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New Technology Claims To Stop Cheating On Tests

January 5, 2011 By

If you’re thinking of pulling out that smart phone in the middle of a test to get an answer from a friend or cheating in some other way, watch out – big brother may be watching. Or at least, big brother may be using some new ways of analyzing whether or not you were honest after you complete the test.

A company called Caveon Test Security, started by the former chief test developer for the SAT, has sophisticated ways of finding the signposts of test cheating. Going under the broad heading of “probability science,” the firm looks for things like illogical patterns where a test taker does better on tough questions than on easy ones, unusually big changes in score when one student retakes a test like the law boards and, in some cases, even the number of erasures on paper multiple choice testing forms. Lots of schools and state education departments feel Caveon is helping them fight a rising tide of test cheating at all levels, though some academics argue that the firm’s techniques are all smoke and mirrors. More on Caveon’s methods here

Filed Under: Student life Tagged With:

A Unique Picture of American College Students

December 15, 2010 By

Check out this cool interactive chart of American college students. It can be easily re-set to show which kind of schools people are attending according to their race, gender or income. You’ll note quickly that public 2-year colleges are doing the heavy lifting in this country when it comes to educating lots and lots of students. Another interesting fact: even from families with more than $200,000. per year in income, a majority of students attend some kind of public college. For-profit colleges account for just under 10% of all U.S. college students at present. See the graphic here.

Filed Under: Student life

Wise & Bush Push Digital Learning – Testing Policies & Teachers Will Fight It

December 1, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Two former governors, Jeb Bush of Florida and Bob Wise of West Virginia, took a break from an education summit in Washington, DC today talk with CNN about a digital learning initiative they’re pushing, aimed at helping kids learn at their own pace. It’s a plan that holds promise, and which is bound to run into resistance from both teachers’ unions and testing policies promoted by Mr. Bush’s brother.

Mixing modern technology with concepts of “multiple intelligence” promoted by writer Howard Gardner in the 1960’s, the former governors argue that digital learning will make it easier for teachers to work with a diversity of students, allowing each kid to move at his or her own pace (this initiative appears to be angled mainly at secondary schools). It will also make it possible for a specialty teacher in, say, physics to reach students in multiple school districts at once, including poor inner city districts with no budget to hire teachers in more advanced subjects.

It will all cost money, of course. Mr. Bush theorizes that some of the funding could come from reduced spending on textbooks, which will occur as more content is delivered in digital form.

Mr. Bush ads that the concept can be implemented with emerging adaptive software programs and a growing library of rich digital content, “if policy changes.” And there’s the rub. The first obstacle to this concept is that state testing programs created George Bush’s “No Child Left Behind” bill are antithetical to children learning at their own pace or, for that matter, pursuing subjects based on their own interests. The current testing mania has forced more and more standardization into schools, and pushed teachers to always “teach to the test.”

The second obstacle, undoubtedly, will be the teachers themselves. While professors in higher education have generally embraced advances in technology, secondary and primary school teachers are a different story. As anyone who has worked with high schools or grammar schools can tell you, teachers at this level are famous for not even using email (yes, even today) and resisting the incursion of videoconferencing or any other tech advances into the classroom. The slightly vague alliance of national, state and local administrators that Bush and Wise say will help to get digital learning put in place will, undoubtedly, face an uphill fight.

Filed Under: Online education, Student life Tagged With: , , ,

California’s A Financial Mess, But Citizens Want The State To Spend More on Higher Education

November 22, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Just under 75% of folks in Califorinia think that their state gives too little money to colleges. That’s up from about 57% just three years ago, and it’s a surprising number given the weak economic environment, belt tightening by state governments everywhere, and the fact that California is one of the most debt-riddled states in the U.S. But the poll taken by the Public Policy Institute of California shows that people in California are worried about higher education cuts and willing to pay higher taxes to support it. In fact, they want more education funding even if it means cutting other programs. Also noted: about 60% of all parents Cali are worried about paying for their kids’ college, 72% of Latino parents fear the financial stress of college bills, and a majority of Californians think the state’s college systems are doing a good job or an excellent job. More on the survey here.

