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Study: College Students Not Learning Much

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Re: Study: College Students Not Learning Much

#21

Post by sidek »

lifestyleigni wrote: post #8

I have a problem with the metrics they use: 20 pages of writing, or 40 pages of reading They are going on the assumption that increased pages of writing and increased pages of reading is a metric for amount learned. There are so many lurking variables at play here. The attribution of cause and effect here to these arbitrary variables is an over simplification fallacy of what's really going on and why.

Also, 20 pages of, say, Spivak's Calculus is simply more than , say, 20 pages of Michel de Montaigne essays.

Re: Study: College Students Not Learning Much

#22

Post by dspeyer »

mkross wrote: post #10
guywithabike wrote: post #2

Maybe the problem is not the college, but the slacker kids who skim by with the bare minimum effort. I'm always amused when the kids who used to tease me for taking college seriously post Facebook statuses like, "omg y cant i get a job?!?!"

"Them darn kids aint learnin cuz they aint tryin!" Let's consider the assumption that between 36% and 45% of all undergrad students are slackers. Sure, a bunch of students aren't learning because they are slackers, but why there are SO MANY of them? Are there more slackers as a percentage of the population than in the past? Is the internet/cell-phone/facebook era changing the mentality of students to be more focused…

Universities don't do much to encourage students to work hard.

You'll pass no matter what, and in many places can get an A by just cramming for the final. Worse, many classes adjust grading standards based on how students are doing, so anyone who studies hard is betraying their classmates.

Fraternities are given official support while study groups are left to fend for themselves (not that much support is needed, but it would be a nice gesture). A football team that wins a championship can expect official schoolwide celebration, which no intellectual achievement would produce.

People are influenced by social pressure. Children are especially influenced. And the pressures aren't really pushing toward learning.

(A secondary conclusion is that if you want to learn a lot at college, your first act should be to find a network of friends who do value learning.)

Re: Study: College Students Not Learning Much

#23

Post by nocipher »

adambourg wrote: post #19

These people are idiots. 2300 college students interviewed... Think about that for 1 minute. That's a sample of less then 10% the size of my university. There are hundreds or even thousands of schools with over 10,000 students. Where has this sample been taken? What colleges? How diverse was the population? Socio-economic statuses? These are all big concerns I have with this statistic. Also, what are they measuring?…

Statistically, you do not need a certain percentage of the population you are surveying to obtain good results. There are other factors used to determine the required sample size to achieve results with a given level of confidence. See the article below if you're interested in the details.

Organizational Research: Determining Appropriate Sample Size in Survey Research http://www.osra.org/itlpj/bartlettkotrlikhiggins.pdf

Re: Study: College Students Not Learning Much

#25

Post by Homunculiheaded »

kenjackson wrote: post #5

One problem is there is no incentive on the part of the college to teach much. I've long advocated that we need output measures for colleges. Colleges are rated on their input measures -- how competitive is it to get into the school. But no measure of how effective they are at teaching. As of today no one can really say where (on average) you'll learn more/better -- at Harvard or Ohio State. All we know is that Harva…

I work in academia, and have also worked in private industry. One of the largest problems with academia is that there is no easily quantifiable metric of success. In the private world a good indicator that you're doing something right is that you're making money. In state schools this is complicated further because budgets are based on something entirely independent of performance. For example the state school I work at has the highest enrollment ever, and our 6 year graduation rate is up, but this is going to be the worst year yet for budgets in a while. There simply exists no reward/punishment system that encourages good behavior and discourages bad. Even tenure works the opposite of its intended effect: the value of life long job security is inversely proportional to how valuable you think your skills are to other people (if you're top in the world any org you work for should be begging to keep you, if you think you're the bottom of the barrel you'll fight tooth and nail to earn virtually permanent employment). The only exception to this is research, where grants can serve as a good reward system, unfortunately this only creates a further imbalance in that research is rewarded but teaching is not.

In short incentives in higher ed are random, if not flat out reversed. The only motivator for good educators is personal passion.

Re: Study: College Students Not Learning Much

#26

Post by idm »

adambourg wrote: post #19

These people are idiots. 2300 college students interviewed... Think about that for 1 minute. That's a sample of less then 10% the size of my university. There are hundreds or even thousands of schools with over 10,000 students. Where has this sample been taken? What colleges? How diverse was the population? Socio-economic statuses? These are all big concerns I have with this statistic. Also, what are they measuring?…

> These people are idiots. 2300 college students interviewed... Think about that for 1 minute.

Common sense is no substitute for an intro stats class. 2300 is plenty.

Re: Study: College Students Not Learning Much

#28

Post by copper »

reader5000 wrote: post #7
kenjackson wrote: post #5

One problem is there is no incentive on the part of the college to teach much. I've long advocated that we need output measures for colleges. Colleges are rated on their input measures -- how competitive is it to get into the school. But no measure of how effective they are at teaching. As of today no one can really say where (on average) you'll learn more/better -- at Harvard or Ohio State. All we know is that Harva…

I think 80% of modern college value-added is signalling. Employers should really just accept SAT scores directly, although I'm not sure if that's legal. It would certainly be cheaper.

Why isn't it legal, out of curiosity? I get to see quite a few CVs that include the rank the applicant got in the IIT-JEE exam (for most purposes, I find that to be a rather useless metric.)

Re: Study: College Students Not Learning Much

#29

Post by kenjackson »

loganfrederick wrote: post #16
kenjackson wrote: post #5

One problem is there is no incentive on the part of the college to teach much. I've long advocated that we need output measures for colleges. Colleges are rated on their input measures -- how competitive is it to get into the school. But no measure of how effective they are at teaching. As of today no one can really say where (on average) you'll learn more/better -- at Harvard or Ohio State. All we know is that Harva…

Out of curiosity, do you attend Ohio State? I'm currently enrolled as an undergrad and am always keeping an eye out for HNers at school.

No, just picked it because its probably the most recognizable state school I could think of. Never even been to Ohio, but if so I gotta go to a football or basketball game.

Re: Study: College Students Not Learning Much

#30

Post by davidu »

idm wrote: post #27

College rocked my world, and I wouldn't trade it for anything. You get out what you put in.

This. And the fact that lots of people go to college who aren't mature enough to know that. Or they go because their parents make them and so they party and dick around. The reality is that many kids who go to college --- shouldn't.
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