Wednesday, July 31, 2013
What to do with the gap?
As an educator at a local community college teaching fundamental math, I see the extreme disconnect between what happens at the jr. high and high school levels in preparation for higher education. The post: Early College (or “Who goes to high school anymore?”) is a prime example of this disconnect. Higher education used to be defined as something beyond high school and not a realistic pursuit for everyone. Compared to world standards, our American education system has experienced a dumbing down. This has definitely affected our K-12 education, but what do we do at the college level? Dumb down “higher education”? Attempt to reteach high school at the college level (my role)? Attempt to collaborate with K-12 education systems (which sometimes results in programs described in the “Early College” post)?
Thankfully, the community college at which I teach is a feeder school for the 4-year universities in the area and works hard to not “lower the bar” for those seeking to continue on to a bachelor’s degree. We “raised the bar” at one point for all associate’s degree students by requiring at least one college level math course, but unfortunately this backfired with certain majors in the Health Science, Business, Industrial, and IT Departments. And so, what’s an educator to do? Make a post on a blog with similar-minded educators!
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In Texas there is a state legislated "Closing the Gaps" program that is supposed to "close the gap" by 2015 (now by 2017?). (Some details are at http://www.thecb.state.tx.us/index.cfm?objectid=233A17D9-F3D3-BFAD-D5A76CDD8AADD1E3 .)
ReplyDeleteI am sadly cynical on this, as the issue is intensely political. Secondary schools claim that they *are* doing a good job, university faculty say, "No, most students are unprepared," parents say to the state, "Fix it" while the state is trying to cut budgets and promise total college tuition under $10,000. And TI (*Texas* Instruments) says, "Y'all just need our calculators to fix the math problem."
At Sam Houston we are not allowed to teach more than two remedial math classes (0331 and 0332) since community colleges apparently cover the *more* remedial mathematics... yet even with just 0332 we are overwhelmed with fifty full sections as *many* (most?) of our incoming freshman seem to need that class.
The "gap problem" is a significant one. "Mind the gap" is not just a slogan for the London Underground....
Yes, and the early college programs in high school soldier on. I came across this webpage of Indian Creek High School, about an hour from Bloomington: http://ichs.indiancreekschools.com/early-college.html
ReplyDeleteThey are proudly promoting that they now offer 11 courses, for free, at the high school, to anyone (including freshmen), taught through high school teachers, that are transferable to "most colleges and universities." These courses include Spanish, American History, Chemistry, College Algebra, and Trig with Analytic Geometry.
The gap is a problem. And I can tell you the answer is NOT to give college credit to high school work.
Ken I looked at the link on the Texas initiative. It looks complicated, and I don't really get it. It looks like another test for high school students? What is your take on this?
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