Study: Most College Students Lack Skills

[Martrae]

Jan 19, 8:13 PM (ET)
By BEN FELLER

WASHINGTON (AP) - Nearing a diploma, most college students cannot handle many complex but common tasks, from understanding credit card offers to comparing the cost per ounce of food.

Those are the sobering findings of a study of literacy on college campuses, the first to target the skills of students as they approach the start of their careers.

More than 50 percent of students at four-year schools and more than 75 percent at two-year colleges lacked the skills to perform complex literacy tasks.

That means they could not interpret a table about exercise and blood pressure, understand the arguments of newspaper editorials, compare credit card offers with different interest rates and annual fees or summarize results of a survey about parental involvement in school.

The results cut across three types of literacy: analyzing news stories and other prose, understanding documents and having math skills needed for checkbooks or restaurant tips.

"It is kind of disturbing that a lot of folks are graduating with a degree and they're not going to be able to do those things," said Stephane Baldi, the study's director at the American Institutes for Research, a behavioral and social science research organization.

Most students at community colleges and four-year schools showed intermediate skills, meaning they could perform moderately challenging tasks. Examples include identifying a location on a map, calculating the cost of ordering office supplies or consulting a reference guide to figure out which foods contain a particular vitamin.

There was brighter news.

Overall, the average literacy of college students is significantly higher than that of adults across the nation. Study leaders said that was encouraging but not surprising, given that the spectrum of adults includes those with much less education.

Also, compared with all adults with similar levels of education, college students had superior skills in searching and using information from texts and documents.

"But do they do well enough for a highly educated population? For a knowledge-based economy? The answer is no," said Joni Finney, vice president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, an independent and nonpartisan group.

"This sends a message that we should be monitoring this as a nation, and we don't do it," Finney said. "States have no idea about the knowledge and skills of their college graduates."

The survey examined college and university students nearing the end of their degree programs. The students did the worst on matters involving math, according to the study.

Almost 20 percent of students pursuing four-year degrees had only basic quantitative skills. For example, the students could not estimate if their car had enough gas to get to the service station. About 30 percent of two-year students had only basic math skills.

Baldi and Finney said the survey should be used as a tool. They hope state leaders, educators and university trustees will examine the rigor of courses required of all students.

The survey showed a strong relationship between analytic coursework and literacy. Students in two-year and four-year schools scored higher when they took classes that challenged them to apply theories to practical problems or weigh competing arguments.

The college survey used the same test as the National Assessment of Adult Literacy, the government's examination of English literacy among adults. The results of that study were released in December, showing about one in 20 adults is not literate in English.

On campus, the tests were given in 2003 to a representative sample of 1,827 students at public and private schools. The Pew Charitable Trusts funded the survey.

It has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

[Captain Insano]

Woah! Are you telling me college is a waste of time and our education system is totally screwed?!

I'm floored. No really.

[Harrison]

This almost surprises me!

No.

[Goose_Man]

/giggle

[Kramer]

not suprising, I think gaining critical thinking skills has more to do with personal motivation and desire to challenge yourself and grow then some class(es) you happen to sit in

[Tikker]

The problem with University is that they reward the ability to temporarily memorize information and don't require people to actually apply knowledge


some majors do better jobs than others, but overall, university is kinda useless

[Lyion]

The problem with University is that they reward the ability to temporarily memorize information and don't require people to actually apply knowledge

College is the biggest MLM scam going. My degree and most peoples I know are completely worthless, and just a vast expenditure of $$$.

Our whole advanced education system is bullshit designed to give a bunch of blowhards jobs, versus actual learning.

[Zanchief]

Our whole advanced education system is bullshit designed to give a bunch of rich people jobs, versus actual learning.

fixt

[Adivina]

Once again I am amazed at how stupid people are.... shouldn't most of those skills be understood by.... say MIDDLE SCHOOL!?!?!?

[Kramer]

I agree... The mix of education and apprenticeship in any area of learning is infinitely more effective than simply going to class for 4-5 years....

I learned more in my last YEAR of grad school while working full time, doing two 12 hours shifts at Texas Children's Hospital, and doing class where we actually had discussion relative to theory and experience, than I did in the prior 6 years of undergrad and grad school

[xaoshaen]

Our whole advanced education system is bullshit designed to give a bunch of rich people jobs, versus actual learning.

fixt

Eh, there's no way my family or myself would have been considered rich when I went to school. In fact, my parents couldn't afford to spend a dime on college for me. Consequently, I'm still carrying a couple of student loans, but I have to say, I got one hell of an education. If you go to a diploma mill, yeah, you might not wind up getting much out of it, but there are still institutions that focus on educating their students.

