MIDDLETOWN, Conn. — Not all college students are willing to live on cold pizza, ramen noodles and greasy takeout.Some, like Wesleyan University junior Nica Latto, prefer wedges of locally produced artisanal cheeses added to the mix, perhaps a gouda with a slightly nutty undertone or a Gruyere for a fondue party while studying with classmates.So to satisfy palates that lean more gourmet than grub, Latto and several friends organized a co-op in which fancy cheeses from a nearby Connecticut farm are delivered each week to the Middletown campus and distributed to students, many of whom line up with baguettes — and meal cards — in hand. While universities nationwide have updated their dining hall menus to meet the increasingly epicurean expectations of students like Latto, many students are also taking things a step further and bringing fancy fare to campus on their own.
For some, it means launching co-ops to get everything from fair-trade coffee to fancy herbs or hand-rolled butter from nearby farms. For others, it means collaborating with the vendors who stock their dorm cafeterias to get quinoa, kohlrabi or other non-traditional items on their menus.
About half of Va. community college students need remedial training
About half of the high school graduates who go into community colleges in Virginia need some form of remedial training, particularly in mathematics, an analyst with the General Assembly's watchdog agency told the commission Monday.
Aris Bearse of the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission said the information came from the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia.
As part of its work plan for this year, JLARC is studying the secretary of education's role in improving coordination between K-12 education, community colleges and the four-year institutions of higher education. JLARC is studying whether to expand the secretary of education's statutory authority, Bearse said. A report is due in July.
Bearse said the secretary of education has no statutory responsibility for coordination of education. Greater coordination could increase college readiness, so there would be less remediation and more retention, Bearse said.
College readiness topics could include learning to refill the
ReplyDeletecopy paper
toilet paper
staples
etc.
If you judge college readiness based on ability to refill those things AND to unjam the copier? The tenured silverbacks in my department would qualify as "unready for college."
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, one suspects the silverbacks simply decline to engage in such petty concerns.
Oh, Viva, but then you're treating them LIKE CHILDREN! If they don't want to come to class, you can't make them. Why on Earth are you even taking attendance anyway? If they don't want to show up on time they should have that right. If they hand in assignments late, you should just accept them. If they want to sleep, well, didn't YOU sleep in college? And you shouldn't MAKE them do silly things like take notes. Sheesh, it's not kindergarten. And plagiarism is just a citation error. They just didn't know what they were doing, so lighten up.
ReplyDeleteNow, I don't believe that shit, but a prof at a school I worked for (and was attending!) did. And made sure his opinion dominated a grade appeal meeting. Can I get a "What a douchebag! from the crowd?
Whatta douchebag!!
ReplyDeleteDOUCHEBAG!!
ReplyDeleteIt used to annoy me that colleges even had remedial programs. I wondered why they were wasting time on people who weren't ready for college-level material.
ReplyDeleteFinally, as a Business Major, I realized that they got to charge people for remedial classes. I also had a better understanding of human nature. They had twelve years to absorb elementary skills, but because it was free they didn't value it. Now that they have to pay for it, it might have a little more meaning.
In the interests of full disclosure, my initial foray into college was none too stellar. I wasn't paying, my father was. So what did I care? Ten years later it was my dime (with some help from the VA, bless them). It's funny how who's footing the bill will change perspective.
I'd be interested to know more about the extent of college and university students taking remedial courses - this is one of the great open secrets, and shames, of post-secondary education in the US and Canada today.
ReplyDeleteHas anyone ever encountered any national (American or Canadian) studies of this, or a collection of state/provincial studies? I haven't (but so far I haven't looked very hard either).
I found it odd that when adjuncting in a community college in [VERY large state that has lots of cattle but no polar bears], the state regulations permitted me, with my BS in Math and an MA in a very different discipline, to teach remedial math but not actual math courses. Um. Shouldn't a remedial-math instructor have the minimum requirement for teaching regular math (MS in math) PLUS some extra training in teaching those-who-don't-get-math? I'd think teaching a remedial course would be harder than teaching a course to people who've already demonstrated at least the ability to pass high school math. Or is Dude, as so often happens, out of tune with the post-mod-ren educational world here?
ReplyDelete