College education is a costly proposition with tuition, room and board at some colleges topping $50,000 a year. Is it worth it?
Increasing evidence suggests that it’s not. Since the 1960s, academic achievement scores have plummeted, but student college grade point averages (GPA) have skyrocketed. In October 2001, the Boston Globe published an article entitled “Harvard’s Quiet Secret: Rampant Grade Inflation.” The article reported that a record 91 percent of Harvard University students were awarded honors during the spring graduation. The newspaper called Harvard’s grading practices “the laughing stock of the Ivy League.” Harvard is by no means unique. For example, 80 percent of the grades given at the University of Illinois are A’s and B’s. Fifty percent of students at Columbia University are on the Dean’s list. At Stanford University, where F grades used to be banned, only 6 percent of student grades were as low as a C. In the 1930s, the average GPA at American colleges and universities was 2.35, about a C plus; today the national average GPA is 3.2, more than a B.
Today’s college students are generally dumber than their predecessors. An article in the Wall Street Journal (1/30/97) reported that a “bachelor of Arts degree in 1997 may not be the equal of a graduation certificate from an academic high school in 1947.” The American Council on Education found that only 15 percent of universities require tests for general knowledge; only 17 percent for critical thinking; and only 19 percent for minimum competency. According a recent National Assessment of Adult Literacy, the percentage of college graduates proficient in prose literacy has declined from 40 percent to 31 percent within the past decade. Employers report that many college graduates lack the basic skills of critical thinking, writing and problem-solving and some employers find they must hire English and math teachers to teach them how to write memos and perform simple computations.
What is being labeled grade inflation is simply a euphemism for academic dishonesty.
After all, it’s dishonesty when a professor assigns a grade the student did not earn. When a university or college confers a degree upon a student who has not mastered critical thinking skills, writing and problem-solving, it’s academic dishonesty. Of course, I might be in error calling it dishonesty. Perhaps academic standards have been set so low that idiots could earn A’s and B’s.
Academic dishonesty and deception go beyond fraudulent grades. “Minding the Campus” is a newsletter published by the Manhattan Institute. Edward Fiske tells a chilling tale of deception titled “Gaming the College Rankings” (9/17/09). The U.S. News and World Report college rankings are worshiped by some college administrators, and they go to great lengths to strengthen their rankings. Some years ago, University of Miami omitted scores of athletes and special admission students so as to boost SAT scores of incoming freshmen. At least one college mailed dollar bills to alumni with a request that they send them back to the annual fund thereby inflating the number of alumni donors.
“Gaming the College Rankings” contains an insert by John Leo, who is the editor of “Minding the Campus,” reporting that in the mid-1990s, Boston University raised its SAT scores by excluding the verbal scores of foreign students whilst including their math scores. Monmouth University simply added 200 SAT points to its group scores. University of California reported that 34 of its professors were members of a prestigious engineering association when in fact only 17 of their current faculty were. Baylor University offered students, who were already admitted to the university, $300 in bookstore credits to take the SAT again in the hopes of boosting Baylor’s SAT averages.
Academic dishonesty, coupled with incompetency, particularly at the undergraduate level, doesn’t bode well for the future of our nation. And who’s to blame? Most of the blame lies at the feet of the boards of trustees, who bear ultimate responsibility for the management of our colleges and universities.
Do you like this story?
yes you are absolutely right
I've often found that a college student, or grad, that did not further their training in a specialty facility, can be picked from a group by just talking to them a short while. Their thinking seems limited and centered on the narrow course of their studies.
Wisdom seems to elude them. Ambitions center around appearing to be successful, or changing the thinking of someone else.
They usually have a few events in their lives, that are mundane daily occurrences to most people, but to them they were major milestones that get referenced often in their speech.
A few overcome college indoctrination and lead productive lives but I find most college connected people boring………
Call them out Mr. Williams, they are teaching Marxist-Leninism and turning our youth into drones. I thank God for leaving college early, it took long enough to de-liberalize from high school!
It's actually a bit worse than what Dr. Williams has written. I am an academic and the students know that if they are getting C's, D's, or F's that they can go to the academic dean and complain about the lack of teaching skills of the professor. The professor then gets called into the Dean's office for a chat about how to improve their teaching because there is obviously a problem. The solution to being in trouble with the Dean is for students' grades to improve, which then solves the “teaching skills” issue. At my university 49% of the student body are on the Dean's List.