[Zanchief]

Our whole advanced education system is bullshit designed to give a bunch of rich people jobs, versus actual learning.

fixt

Eh, there's no way my family or myself would have been considered rich when I went to school. In fact, my parents couldn't afford to spend a dime on college for me. Consequently, I'm still carrying a couple of student loans, but I have to say, I got one hell of an education. If you go to a diploma mill, yeah, you might not wind up getting much out of it, but there are still institutions that focus on educating their students.

Tuition fees are insane in the states. Do you actually expect low-income families to spend more than the price of their house so their children can get a piece of paper that is pretty much meaningless most of the time just so they can get an interview for a job that has nothing to do with the diploma they got?

It's all rich elitism so poor people stay poor. Happy now you made me go into my crazy liberal conspiracy theory bit.

I expect a flood of "but but black people get tons of racist scholarships" counter point.

[Lyion]

Eh, there's no way my family or myself would have been considered rich when I went to school. In fact, my parents couldn't afford to spend a dime on college for me. Consequently, I'm still carrying a couple of student loans, but I have to say, I got one hell of an education. If you go to a diploma mill, yeah, you might not wind up getting much out of it, but there are still institutions that focus on educating their students.

I have a mathematics degree from Cal Poly and work as a DBA. While I indeed learned a lot in college, none of it pertains to my current job, nor my prior ones.

How old are you, what's your job, and what's your degree in, and from which university?

You speak vaguely about the benefits of college and the vast amounts spent, but give no proof to back it up. Please explain how your vast dinero spent on college aided you, outside of being an 'elitist'<hf> on a message board?

[xaoshaen]

Tuition fees are insane in the states. Do you actually expect low-income families to spend more than the price of their house so their children can get a piece of paper that is pretty much meaningless most of the time just so they can get an interview for a job that has nothing to do with the diploma they got?

It's all rich elitism so poor people stay poor. Happy now you made me go into my crazy liberal conspiracy theory bit.

I expect a flood of "but but black people get tons of racist scholarships" counter point.

Did you not actually read what I said? I went to an excellent school. My parents contributed precisely zero dollars. So, no, I don't expect low-income families to bankrupt themselves to fund their kids' college education. I expect the children to bust their asses making it possible for themselves.

The relevance of your diploma also depends on your choice of schools. As I mentioned, the education I received was well worth the time and money I spent on it. It's not just the raw knowledge I receieved, but the industry experience, and the fact that college helped teach me how to absorb vast quantities of information and to review it critically.

[Lyion]

Answer the question, Claire. Let us know what degree you recieved, from where, and what you currently are doing which is using the degree specifically. Also, what industry experience did you recieve in college? Or are you talking grad school with a state or educational sponsored work plan, which is solely another useless mouth to feed in the MLM scam which is modern university learning that cycles back to tuition and fees.

Everything you quoted above is obtainable via work experience, knowledge transfer, and learning without paying 15k/year in tuition. I've already explained my point, and given my background.

[xaoshaen]

I have a mathematics degree from Cal Poly and work as a DBA. While I indeed learned a lot in college, none of it pertains to my current job, nor my prior ones.

How old are you, what's your job, and what's your degree in, and from which university?

You speak vaguely about the benefits of college and the vast amounts spent, but give no proof to back it up. Please explain how your vast dinero spent on college aided you, outside of being an 'elitist'<hf> on a message board?

Harvey Mudd College (no, I don't expect most of the people here to have heard of it), CS Major '96-'00. Total cost, around $150,000. Total parental contributions, $0. Currently employed primarily as a programmer.

Even if I wasn't currently working as a programmer, the critical thinking skills, the information retention and comprehension abilities, and the broad base of education would have served me well.

Once again, we see the term 'elitist' being abused. If I was 'elitist', I'd have claimed that I was somehow special for going to college, or that other people couldn't replicate the feat. On the contrary, I think my experience can be emulated by anyone who's sufficiently motivated.

[xaoshaen]

Answer the question, Claire. Let us know what degree you recieved, from where, and what you currently are doing which is using the degree specifically. Also, what industry experience did you recieve in college? Or are you talking grad school with a state or educational sponsored work plan, which is solely another useless mouth to feed in the MLM scam which is modern university learning that cycles back to tuition and fees.

Everything you quoted above is obtainable via work experience, knowledge transfer, and learning without paying 15k/year in tuition. I've already explained my point, and given my background.

I was answering Zanchief, not you, hence my quoting Zanchief. Like many of the higher-echelon schools, Mudd runs a clinic program that attaches students to corporate projects. In my case, I worked for IBM's Almaden research lab.

[Zanchief]

Did you not actually read what I said? I went to an excellent school. My parents contributed precisely zero dollars. So, no, I don't expect low-income families to bankrupt themselves to fund their kids' college education. I expect the children to bust their asses making it possible for themselves.

The relevance of your diploma also depends on your choice of schools. As I mentioned, the education I received was well worth the time and money I spent on it. It's not just the raw knowledge I receieved, but the industry experience, and the fact that college helped teach me how to absorb vast quantities of information and to review it critically.

