8 Responses to “The 3-year degree: an idea whose time has come?”

1. Cinda Says:
   October 28th, 2009 at 10:59 am

   I think requiring electives that have absolutely nothing to do with the degree are just a ploy to get more money from students/parents. If schools eliminated these and reduced the number of hours/credits for the degrees accordingly, it would be a nice start in the right direction.

2. Tim Says:
   October 28th, 2009 at 11:49 am

   The argument that colleges and universities should require only what is necessary for the major means that these institutions would become a version of vocational schools. Students would just learn a trade, so to speak, instead of becoming educated. While learning about the wide wide world can be done without going to school, it is not likely to happen, or happen to the extent necessary for a well-informed citizenry, without the structure of classes and help of people (professors) who study and help others learn about the variety of issues confronting society.

   If a person does not learn to think more broadly and in wider contexts than just their field, they may not seek out different perspectives on complex issues, and life will continue to appear to them to be as simple as when they were children. A college education should be an education, not a trade. Education began as something only rich elites could acquire, and only those folks could effect and affect policy (barring revolution by the common person who wasn’t part of the process). A well-informed constituency is necessary for good governance to happen, but where will they learn the critical thinking skills and get the broad exposure to concepts and histories to form the basis of continuing to be informed? Working 9 to 5 doesn’t leave time typically to pursue history (are we doomed to repeat it?), the arts and literature (what have people thought), science and technology (shall we leave policy to people who don’t know anything about the subject, or to the few who do?).

   I would argue that higher education might indeed need to be restructured somehow if it is ineffective at actually producing critical thinkers, but let’s not abandon the idea of education in favor of just producing workers, leaving true education to the rich and elites.

3. Troy Says:
   October 28th, 2009 at 12:03 pm

   I have nothing bad to say about a four year degree except four is now turning into five as required courses rarely have open slots. If a three year degree was pushed perhaps more would make it out in four.

4. Hank Walker Says:
   October 28th, 2009 at 12:25 pm

   I do not think this is realistic for most engineering majors. Looking at our own curriculum, the first three years require a sequence of courses that cannot be taken in parallel, and the fourth year electives assume knowledge of the prior years. Trying to go faster would just lead to attrition.

5. Robert Says:
   October 28th, 2009 at 4:29 pm

   President Barack Obama’s Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan was interviewed recently on a cable TV channel talk show. Duncan had a very interesting insight as to the model of education used in America-The agrarian model. He added that America is now an urban society and conforming education to the planting and harvesting seasons has long since been outmoded and needs a necessary paradigm shift with those in educational leadership circles. His solution is to go to a longer school year and have no more than a 6 week summer vacation period. This insight is interesting and needs serious consideration, but the larger problem is curriculum content and those teachers delivering it in the classrooms to students while teaching it ethically, competently and constitutionally. America is indeed in an educational crisis, and is not even competitive with at least the top 20 countries, which have scored much higher in math, science and in general knowledge of the liberal arts. Duncan supports “pay for performance” schools such as those in the Atlanta, GA area, and charter schools, like in Arizona (which are issues Teacher’s Unions oppose), that are trying to be a part of the solution, instead of perpetuating the problem prevalent in our failed public education system. Instead of making the massive changes first, the federal government needs to encourage, through educational block grants to states and educational tax credits, school vouchers, etc., for families opting to go that route for educating their children, to serve as pilot programs to see what models work and those that do not work. Then, having these proven models to make their proponents case, allow each state to decide which model(s) to use in their educational jurisdictions. If successful, these tested educational programs can be adapted and implemented in a wider educational network in other states across the country. If the US Department of Education truly seeks a better educational result in American schools, then they might see that they need to vanish away with the old, failed system that has been in force for decades. It’s a long-held observation by many, but re-creating/re-tooling a massively funded (by tax payers) public, government-run education system with these aforementioned proposed changes to implement, will again produce, nothing more than an inefficient, highly bureaucratic, corrupt and inept educational result. Let’s not support educational-model proposals that encourage “excellence deficits.”

6. Elizabeth Says:
   October 31st, 2009 at 4:50 pm

   I agree strongly with Tim, and I have taught at both vocational and academic higher education institutions.

   I believe that I have (over the decades since I received my first of 5 degrees, since the early 70s), put to good use all of the knowledge and skills I gained by completing the general education curriculum as well as all the other required courses that I took outside of my major curriculum. How could I have known in the early 70s how significant it would be some day in a global market to have studied a foreign language, when I had gone to college to study chemistry and mathematics? And in 1970, I took a class called “Basic Environmental Studies.” It was an interdisciplinary course, an elective, that was offered at that time through the sociology department, since there was no department, and no faculty member, no textbook, etc in existence as that field of study (environmental science) had not even been instituted. You never really know in what ways all those courses may be significant.

   If 120 or so credit hours are required for a 4-year degree, do the math! Figure out how many credits to take, when to take them, and get it done. A student can take summer classes, get the degree in 3 years, and get a job (i.e. begin paying taxes) a year earlier. I did that, finishing a dual degree in math and chemistry in 3 years (including the summers), back in 1973. And yes, I was working part time; full time during breaks. And, that’s from an era when students did not have the dual credit option, of getting college credit in high school. So I was starting from scratch. Of couse, I had taken some chemsitry, physics, Calculus 1, etc in high school, which a lot of students can do if they apply themselves for the 12 years that come before college.

7. Joey Says:
   November 5th, 2009 at 3:38 pm

   Tim, all that intellectual drivel is fine for some people, but others just want and/or need to learn what’s necessary and get to work. The students are paying for the education and the students should have the choice of whether or not to take extra courses. That would be the American thing to do. It is, after all, the individuals responsibility to get the knowledge they need to make informed decisions, not the schools.

8. YoungGandalf Says:
   February 17th, 2010 at 3:32 pm

   What we need is 5 year degrees, not 3 year degrees.

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