Filed Under: Cost of college, Paying for college, Student life Tagged With: , , ,

War Of Words About Illegal Immigrants Getting Tuition Breaks On College

November 18, 2010 By Leave a Comment

A heated debate is going on in California about college benefits to illegal aliens, as the state’s supreme court has ruled that illegal aliens can attend state universities, paying in-state tuition fees. 10 other states are currently giving illegals the same educational benefit.

Other action on his issue:
- Texas A&M’s student body just turned the opposite way – approving a bill that opposes the right of illegal aliens to pay in-state tuition rates.
- President Obama is believed to have recently told a group of Latino legislators that would like to soon pass the “Dream Act,” which gives illegals a path toward legal status if they either join the military or finish two years of college in the U.S.

An opinion piece on CNN.com argues that illegal aliens pay the same property and other taxes that American citizens to, a shakey claim in our view. Do illegals all file federal and state income tax returns? CNN’s commentator does, however, make a strong argument that if we are going to continue hiring foreign workers to do the menial jobs we don’t want to handle, we should give them a chance to become Americans. Read more on the subject here.

Filed Under: Student life, Uncategorized Tagged With: ,

Top 10 Reasons To NOT Go To College

November 10, 2010 By Leave a Comment

When I was a college senior about 35 years ago, I wrote an economics thesis about the value of a college degree. It asked simple question: Over the long term, would an average student get a better financial return from a college degree (in higher career earnings) or from taking the full cost of college and simply investing it conservatively, say in bonds or large cap stocks?

I realize now that the whole idea had one flaw: that if most people did not go to college, they would not necessarily have all that tuition money sitting in a pile to invest somewhere else – many would only be able to access it by getting loans specifically for college.

But after about 75 pages of calculations and analysis on how much more the average college grad earned in a lifetime than a non-college grad and comparing that to a typical return one could get over 30 or so years from an investment of $16,000 (yes, that’s what a full four-year degree from a high-end private school cost in those days – more here on how to save nowadays through the cost of online college), I arrived at a clear conclusion: it was a very close call. The value of a college degree varied a lot from person to person, but on average, the return from it was very similar to just investing the money intelligently.

I got a B on the thesis and a double degree in English and Economics.

Now that I’m in the process of putting two kids through college and seeing that one loves it and the other absolutely hates it, why not go against the general pro-education sentiment we all seem to have with this list of possible reasons to NOT bother going to college. Here are my top 10:

  • You might do better by spending the four years getting your career started. Bill Gates, who dropped out of Harvard, is constantly mentioned as an example of how you can skip college and still become rich. Of course, he had a plan. If you either have a plan yourself or you want to get into a really high paying trade like plumbing, you may have a very valid case for not going to college.
  • It’s insanely expensive. Since 1976, the year I graduated, the cost of college has gone up sevenfold while even the cost of healthcare, often portrayed as the ultimate runaway cost in our society, has gone up just threefold. Since I did my thesis, I think that may have skewed the numbers in favor of the non-college choice.
  • It’s so insanely expensive that kids are taking on far too much debt. Average student debt in the U.S. is now over $23,000 for undergrads, while professional graduate students are now leaving college in a $75,000 hole on average. That’s just an awful lot of debt overhang to start out a career with.
  • Sixty per-cent of students who start college take more the four years to complete it. That means that school often costs 25% more than students and families originally plan for.
  • Having a four-year college degree doesn’t impress anyone any more. A bachelor’s degree today hardly sets you out from the crowd. On the other hand, not having one might.
  • College may train you to be a follower rather than a leader. Learning to be the kind of nice, compliant student who is loved by teachers and doesn’t act up in class can be a big advantage in school. If you look at the history of highly famous people, however, most of them are raving lunatics who never put up with anyone telling them what to do or how to act.
  • A college diploma does not guarantee employment. While college grads to have lower unemployment rates than non-degree holders, there are still plenty of kids out there with degrees who don’t have jobs right now. A lot depends on what subject you major in, what school you went to and how truly engaged in your career objective you are.
  • Many good paying jobs simply don’t require a college degree nowadays. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that of the 10 careers expected to grow the most in the next decade, only two require college degrees. Other fast growing categories like nursing and customer service do not.
  • Lots of what you learn in college is available for free online. If you’re not hung up on having a degree, there is a huge volume of information that can be accessed online, including videos of top professors from schools like Tufts giving their classes. If you are a self-directed student, you can learn much of what you need at your kitchen table.
  • You will probably change careers a few years after finishing college. I cannot count the number of times I’ve attended a presentation where a speaker asks: “Will everyone who is still in the career they started after college please raise their hand” and virtually no hands go up. People usually change directions several times in their careers. It makes you wonder how much real use anyone has for all that training they got in college
Filed Under: Careers & Salaries, Paying for college, Student life Tagged With: , ,

Textbook Rentals Don’t Save So Much After All

November 9, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Textbook rentals sound like a good idea, and have spawned a number of startup services like Chegg. But while about half the major schools in the U.S. are now offering rental textbooks through their bookstores, many of them are finding that the savings aren’t that great.