I have lived long enough to know that this article is true. Students today expect to get an A without actually having to work for it. Many of these students are foreign students and if they don't get it, they complain, going through a lengthy process of arbitration, dragging the professor along. A lot of professors give in to avoid the process. As an educator, I see a “dumbing down” of education right across the board, from primary right through university. I refuse to go along with this, but I am the exception. Many teachers are apathetic.
Walter Williams is right on the button. This man sees into the essence of the matter and has yet once again reported the truth about the publicly accepted practice of lying! In the Islamic world, this same practice is carried out in other ways but with a similar goal. “Al-Taqiyya” and “Kitman” are two terms which simply mean that the Koran gives permission to lie for either Kitman reasons or for Al-Taqiyya reasons. Whichever one the practitioners use, the point is that they are given divine permission to twist anything and be completely dishonest and deceptive when talking or writing to an infidel. This warped and perverted approach to education and communication, is also now being applied to college entrants who get accepted only because they are of a certain race or religion.
Mr. Williams is so correct about this twisted trickery and fake compliments given to below average students. The approach of the once big name colleges is so archaic and last Wednesday. They are still practicing the washed out agendas of racial preference. Even though some black job applicants are less qualified, they replace the whites anyway. However, in reverse, there is always a dishonest approach. They will never say that there are too many black basketball players and they must be replaced with whites even though the whites are inferior.
Academic inequality has become a goal in the fading glory of those once revered institutions. Similarly, this leftist pseudo intellectual approach has captured the media as well. The once sophisticated and revered New York Times has become a mediocre high school level publication with reporters who need to learn the syntax they failed to catch while rushing for their rubber stamped degrees.
Thank you Mr. Williams for exposing them for what they are; affected players, failing to impress, while flashing numerous credentials in a dubious attempt to impress.
This type of thinking has trickled down to the high school and middle school level. I have been teaching middle or high school for the last 13 years. My first year of teaching, in my first semester, I was called to the principal's office and told that “I” had failed too many students, about 65%. My reply was that was what the student's earned, and that what they deserve. The prinicpal's response was”…well thats too many to fail. Fix it…” The conversation went round and round, and I was told if I did not change the grades, they wold be changes at a higher level, by guidance. All in the name of self confidence and self esteem, we lie to these kids on regular basis, then wonder why they can't do simple mathmatics, or comprehend the written word.
This racist article was written with the sole purpose of demeaning the Accomplishments of Our Great President Obama. The Titoist spy who wrote this piece no doubt watches Foxnews – when will the Leader begin to eliminate this vermin from among us? Have we no camp facilities in North Dakota or Alaska to re-orientate these spoiled rootless profiteers?
College, universities and law schools have become factories, not institutions of higher learning. They need to keep the students to: 1) pay for the financial shortfalls other income sources do not cover, 2) keep up with the beauty pageants, i.e. Princeton Report, US News & World Report, that “rank” them and 3) justify a program or curriculum that is not relevant outside of academia. This is especially true for liberal arts, most non-science/non-technical academic programs and so called prestigous universities. College and university educations have been diminished to a commodity. Like shopping for food, clothing or retial products students look for the “label” or brand name without checking to see if they are getting their monies worth. A Louis Vuittone handbag to accompany their diploma. They are interchangeable in the eyes of the student and academic institution.
I saw it happen from a personnel perspective. While attending a respected law school,in the Midwest, only two people failed out of an entering class of 225. The 2 were failed, not for academic reasons, but the fact they never went to class. Grade inflation, intellectual dishonesty, colleges populated with students who should not be there and students rewarded for regurgitating the teacher's position on a topic instead of critical discourse of all views, have diminished the value of a college education and made the “education” not worth the paper the degree was printed on. Worse when students graduate they think they deserve the corner office with all the perks, just because they have a degree and no experience or real world knowledge.
Saddled with the modern scarlett letter, i.e. student loans, and a commodity, i.e. a college diploma, they are ill prepared for reality. Their “education” was a fraud and/or disservice perpetrated by the institution.
Sadly this will not get better. With the explosion of online and strip mall “universities” the situation will only get worse.
All phases of education are inefficient, doctrinaire, corrupt and the returns to the citizens are negative. As employer I must re-educate those Harvard graduates who are educable. When idiot teach idiots to teach our children our children will be idiots without any job skills.
The “Student Loan” programs are a farce like the Community Redevelopment Act it gets people into something they have no concept of maintaining, thereby running up the costs. The corrupt educators like it because they can get jobs and, in the end, it is all about their greed.
