordie Howe? Richard Howe? Elizabeth Howe? Art Howe? Which Howe?

So what if the world doesn't share his views? He's on the inside. They are on the outside looking in. Who knows better the real situation? Someone living outside the US who has always heard what US education is supposed to be? Or someone who knows what the reality is from the inside? Sears lived on their reputation as an ethical company that sold quality goods for a couple of decades after they abandoned their principles and went to just flat out ripping people off. They are now bankrupt.

Look at how much the corporate world has to spend annually just to get their new hires right out of college up to a level of skill that allows them to be at least semi competent. Corporations spend 1.7 billion dollars a year just to train the kids who just graduated from college! If our educational system is so good why do corporations have to spend that kind of money teaching their employees the things the educational system was supposedly teaching them for decade+? That points to a major fail by the educational system.

I went to a parochial school system up through high school. I then, after I graduated from high school, spent 10 years burning my brains out with drugs and alcohol. At the end of that time I walked into a college counseling department, took a battery of aptitude tests, and I scored in the high 90s percentile wise with my scores compared with the kids who had just graduated from public school the previous year. And I just walked in and took the tests with zero prep. No refreshment courses. I didn't look at a single textbook or any test prep at all. I hadn't even used what I learned in high school for the previous decade. So if the public school system was doing such a wonderful job of educating kids how did I manage to score that high after years of no study, no prep, and lots of drug use for a decade? I should have scored considerably lower as I goofed off all through high school. (All I had for a cumulative GPA in high school was a 3.5) While in high school I was far more interested in sports and girls than academics. Our public school system sucks.

When I went back to school in 2001 the majority of the kids in my classes were almost illiterate, and their critical thinking skills were nil. All they did in class was parrot what the teachers said. They showed no ability, or desire, to think on their own. I felt sorry for them as they were completely unprepared for life.

Take a look at the educational statistics world wide on the state of US education. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tan...14_stem_dot-2/

We used to lead the world in education. Now look at us. We're mid pack at best, and our educational system places more emphasis on political correctness than it does on critical thinking skills, by far. It's more focused on creating "safe spaces" for kids who have no idea how to deal with competing ideas. So what does that tell you about our educational system? It tells me that they are brainwashing kids, not teaching them to think. If they were teaching the kids to think for themselves there would be no need for "safe spaces" as the kids would think through the ideas not scream when they see ideas they have have been taught are not to be considered.
 

quip

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quip and Arthur Brain


I can't understand why you two are so eager to display your ignorance. An economist studies how human beings behave. That is the basis of economics for it looks at what people do in financial terms. How they spend, how they earn, their habits and practices of saving vs spending, etc.... It doesn't look at or presuppose motivations it just deals with behavior. The actual facts of behavior not suppositions.

This means only a part of an economics professors job is to teach math. The rest of what he teaches is based upon critical thinking skills and the ability to communicate clearly and effectively. Thus an economics professor is in a very good position to observe the skill levels of all the students that pass through his courses. And as Williams has been teaching economics now for decades he has had to watch this decline in the educational levels of his students deteriorating on a year by year basis.

That you guys think he's in no position to judge the critical thinking skills and ability to use the English language of his students is ludicrous. All you're doing by making the remarks you've made is demonstrate your own ignorance.

Ease up there sparky.
I'll admit that he has a point regarding the falling education standard at all levels (the statistics bear this out.). My beef was regarding his opinion over those particular Lib Arts courses and his subsequent overreaching conclusion. That last sentence is rather oddly out of place...
if only he'd isolated his opinion on the statistics....everything would've been just swell! :up:
 
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