The Push to Graduate

California colleges, like all others nationally,  have been pushed to graduate students.  The first thought that most professors have is that not all students are ready for college.  The drop out rate often is the byproduct of our aggressive recruiting because of the pressure to get students into college - if they are ready or not.  Professors are always amazed at the students who come without better reasons than all of their friends are in college, their mother wants them in college and that they will be handed a high paid job the day after graduation.

Those students who are not realistically motivated or mature often do not make it beyond the Sophomore year, hence the large drop out rate happens within the first two years. This happens nationally.  There is little as professors that we can do to reach, or even identify, those students when they are sitting in a classroom of 150 or more students and not interested in seeking us out.

But what about the students who are motivated, mature and intent on graduating.  Not all of them leave college having failed.  Sometimes the system fails students as they try to play the game of getting all the classes they need lined up in a row.   Not getting perquisite classes early in their first years of college can cause them to add on an extra year or more.   Not being able to take upper level required courses for graduation puts them behind also.

To those who do not understand how colleges manage their finances,  it seems simple, just make sure there are lots of course offerings so that students can easily take those prerequisites and required upper level courses.  That would put colleges in the red.  It takes 14 to 18 students in a class for the college to squeak by to cover the cost.  Offering all required courses each semester would break the bank.  In addition, upper level courses most often require full time tenured or tenured track professors, expensive labs, complex assignments and more preparation time for faculty.  Professors that qualify to teach these courses often have a teaching load of one or two classes a semester.  Most universities are not staffed sufficiently to be able to offer all the courses students need each semester.

California legislators have come up with an interesting solution: give students credit  "for faculty-approved online courses".  These courses are Massive Open Online Courses MOOCs.  I think this could work.

The high drop out rate for MOOCs is attributed to students lack of motivation, self discipline and direction, which is the case for most online courses that do not have heavy involvement with faculty and other students.  Also it is thought that a large majority of the persons who enroll do so without the intent to complete the course.  Students who need a MOOC  to graduate and are replacing it with a course they need, will be motivated, have the self discipline and will have contact with their university professor, advisor and other students in the same situation.  Their intent will be to complete the course.

The university will not be losing money when students take the courses because students will be on track for graduation, stay with the university that gives them credit for the course and, frankly, as an employer  I would certainly hire a student who demonstrated that could manage the system of college wisely in a manner that showed motivation, self discipline and cleverness.   

One always hesitates to agree with legislation that legislators dream up, but this one might work.  Often we become so concentrated on the students that come to college without direction that we miss those students who are at risk for leaving because of our own system's lack of ability to provide a timely path to graduation.  In addition, now that Pell Grants have lowered the number of semesters from 18 to 12 the need to provide students with a sure fire path to a four year degree in four years is going to be a necessity unless we want to see more students drop out because of expired funding.

Is Higher Education Changing Faster Than Leadership?

In an article, Study Finds Higher Education Presidential Pipeline Is Slow to Change, it shows that the make up of leadership is not changing very quickly. What I found interesting is that 58% of the current Presidents are 61 or over and heading toward retirement. So who are the new leaders going to be as this majority of college presidents begin retiring?  What will they be bringing to higher education?

Only 41% of College Chief Academics are women and only 2.3% are ethnic minorities.  This reflects the make up of faculty.  In all of higher education, the vast majority of faculty are white, 80.3%.  We need to do better than that.  The next generation of higher education presidents are not going to be ethnically diverse.

However with 58% of the Presidents retiring, there are some changes ahead.  That 58% of soon to be retiring presidents were born before there was easy and affordable access to computers.  The Internet was an emerging technology coming into a skeptical educational community.  Social networking was a cocktail party at the President's residence.  No one could earn a degree online.

The younger generation coming up were raised with computers, the Internet, online courses, purchasing books on line and texting their colleagues and students.  This will be matched with the disruptive technology of the iPad and  tablets as they quickly replace paper textbooks and even textbooks entirely.  The secure jobs in academics has seen its day as higher education is charged with declining budgets and increased accountability.

There is going to be an interesting 10 years ahead. Certainly worth watching.

Should we rate students by their work ethic?

All of us working know that if some of the D and C students conducted themselves on the job like they do in college, then they would end up with a D or C job with D or C pay.

Today an article came out from InsideHigherEd.com, "Transcript for Work".  It told about a 2-year college in Missouri, Linn State, that rates students "job readiness and work ethic".  Initially it sounds to me like a good deal both for students and for faculty. About five years ago I worked with a technical college in Wichita  Kansas, Wichita Area Technical College that did the very same thing. Employers love it.

Both colleges have rubrics for faculty to use and students to understand how they are graded.  What WATC did was advertise to their employers to ask for students' transcripts when graduates applied for a position.  This attracted employers who felt confident they hired the best employees.  Interestingly enough, not all A students had the highest ratings for work ethic!

In a time when states are concerned with employability of graduates, this does not sound like a bad idea.  It would be interesting if four year college students would be as attentive to their work ethic grade.  Many students opt to attend technical school with the idea it is a short path to a career.  Do they have more motivation to be more serious about their employability?

Should Students Carry Concealed Weapons on Campus?

This idea is back in the Texas Legislature with a new bill Channel 5 NBCDFW.com reports.  This is Senate Bill 182.  You can watch this bill by clicking here.