Why anyone would go to college today except for a professional prerequisits and we have enough lawyers, MBAs, economists, Welfare Workers, financial analysts, etc. Student Loans shold only be for those studing the hard sciences and not to support the parasites. The Yellow Pages in my area are twenty times larger for lawyers than plumbers. Guess which have a better quality of life.? As the feminists are learning, the backstabbing on the corporate ladder is not all fun and games. Been there, done that and they can have it.
I am in a PhD program at a major university in the United States and have TA-ed for multiple courses, and I do not disagree with some of the opinions of Mr. Williams. But this particular comment is very much out of line. 1) the use of the term “foreign students” means nothing. Many foreign students are the best and the brightest (many have jumped through extra academic hurdles and higher standards in order to get funding/visas), and I have personally seen them be abused by professors because they are afraid of losing visas/funding etc.–so to pretend like all the students who expect an A and who then go through lengthy processes of arbitration is ridiculous. There may be some “foreign students” who abuse the system, but certainly the vast majority of them don't–certainly no more than American students do, 2) which leads me to the next point, in that I would say this idea of grade inflation is mostly an American idea. I have lived over half of my life overseas in a former British colony where students expect to earn C's. It is often disconcerting to them, then, when they go to the U.S. for training and earn a B and think they are doing great or a C and think they are doing fine only to be told by the professor/fellow students that this is a marginal grade (at least in grad school). So, I would say the majority of the students who expect high grades are precisely NOT the foreign students but the American ones.
Finally as one who is “in the system,” the tricky part about not going along with it in grading students is that you can destroy very good, very bright students by giving out a large number of C's, when the entire system says that C is close to a failing grade. That is, if just one person is “holding the standard” and giving low grades it gives a false picture of the student's ability and can hurt them later. Generally in my classes in the U.S., the average grade is a low B but there are plenty of C's as well. I have given the occasional F and D as well. Generally those I give A's deserve them. I have taught overseas as well, and there my average grades are C's.
All that said, of course college ratings are problematic, and padding SAT scores etc is just plain wrong. The university system has plenty of problems as most who are in this field will tell you, but let's not add to it by using stupid stereotypes about “foreign students.”
This comment is even more offensive than the last one. What experience do you have of college entrants of a certain race or religion being less qualified than “normal white” students. Again in MY experience, I have had some “minority” students who are brilliant and competitive, others who are average, and others who are at the bottom of the class. This is the same for your “white norm” as well.
I won't even get into your other extremely offensive assumptions. It is, frankly, not worth my time.
In terms of knowledge, critical thinking, and the skills needed for both, with few exceptions, a university is a lie. It has become a political processing to produce a uniform mindless drone concerned only with material security and comfort. It is dangerous to send your children to an institution dedicated to the destruction of the parents values. This just as true with “Christian colleges and seminaries as with secular. Further, not everyone has the inclination for scholarship and should be incouraged to apprinticeship or vocational college where they will enjoy the work and excel with their natural aptitues. An individual today needs to take charge of his or her own education and not allow the system to funnel him on to a trac that is designed to brainwash, steal his soul, and control the course of his life. It may be that avoiding a formal”college” education entirely and immersing in classic books, self study, and taking selective courses rather that pursuing a degree is wisdom.
You are a self taught free thinker which has become quite rare these days, sir!
Maybe it's offensive because it has some truth. I don't know about the “normal” white students, but seems to me if we are going to talk about preferences, let's have them all the way around and see what happens. What makes Negroes so special that they need different treatment. Seems like it is racist to them. They can't succeed unless they are “helped.” And yes, I am a minority, and I don't want the “help”. The last time they tried to “help” it cost me money.
Dr. Williams,
Thank you for your comments and for the referral to other sources.
I once read Mortimer J Adler, former general editor of the Encyclopedia Britannica, write that the educational system produces the society, but also that the society produces the educational system. I'm sure that he was not claiming that these two, educational system and society, were the only players in this interaction of cause and effect, but that he was pointing out that an analysis is incorrect if we let society off the hook as if it were no more than passive putty molded by the active force, the school system.
I will mention a couple well-known examples where society is the active agent and the system the accommodating putty.
Parents want their children to be given high grades and powerful parents will sue the educational system to assure those grades. Since the schools want to be popular with parents for political reasons and since the schools have little or no “fat” in the budget for lawsuits, grades acceptable to society are granted.