Among the problems: professors believe it’s their right to choose the reading material for their courses, and many of them choose the newest editions of textbooks, which are not widely available for rental yet. And while Congress passed a law recently that required textbook publishers to give professors the prices of new textbooks and actually list the revisions from the old to the new editions, those brilliant legislators in Washington didn’t bother to put anything into the law that actually forces the publishers to comply with it.

In addition to the fact that it costs a school a bundle to start a book rental program, students are finding that even then, the rental costs aren’t that cheap. For more on a textbook situation that seems to satisfy no one, go here.

Filed Under: Cost of college, Paying for college, Student life

What Exactly Is A For-Profit College?

November 8, 2010 By Leave a Comment

For-profit schools are what they sound like – schools that make money by teaching students. Many of the largest ones are actually free-standing corporations, with large numbers of stockholders. The University of Phoenix, which is a subsidiary of The Apollo Group, has a whopping 455,000 students enrolled. For-profit schools like DeVry, Phoenix, Capella and Kaplan tend to dominate the online learning space. They currently account for about 8% of the total number of college students in the U.S. They offer a wide range of degree programs, but tend to focus on career-oriented learning in everything from trades to nursing, law enforcement and education. Many offer fast-track degree completion programs that cater mainly to adult learners. (Click here for a list of non-profit online schools)

For-profit schools get only a portion of their revenue from direct student tuition payments. A large proportion of their fees are paid by the government, but way of Pell Grants and other federal and state education aid programs.

Many of the for-profits have come under fire recently for over-aggressive recruitment tactics and, allegedly, a lack of focus on getting students actually graduated. As a result, there are rule changes going into effect in 2012 that will force these schools to publish their tuition fees and the hire rates of their graduates.

What’s a bit lost in the debate about for-profit schools, however, is the fact that non-profit colleges and universities get huge tax benefits from the cities and towns they are located in, have a tenure system that doesn’t necessarily reward professors for actually teaching, and have very little to offer in terms of proof that their graduates find employment as a result of their degrees.

The source article here says that for-profit schools are generally more expensive than their non-profit counterparts. That’s just not correct, however, when you factor in astronomically expensive private colleges, which are also non-profit.

Filed Under: Accreditation, Adult education, Online education, Paying for college, Student life Tagged With: , ,

Are colleges unfair in giving preference to children of alumni?

September 30, 2010 By Leave a Comment

An op-ed piece in The New York Times today decribes a rising populist resentment against the time-honored practice of colleges and universities giving preference in the admissions process to the sons and daughters of alumni. It’s helped lead to family dynasties in some cases where generation after generation from the same family keep attending the same school. It’s also proved to be a good fund raising technique. Although most colleges don’t explicitly state that an alumni’s donations to a school will help get a child accepted as a student, many alumni believe that it does.

According to the Times piece, about three quarters of selective private schools openly practice “legacy preferences,” which increase a student’s chance of getting accepted by as much as 20%. Author Richard D. Kahlenberg says these kinds of preferences for alumni’s kids may be illegal, and are starting to be challeged by lawsuits. Read the Times piece here

Filed Under: Student life

Buffett and Jay-Z talk working, education and luck

September 28, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Here’s a fascinating video clip of the unlikely pair of Warren Buffett and Jay-Z talking with Steve Forbes about the role of luck in their careers. Among other tidbits, billionaire Buffett says that NOT getting accepted at Harvard was the best thing that ever happened to him, because it resulted in his going to Columbia to study under economics legend Ben Graham. It was Graham’s ideas that formed the basis of Buffett’s investing strategy. Both the financial whiz and the rap star agree that it takes a little luck to be tremendously successful at something you love to do.

Filed Under: Careers & Salaries, Careers and education, Student life
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