This bill is not a new idea.  It was proposed during the past 82 Legislation also. At UT Austin, many students protested as well as some were for the bill.  Administrators clearly did not think this was a good idea.  This is where they stood according to The Shorthorn:

UT System chancellor Francisco Cigarroa – opposed
President James Spaniolo – opposed
Student Affairs Vice President Frank Lamas – opposed
UTA Student Congress – opposed


The legislators from that district were two out of three in favor. 
Sen. Chris Harris - favor
Rep. Barbara Nash - undecided
Rep. Bill Zedler - favor (co-signer)

* Note: Rep. Diane Patrick was unavailable for comment

There is no getting around it, the emotional impact of the Newtown shootings on the general population has opened an even greater emotional national debate.  I learned not to even mention it on my Facebook!  It immediately starts a family war.

Kidding aside, there are many serious issues and passionate stakeholders in this debate. It includes how we define mental illness, constitutional issues and, most of all economics including jobs. The firearms business is a multi-billion dollar ($11,000,000,000) industry in the U.S. with lots of money to override grass roots efforts. The yearly federal sales tax revenue is $123,000,000. This does not include the companies that sell firearm parts and accessories, clothing, courses, hunting services.... the list of tax paying businesses goes on. The number of background checks in 2011 was 16,000,000 with an annual yearly production of firearms at 3,444,375. The number of background checks does not represent just gun sales, it can also be transfers. It does represent the movement of firearms and their owners.

There are very few answers as what campus should do. What is clear in my mind is that individual campuses need to make decisions according to their campus values and locations.

NMC Horizon Report > 2013 Higher Education Edition

What is happening with technology in today's education? "The NMC Horizon Report > 2013 Higher Education Edition is a collaborative effort between the New Media Consortium (NMC) and the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI), an EDUCAUSE Program. This is a ten year program to analyze what trends are coming up in education."

This edition of the report gives us six trends that experts from EDUCAUSE and other predict will be the leading trends.  They even give us the time span in which these technologies will be common place.

After being in many years of education, one thing is clear.  George Saltzman from Abilene Christian College put it best, "Popular culture leads educational technology trends."  Think about it.  The Internet opened up to educators and scientists first.  It had many years with just amazing content, no ads, alien blogs, pictures of cats, etc.  It also have very few users.  The day the Internet was unleashed by NSF to the public, it went crazy with developers and users.  Educators have had generations of youth leading the way.

I clearly remember people taking bets on what day Amazon would go bankrupt, "Who would buy a book online?"  and faculty pooh pooing at the idea that someone would take a class completely on line, "It will never happen."  Now we have MOOCs nipping at our heels, "Who would take a non accredited course on line?".  Well enterprising people who want to learn or retool and not pay the high tuition of college.  That is some of what George discussed today.

So how do we get technology into the hands of students?  By teaching them to use it as a tool, not the teachers.  Surveys show that most teachers use their computers to find information, answer questions, and find resources for their lessons.  Lets have students do that!

This report is very good reading.  Click here to get the shortened version.

Free Tests!

There is a lot of debate on the value of MOOCs, Massive Open Online Courses. Insiehighered.com reports that some enterprising students have found them beneficial for studying, particularly for practice tests. One element of student success we always see is that you cannot keep an A student down. They will find the best way for them to look best.

 In my UNIV course, the course freshman are forced to take (student perspective) I always tell students to take advantage of these free courses in many different ways. One of which is to take the course online before they take the course at UTB. This way they can prepare themselves with what to expect, gain more knowledge and save their bad grades for courses that don't count. MOOCs are also valuable to have students explore to learn if the major their enterprising Uncle whispers advice to them, "Plastics, go plastics" is really the career for them.

I am always amazed at how many students think that astronomy would be fun. About two weeks into the semester I can pick those students out on the phone by the tears, hicuping "Math, did not hic know  hic there was sob math in astronomy".  If students take a MOOC before they register for a course, things like mathematics in astronomy won't be a shock.

Feed the Hungry Adjuncts!

A food drive for adjuncts, sounds good.  I would also include some bandages, aspirin, splints, and maybe a liver or two for the occasional transplant.

The food drive is not for real in that adjuncts are starving to death, although I am sure they often miss a meal or two, but it is a statement on the way in which we pay a large portion of our higher ed workforce.  Not well.

The critical situation applies mostly to the adjuncts who are trying to make a living from teaching part time.  That is an exercise in putting a square peg in a round hole.  It doesn't work.  There is little time to do what will get them hired full time: research, publishing and other academic pursuits.  There are no health benefits and, for those lucky enough to get retirement benefits, they are small.

The pay does work better for those adjuncts who are employed full time elsewhere and are teaching for extra cash, as a service to the community and even just because they love teaching.  It is definitely a nice way to say "Thank You" but not a realistic compensation for hours worked.

From my experience working with adjuncts for fifteen years, most of the adjuncts I know love teaching and sharing what they feel passionate about.  They do enjoy the pay, but that is not the main motivation for them spending countless hours outside of class preparing tests and assignment, grading and meeting with students.

The IRS has just passed new rules that the number of hours adjuncts work outside of class has to be calculated "reasonably".  The benefit to that is higher ed institutions have to sit down and really understand how much time adjuncts are spending on courses.  The actual time, not the hours they spend standing in front of students.  I bet it is mind opening.

Bless the adjuncts for they are wonderful for what they do.  Even in this time of cutbacks, they should be put forward.

P.S. For those of you teaching in the Rio Grande Valley look at the compensation the article reports the adjuncts make.