Good for you. I have no doubt you've done well for yourself but that may have something to do with your freakish intellect.

I'm sure the vast majority of people aren't capable of indebting themselves in the near hundreds of thousands of dollars to get a diploma and then immediately find financial success enough to unburden themselves.

I would wager that far more people, even those who use student loans, get financial assistance from their parents at one time or another.

[xaoshaen]

Good for you. I have no doubt you've done well for yourself but that may have something to do with your freakish intellect.

I'm sure the vast majority of people aren't capable of indebting themselves in the near hundreds of thousands of dollars to get a diploma and then immediately find financial success enough to unburden themselves.

I would wager that far more people, even those who use student loans, get financial assistance from their parents at one time or another.

Heh, if there was one thing that attending Mudd taught me, it's that I'm not as smart as I used to think I was. I also didn't have to go into hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of debt. I think my total load was around 20k, which would have been paid off had I opted to pursue a higher paying job. I received a tremendous amount of financial aid, but all it was publicly available.

I don't doubt that most people get assistance from their parents, and I certaintly don't think it's a bad thing. Hell, my parents would have helped me if they'd been able to afford it, and I plan on helping my kid sister in a few years here. I'm just saying that it's possible to go to school without placing an undue financial burden on other people.

[Zanchief]

I'm just saying that it's possible to go to school without placing an undue financial burden on other people.

And if tuition fees were lower it would be even more possible.

[Lyion]

The (hf) from my Elitist comment was for a humor flag. It wasn't meant seriously, as Zan would tell you I'm the biggest elitist here.

You are a recent grad, and in one of the specific fields where you are actually doing what you learned. It's a rarity from college, and I do not doubt you were well served doing what you did. Any Nurse, Lawyer, Doctor, etc is also well served and the degree is an awesome and wise investment, even if much of it follows the scam silliness I've complained about.

That said, my point is if you didn't have that degree, had acquired the same knowledge via the military, tech school, or being self taught, I think you could equally be as good, just without the bill and the plethora of off tangent expensive courses.

The best programmer I know has never done a day of college. He exudes knowledge and has been coding for 35 years and routinely trains and criticizes people with Ph Ds in Comp Sci and related fields. John Carmack and his ilk are also fairly decent in coding, wouldn't you say?

Likewise, given your current level of skill, I'd wager you could be equally as good a programmer with a different degree, as much of what you learned in college does not translate to coder jobs. I learned to program by writing a device driver for an Optical Disk Library on Unix back in 1989. That experience taught me so much more than my 4 college level programming and two graduate CS courses I've taken, it isn't even funny.

Honestly, I could go on a huge tangent in how I believe college should be, but really I'll just say the current system ensures a degree is needed, but semi worthless for most. I believe college has positive aspects and indeed does give people some knowledge, but overall for what people are paying it really is an MSM Scam, unless you are a Doctor, Lawyer, or Nurse.

[xaoshaen]

My apologies, Lyion, I completely misread the humor flag. It does seem that we've diverged a bit from the original discussion. I don't think college is necessary, but I do think it can be beneficial. I too have worked with some excellent programmers who had little to no formal education. I also know, however, that without taking courses like ConLaw, or the vast array of humanities they insisted on shoving down my throat, that I'd have a much less well-rounded knowledge base to function on. If anything, I see a college's primary job as teaching people how to think, rather than how to perform specific functions. I focused on neural network design in school, but I have yet to apply any of that information in a job. I can say for a certainty that I'm a much better learner now than when I entered college, and that alone has given me a leg up on some of my peers, many of whom are much smarter than I.

I'd also be the first to agree that many colleges do not do their job. I've taken courses at several different universities, and without calling them out, I'll say that several of those courses consisted of the rote memorization and regurgitation that Feynman despaired of in the Brazilian school system.

[xaoshaen]

I'm just saying that it's possible to go to school without placing an undue financial burden on other people.

And if tuition fees were lower it would be even more possible.

Oh, definitely agreed. I'd love to have the extra money in my pocket each month, but I still consider it to have been well-spent.

[Eziekial]

[quote="xaoshaen"]...I see a college's primary job as teaching people how to think, rather than how to perform specific functions. [/quote]

Give this man a cookie!

Biggest issue I see is that many in our nation don't have a brain to start with so they gain nothing from higher education but a worthless piece of paper.

PS. I graduated from the United States Merchant Marine Academy and am currently working in a maritime related field. :pirateship:

[Kramer]

colleges are certainly systems of social classism... no doubt, though there are only about 100 that will really get you "in" as far as class is concerned... but most people don't want to hear that....

People are still bamboozled into thinking that just getting a degree will guarantee:

1) a good job
2) financial stability
3) higher class position
4) preparation for a specific field BEYOND what someone without a degree would receive

these are mostly false promises