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Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

latimes.com

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Re: Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

#171

Post by jonbarker »

davidreiss wrote: post #144
aphextron wrote: post #84

The level of elitism in this thread is staggering. Should kids that are not at the top of their class be left to work in the salt mines? Do we just abandon the idea of educating people and make all universities a private "smart people only" club? The CSU system's mandate is to provide accessible education to all Californians . Ragging on them for working towards that goal makes no sense. The UC system is still the mo…

Saying college students should be able to pass remedial math and english tests isn't elitism. If you can't pass a basic remedial test in basic math and basic english how are you going to take college level courses? Where are you getting elitism from? Having some basic minimum standards isn't elitism. It's having standards.

It's elitism when you realize being born into the wrong school district and/or with the wrong parents may increase your chances of not being able to acquire those basic skills.

Re: Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

#172

Post by jonbarker »

kashkhan wrote: post #107
Nickersf wrote: post #59

Let's just drop meritocracy all together. Everything is subjective, right? Seriously though, I'm worried about our future as a spieces. The knowledge and technologies we have developed, which require nurturing. We nurture modern civilization by making sure the smartest get into positions where they can express their intellect. Part of that process needs to be keeping rigours standards in place when it comes to educat…

college and other education should be about adding learning to the recipients and not about measurement. People should learn things as they want, and not be required to meet arbitrary standards and degrees to obtain societal benefits. A hundred years ago ~1% of the people went to college. Now it's more than 50%. The societal function of college has changed.

In the industrial manufacturing based economy people could get good jobs without basic undergraduate 'skills'. Now in the knowledge economy, they can't.

Re: Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

#173

Post by strictnein »

mathattack wrote: post #160

This seems like they're focusing on the wrong metric. They look and say, "Graduates earn more money" and say "ok, for the best NPV, let's reduce the cost and increase the graduates". The problem is they mistake causality with correlation. If you focus strictly on graduation, without improving the students, then you will find that graduates will earn less. This same problem happens in high school - lowering the standa…

College graduation and home ownership were markers of success that were misinterpreted as the source of success.

Re: Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

#174

Post by aphextron »

PeterisP wrote: post #104
aphextron wrote: post #84

The level of elitism in this thread is staggering. Should kids that are not at the top of their class be left to work in the salt mines? Do we just abandon the idea of educating people and make all universities a private "smart people only" club? The CSU system's mandate is to provide accessible education to all Californians . Ragging on them for working towards that goal makes no sense. The UC system is still the mo…

The proper level of education doesn't really mean college education - having 100% people go from high school to college isn't a goal, shouldn't be a goal and is not a desirable thing in any way whatsoever. For many "life paths" that any society needs going to college is a good thing, and for many of them it's a bad thing, wasting many years. This education should be available for the people who choose it, and people…

>The proper level of education doesn't really mean college education - having 100% people go from high school to college isn't a goal, shouldn't be a goal and is not a desirable thing in any way whatsoever.

I guess that this is where we will have to disagree. I feel like this is the same sort of attitude that leads to "tracking" in schools, which can be devestating to ones educational future. We certainly do not need to enforce 100% equitable outcomes in higher education. But there is still a massive gap in equity of opportunity afforded to those who missed out on key skills in high school for one reason or another. These people should not be relegated to some vocational training program simply because they could not pass a multiple choice algebra quiz on entrance to a university.

Re: Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

#175

Post by mannykannot »

richardknop wrote: post #108
StanislavPetrov wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you are missing the point. For many years now, admissions standards have been so low that rather than teaching the courses they are scheduled to teach, college professors are forced to offer a remedial review of information that should have been mastered in high school. Many, if not most, high school graduates are functionally illiterate, lacking the basic reading and writing skills we took for granted in the rec…

Ha thanks. I am from Slovak Republic originally. I don't think our schools are that good to be honest but I think there is a stronger emphasis on math/physics and technical skills in schools in Eastern Europe. Probably historical reasons.

I have always thought (guessed, really) that it is because Eastern Europe (and, more recently, many parts of Asia) recognize something that the West sometimes forgets, even though that is where you will find the strongest evidence for it: technical competence can lead to radically better lives.

