What Degrees Should Mean

Original Article

The point is to focus on what student learned. Not how you teach them or how institutions structure their courses.

I think the work done by Lumina has it's implication and use in generally framing the shared understanding. But, as mentioned through out the article, there is a long way to go to get to the campus level.

I would like related back to points raised by two commentators:

Andy Rundquist: "Not all employers care where a candidate got their BA/BS degree, but those that do have a lot to aid in their decision. Does the school have a good reputation? Have we hired someone from there before? "

Patrick F. Bassett: "Demonstrations of Learning"

As we all know it, institutions and faculties have a lot to say about how they like their students to achieve. That is all very well. But, on the other hand, that do not impose or limit what employers are looking for.

At this point in time, employers, in general, do not have the resources to do a thorough evaluation of their applicant. They are relied on interviews, references and reputations ... etc. Part of the reason, of cause, is a judgmental call on how much cost is worth to spend to fill a particular job, especially when there is no ready made assessment tools that can tell candidates apart.

Now, what if there were such assessment tools available? Noted that I use the plural. Each institutions are free to set their directions, tools will evaluate various kind of achievements. Employer is free to look at various combination of achievements. For highly academic courses, there are still markets for it, since the appropriate employers will understand that the usual assessment tools are not suitable in these cases.

The point is to focus on what student learned. Not how you teach them or how institutions structure their courses.

Lumina and faculties' work in defining the learning are of great use in framing the assessment tools.

Are Undergrads Learning Much in College?

Original Article

Graduation rates and assessments are measures that balance each other.

I am in the opinion that the real study begins with students pondering on books.

As to solving today's problem, we need to support professors while, at the same time, evaluate students and publish the results.

I believe most of our professors are well qualified. It is our college kids that need to work hard. For these old kids, it is not the professors' job to tracking them down. Professors are there to provide guidance when these old kids run into obstacles while studying.

Part of the problems these day is that SOME professors are taking the easy way out when facing pressures from student evaluations and administrators and this is why we need to support our professors by evaluating students' learning and publishing the results.

If large percent of graduates failed assessments, it may indicate that professors may have been too easy on their students. This give professors voices to boost their grading system. Publishing the results will help professors to fend off pressures from administrators whose only goal is to boost the graduation rate.

Graduation rates and assessments are measures that balance each other.

Colleges and the Common Core

Original Article

Common assessments is the question!

Actually, I think the most important question raised by the article is the common assessments.

If we assuming, for a moment, that the assessments is accurate. Is there any reason to against the common assessment? For me, I don't see any reason to against it ( I will address Donald Asher's comment later). The question left is, then, how can we make these assessments reasonably accurate. Ideally, the assessments will provide useful information on various measurements. There is no reason to limited to, say, one score for math. There could have one score for algebra, one score for trigonometry ... etc. There is also no reason to limit depth except to limited the number of questions students have to answer.

With these assessments in place, the rest is history. Do we need common core? Will college using these assessments for admission? The answer to these two question are obvious. We do not need common core since these assessments will drive the curriculum and schools can pick whatever way to teach their students. If these assessments are accurate, I can't see why college would not use them.

Now to the comment of Mr. Asher: the creativity. Apparently, Mr. Asher is very proud of the American innovation machine. The thing I would like to point out is that, at this point, it may be true that American have been innovated. But I am not so sure this is directly linked to the American education system. Also, for a long time, China and India have to fight for their survival first. Mr. Asher's arguments on teaching to the test is also questionable. Personally, I went through all these test preparation culture and I can tell you that those people who standout are those really understand the material. Teaching to the test does not work - especially if the assessment is well designed. The entrepreneur argument isn't without a flaw either. In American there are plenty of foreign born entrepreneur and much of them are in the hi-tech field. Besides, Microsoft and Cisco are created by nerds who are of no typical American kids.