In order to survive, universities along with their administration and faculties need lots of students. Since students and their parents want good grades, the universities, in order to prevent their demise, must have a reputation for giving high grades.
After a more complete picture of the situation comes into view, it seems that the request that schools and universities practice honesty in grading is an recommendation of mass suicide for virtues that the society does not actually honor.
The problem is not them alone. The problem is them and us.
failing grades are a must in any educational environment. I go to a small school and will graduate in a class of 25 students this year. No one in my class will graduate with a 4.0 and only five will graduate without a failing grade on their transcripts. The teachers set standerds that have to be met and I feel much better about my un-traditional education than I would have with a traditional education. I am afraid, however of falling in to the trap of grades next year when I go to college. I would rather my teacher gave me a bad grade when I didn't understand a class than pass onto a higher lever class where I will be even more lost.
Seems like the Universities have found a way to sop up student loan money and get rich.
They students may find it a little hard to pay back the loans. Suckers
LOL, with the low ability of the high school graduates entering universities, no wonder! Self-esteem to the extreme. Don't you know that it is never the student's fault when failing, only the teacher's.
English Instructor
Donna,
I did not read word one regarding race in this article. This is typical race baiting of a myopic liberal. You do not have any credibility.
A Deist, Feminist, Goy, Zionist
As a current college student from a prestigious business school, I cannot agree more with this article. Although our honors program is limited to the top 10-15% of students ( which is more selective than the university-wide honors program ), grade inflation is rampant. Our curve is set at an A-, and professors openly discuss and joke about this fact. I can say that for me, eduction has been merely a tool to get a decent job upon graduation, the real learning is not taking place at universities. I think that it's despicable. What happened to higher learning?? I read the writings of classic authors and mourn the loss of free thought.
I don't know when this happened, and I won't argue with you, you were there.
However, law schools are one place, that from my personal experience, engaged, if anything, in grade deflation. The law school where I graduated, had a reputation for letting “anyone” in. Actually, some of the people probably had no business in law school, but that is a different issue. The story was, and in seemed true, they would gladly take the first semester's tuition, fees, etc., of the people who had no business there, and then gladly flunk them out. We ran about a 50% failure rate the first semester. Even for those of us who “made” it, an acceptable grade was a “C”, a “B” was fantastic, and there “might” be 1 or 2 “A”s out of a class of 75-100. In many cases there would be no “A”'s. After the first semester the flunk out rate decreased, but never below 30% even in the senior year. The treatment was like boot camp/basic training. The only thing that was missing was the physical abuse.
You are to be congratulated upon your realistic attitude and we all trust that there will be jobs available to you upon graduation.
While at law school, even though the fail/drop out rate was minimal, my first year was in line with yours, i.e. not many “A” s and a lot of “C”s, but few if any “D”s or “F”s. All students took the same courses in first year. The mentality of the administration and students was, in my opinion, they survived first year so even if they received “C”s the rest of the way they were only concerned with passing the bar, because they graduated from an ABA accredited law school. When their legal knowledge base was spotty.
In law school I saw professors “imposing” their views on what students did. In Advanced Legal Research the professor flat out stated that she did not like corporate nor business law and recommended students not research those topics for the class.
Students were no better. They would sit around reading the latest legal reports on how much money lawyers were making, illustrating, in my opinion why they went to law school. Liberal arts degree=no job or low pay; law degree=lots of money.
Not to get sidetracked, but, in my opinion, we have too many law schools, over 180 last I heard. Even if all law schools were rigorous and had a 30% failure/drop out rate, we are still graduating too many, thus turning a JD into a commodity.
In closing, I found my MBA program more challenging. If you got two “C”s or one “D” you were dropped from the program, no gentleman's “C”s to coast through the program.
As a history prof. at a small private college, I have to say that William's has a point. The other factor which must also be considered is that the dumbing down has already taken place even before students reach a prof, like me, who really wants them to learn. If I hold too firmly to standards, too many students flunk out too soon. If I let standards slide, there is not much real learning going on. In the trenches I find myself perpetually trying to balance these two things. How can I remediate students who learned so little in primary and secondary education and give them at least the facsimile of a true college level experience? That is my struggle day in and day out. Those who want to use education for non-educational purposes have practically destroyed it at almost every level.
Bwa ha ha ha ha, Brazil-nut, ha ha ha ha.
Love it.
Thank you a lot for sharing this with all of us you really recognise what you’re talking approximately! Bookmarked. Please additionally seek advice from my web site =). We may have a link change agreement among us