College students don't study as much as they should
“How much do college students really study? According to the annual National Survey of Student Engagement, the average college senior hits the books for about 15 hours a week. But the amount they devote to reading, reviewing notes, or participating in study groups varies significantly depending on their major. Engineering students rack up the most time—19 hours per week—while their business and social science major peers study a relatively paltry 14 hours per week.” Read more…
(source: Good)
Illinois teacher suspended for showing Jon Stewart 'Daily Show' clips in class
“An Illinois teacher at Eureka High School is on paid suspension for showing clips of “The Daily Show” in school. Rhett Felix, a first-year government and law teacher, showed three segments from Jon Stewart’s show to his sophomore-level class,” Read more…
(source: Huffington Post)
(source: Dilbert by Scott Adams)
Harvard is no longer the world’s best school — on one list, at least
“Harvard has toppled off its lofty perch. On Thursday, Times Higher Education (THE) published its annual list of the world’s best colleges, and there’s a new frontrunner in the game. California Institute of Technology, or Caltech, snagged the top spot, beating the Harvard Crimson in a geeky, intellectual Ph.D. face-off.” Read more…
In classroom of the future, stagnant scores
“To be sure, test scores can go up or down for many reasons. But to many education experts, something is not adding up — here and across the country. In a nutshell: schools are spending billions on technology, even as they cut budgets and lay off teachers, with little proof that this approach is improving basic learning.” Read more…
(source: New York Times)
College plagiarism is at an all-time high
“More than half of the college presidents surveyed said that plagiarism in students’ paper has increased over the past 10 years. Further, an overwhelming majority — 89 percent — say computers and the Internet have played a major role in the rise in stealing others work and claiming it as their own.” Read more…
(source: Time)
Is it worth getting a degree? One in five graduates is earning less than a school leaver
“One in five graduates earns less than a person who left school with as little as one A-level. The official figures raise doubts that thousands of students have wasted their time with ‘useless’ degrees.” Read more…
(source: Daily Mail)
Students have no idea how Google works
“You’d think that with all their Googling to find the Spark Notes of the novels they didn’t read, today’s students would understand how the search engine works. Wrong: They are completely clueless! In a detailed study of 30 college students by anthropologists at Illinois Wesleyan, only seven were able to do a ‘reasonably well-executed search.” Read more…
(source: Gawker)
Overconfident and underprepared: why too many students drop out of college
“As back-to-school season approaches, incoming freshmen nationwide eagerly anticipate their first semester of college…. But for too many would-be scholars, the dream of earning a post-secondary degree is short-lived. Roughly half of entering college students from low-income families drop out empty handed. Financial pressure is certainly a factor… but money and family obligations aren’t the only barriers to college completion.” Read more…
(source: Take Part)
When C's became A's: Grade inflation in higher education today
“[B]y all objective measures, the current generation’s graduates are exceptional. A’s account for an astounding 45% of the grades handed out in college classrooms these days. This seems like an incredible accomplishment; but where are all the news articles celebrating the smartest students of all time? The answer is that the giant proportion of A’s being doled out isn’t due to bright students – it’s all a result of a severe trend in grade inflation that has been increasing in scale over the last half-century.” Read more, view infographic…
(source: mastersdegree.net)
Are today's workers smart enough for tomorrow's Smart Grid?
“The importance of education initiatives for training and retraining the smart grid workforce cannot be overstated,” the report says. “Existing and future employees alike, and therefore the smart grid effort itself, benefits from active, direct and productive engagement of the industry at every level of education.” Read more…
(source: SmartBiz.com)
