August 15, 2003
From the desk of Jane Galt:We're not the only one with education problems
Great article on British secondary and higher education from the Financial Times (may require a subscription):
People often think of the US as utilitarian in its values. Yet its educational system is far less utilitarian in style and substance than Britain's. As in continental Europe, everyone has to study a broad and balanced curriculum at high school. University education is also longer and broader. Many of the brightest students in England leave university at 21 or 22, after a narrow undergraduate education. In the US, comparable students usually spend twice as long in higher education. And specialisation, instead of beginning at 16, is often delayed until graduate school. The upshot is that many Americans end up with a broader and deeper education than their British counterparts.Posted by Jane Galt at August 15, 2003 4:09 PM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound linksIt was universities' utilitarian attempt to pump out specialists in record time, egged on by a Treasury that wanted to minimise public spending, that accounts for most of the absurdities of English secondary education (the Scots were always a little wiser). You can get a physicist, say, to a high level at 21 only if he arrives well prepared. So schools were pressed into adopting narrow "A-level" courses: the budding physicist would study nothing but maths, physics and chemistry in his final years, so as to make life easy for his future university tutors. And his literary counterpart would force himself into a different, but equally narrow, mould.
A-levels were initially made demanding to guarantee that those who passed well could manage a short but intense degree course. When this elitist system was introduced in the 1950s, only a small percentage of the population went to university. Few experts cared that the secondary school curriculum was designed largely to cater for the artificial needs of this tiny minority. And they were apparently happy to see the majority of pupils branded as failures and ejected prematurely from school without gaining worthwhile qualifications.
The world has changed greatly since then, but British secondary education remains as illogical as ever. Successive governments have steadily increased the target for participation in higher education (it is now 50 per cent and probably unrealistically high). They have made A-levels easier so that a higher proportion of pupils can satisfy university entry requirements. The result is a curriculum that serves nobody's interests. The exams are no longer demanding enough for the able pupils for whom they were first created. And the "pick and mix" provisions mean that students are now designing absurd curricula for themselves.
I've yet to see a system that started setting enrollment targets for tertiary education that hasn't turned into a train wreck. It always appears that planners decide that since people with degrees earn more money than people without, then turning out more degrees makes the world a happier place.
Which works might well, providing you actually have some sort of demand for higher degrees, some sort of reasonable pedagogy that actually means that the degree means something. A rigorous avoidance of both degree and grade inflation is pretty helpful too. Oh yeah, that and the idea that perhaps, education should have some sort of price or meaningful opportunity cost associated with it, so it doesn't turn into a four-year drinking binge on Mom & Dad's Visa card.
Why is it that centralized education planners always have such a damned difficult time even thinking about these things?
"....comparable [US] students usually spend twice as long in higher education".
That's so Universities can screw more money out of the dumbasses. And despite the extra time they still leave with only a vague idea of where Canada is. That might explain why Bush is such a total moron.
Or am I misunderestimating him?
Well, the cause for "the five-year plan" (rapidly becoming the six-year plan) in the mid-level state universities where I have had most of my teaching experience is a bit more complicated than misunderestimating George W. Bush.
Among the various causes are: 1) a significant lack of K-12 preparation for such arduous tasks as writing a clear, coherent sentence, showing up for class on time every period, taking useful notes, paying attention in class, staying awake in class, reading assigned readings, etc; 2) little knowledge of why one might be taking college courses to start with (somewhere around 25-30% of my freshmen cannot give any definitive reason as to why they are attending college -- some because their friends to, some because their parents want them to, some because they don't know what else to do, some because "it'll help me get a job" even though they have no clue as to what kind of courses might help, etc.) and thus no good reason to make progress toward graduation; 3) working either full or part-time. sometimes this is needed to meet college expenses, many times it appears to be to maintain a life-style; 4) even good students lack clear post-college goals, and may change majors more than once; 5) it's easier than the full-time work they might find outside.
I don't want to denigrate my students. Most of them have never had to think about what life may be like post-college. Quite a few think they can go to law school and get rich. I can't imagine why unless they believe what they see on TV and in the movies. Many, maybe even most, are in a sort of late adolescence that seems to last til about age 25. However, most also seem to start to get their act together toward the end of their undergraduate life. I think they just finally begin to focus on what's real.
Anyway, hasn't adolescence always amounted to about 1/3 of your life expectancy? When the average age at death is 45 (pre-1900) you became adult at 14 or 15. Now that it is 78-80 you become adult at around 25. The difference is the physical as compared to the social. It also keepa many out of the regular work force for years. (The Europeans do so as well, just in a different way.)
So, if you think of those college years for most as a sort of cross between training and warehousing, it's not surprising that it is taking longer and longer. Everybody concerned, on average, wants it so.
"Anyway, hasn't adolescence always amounted to about 1/3 of your life expectancy?"
Yeah, and food "always" accounted for the lion's share of the average person's budget. Until per-capita wealth and income went up, and the portion of one's income spent on food dropped like a rock.
Just because someone lives longer doesn't mean that a longer adolescence is desirable. Nor does it mean that we should let our schools get away with teaching our kids whenever they get around to it (with 3 whole months off per year!), on the theory that educated, independent teenagers might hurt themselves.
Ken,
I think the theory is that educated, indepdendent teenagers might hurt others (like people who want to work less hard for more money, and might lose their job).
"That might explain why Bush is such a total moron."
Keep thinking this, buddy.
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