Re: Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

#176

Post by maxlybbert »

aphextron wrote: post #82
userbinator wrote: post #19

The hope is that these efforts will also help students obtain their degrees sooner — one of the public university system's priorities. Cal State has committed to doubling its four-year graduation rate, from 19% to 40%, by 2025. The implicit message here seems to be, "let everyone pass through the system regardless of how qualified they actually are, but we'll have to lower the bar to keep grades and graduation rates…

>The implicit message here seems to be, "let everyone pass through the system regardless of how qualified they actually are, but we'll have to lower the bar to keep grades and graduation rates high." No. You are completely missing the point here. Graduation requirements have not changed. Students still have to pass the same amount of classes. What this will do is allow students to have a shot at taking actual credit…

On the one hand, I remember my high school math teacher complaining about how colleges even had to offer remedial education (she considered it proof that high schools were generally failing to do their jobs).

On the other hand, I personally didn't go straight from high school to college, so I was given a particular placement exam, and when I passed it I was put in college algebra (instead of being allowed to take the next harder placement exam). It was clear to me after about a week that I remembered more math than the school thought I had. Of course, I should have tested out of the class and used the free time to take something that would have been more useful to me.

I wish the school had been less rigid about which math class they would allow me to take. But the obvious outcome with this policy change will be that students will have to decide which class to take, and some will get it wrong. Will they be allowed to fail? Will that help double the graduation rate? Will more classes simply include remedial material? If so, is that an improvement?

Re: Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

#178

Post by smelly_turd »

xienze wrote: post #6
oh_sigh wrote: post #2

"At Cal State, about 40% of freshmen each year are considered not ready for college-level work and required to take remedial classes that do not count toward their degrees." This is crazy to me. I'm not familiar with Cal State but do they just let anyone in who applies?

It's amazing that there's such a thing as remedial classes in a university, but hey, how else are we going to get an adequately diverse student body?

Go to community college like I did. I took a bunch of remedial classes that helped me prepare for university. I wasn't prepared for a real university education out of high school. But after 3 years of community college (2 major switches) I transferred to UCSD for CS and got by BS and am currently doing my masters.

I don't think lowering the standards is a good idea. I think we should fill the gap's in education left by high schools failing at their jobs.

Re: Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

#179

Post by talmand »

rtpg wrote: post #97
StanislavPetrov wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you are missing the point. For many years now, admissions standards have been so low that rather than teaching the courses they are scheduled to teach, college professors are forced to offer a remedial review of information that should have been mastered in high school. Many, if not most, high school graduates are functionally illiterate, lacking the basic reading and writing skills we took for granted in the rec…

I know the US system has its issues relative to other places, but I have never seen research showing that people are in fact worse going out. In fact, I feel like I've seen a study showing that the "new math" teaching methodologies that get parents so mad nowadays end up with kids being better at math...

Funny, my kids' math teachers have all stated to me, in public not whispers, they hate the "new math" and it is inhibiting them from teaching math correctly. Since I wasn't educated in the "new math" as a kid I have difficulties helping my children with their homework, which the teachers also admitted to being a problem. Typically I just show them how to solve the problem the way I learned and they pick it up much quicker.

To each their own I suppose.

Re: Cal State will no longer require math and English placement exams

#180

Post by such_a_casual »

userbinator wrote: post #19

The hope is that these efforts will also help students obtain their degrees sooner — one of the public university system's priorities. Cal State has committed to doubling its four-year graduation rate, from 19% to 40%, by 2025. The implicit message here seems to be, "let everyone pass through the system regardless of how qualified they actually are, but we'll have to lower the bar to keep grades and graduation rates…

> The implicit message here seems to be, "let everyone pass through the system regardless of how qualified they actually are, but we'll have to lower the bar to keep grades and graduation rates high."

This is how highschool was for me. I dropped out of a highschool with a 98% graduation rate. In that situation, no one cared if people were learning or even about what's best for the society or economy. For the school it's about building a system that gives them the desired numbers. Second anecdotal: Education has been giving girls better grades. There is a college in California that is famous for their animal science and veterinary programs. Girls don't want to work with big animals. So the school simply does not have enough people interested in big animals. They tried lowering the GPA requirement just so they could let enough boys into the program. This caused their school ranking to fall, and they immediately reversed the decision.

Schools are playing politics. Favoring girls in education has led to problems across the board as people just assume girls will want to do the same jobs at the same rate.

All anecdotal for sure. Definitely nothing conclusive. Just thought I'd add my 2 cents.

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