

Why College Shouldn't Take Four Years - tokenadult
http://www.newsweek.com/id/218183

======
HistoryInAction
I think the most amazing thing about this article is that it was written (or
at least bylined) by a sitting senator. I don't agree with many of Sen.
Alexander's political positions generally, but wow! That's a policy paper
right there and a rare thing for a politician to do, generally. Basically,
this piece seems intended to 'pull' the average student back towards a four-
year average by giving them opportunities to graduate early. However, I feel
it doesn't actually incentivize them to graduate unless they're already driven
to do so.

@yummyfajitas, tokenadult, It would definitely be interesting to graduate in
three years, but I think the better option is to regear the fourth year as a
transition year, with few classes and geared towards internships, externships,
coops, and on-campus research. It should propel you to grad school, your
vocation, or even give you a chance to meet co-founders and enter startupdom.

~~~
yummyfajitas
Instead of graduating in 3 years and getting work experience in the 4'th year,
students should stay in school and get work experience (*ternship, coop,
research) in the 4'th year?

Apart from being an opportunity for the college to take an "internship fee",
"computer fee", "student activities fee", "PIRG fee", etc, what purpose does
this serve that 3 year graduation would not?

~~~
fpgeek
It gives the student an opportunity to get a taste of the working world before
making their first major professional decision. That, to me, is worthwhile.

~~~
yummyfajitas
What makes the 4'th year internship a "taste" while the first job is a "major
professional decision"? Is it simply because the label "internship" will make
it socially acceptable to quit and do something else?

~~~
fpgeek
Pretty much. An internship is structured to be time-limited, so there's a
natural stopping point to re-assess (on both sides). First jobs don't have
that.

Consider law and business students who typically do summer internships. Many
end up working for their internship employer, but many do not.

------
yardie
It doesn't have to be this way. I've looked at the French university system
and it makes sense. Unfortunately, with the Barcelona agreement, they are
switching from the pretty decent system they have to the anglo-saxon model.

If you are unfamiliar you are given a license? for each year you complete. So
you would receive Bac+1, Bac+2, and a Bac+3 is the equivalent of bachelors.
Employers specify how much time and which degrees they are looking for when
you apply for work. I've seen some only require a Bac+1 and a few want a
Bac+3.

This is completely unlike the US model where if you are 1 or 2 semesters away
from receiving a degree (I'm sure some of you have a few friends like this)
you are only a highschool graduate no matter how much time you've invested at
the university.

Also, I'm a 6-year grad, 1 was working, 1 was cooping, 4 were actual
university time. My final year was a straight year (May-May) of school. It was
hard, physically, because during the summers my school tried to cram an entire
semester (4 months) into 4 weeks. While this looked doable on paper you end up
chewing through a lot of material, disregarding it, and then repeat the
following week. I remember nothing from my summer courses.

If your schedule didn't mesh perfectly with the courses then you might have to
wait a year until a required course becomes available again. I pushed, shoved
and begged my way into every class my final year. Because I wasn't an athlete
or honor student I had to wait for enrollment. This wasn't my timeline, just
the realities of the university system. Knowing that I would be kicking around
campus until spring made me desperate.

Universities have been kicking around the 3 year degree for years and decades.
Until they, fundamentally, change how courses are distributed, how schedules
are dictated this thing doesn't have a snowballs chance in hell of gaining any
traction. I've heard the same thing for years, 3 years means less pressure on
classes, less cost, and the continuous use (no breaks) of knowledge. But the
reality is whether you do it during the fall or the spring, the costs are
still the same. Comparatively, it's more expensive since summer courses
usually max out at 12 credit hours while a normal semester can go to 18 at the
same price. Fewer courses are offered, during the summer and the ones that are
available are generally freshman, sophomore courses. If you are an
upperclassman there is very little for you except a few uni requirements.

College shouldn't take 3 or 4 years. It should be a continuous thing with
clearly defined goals. That way someone shouldn't have to be on the line for a
4 year degree. If they happen to find a job that only needs 2 or 3, instead of
the nebulouse "some college", then they should feel confident in applying
because the employer can gauge their level of education fairly.

------
Alex3917
I think the best way to improve college would be to ban the practice of
granting degrees altogether.

------
pegobry
College shouldn't take four years, but it shouldn't take three years either.

Everyone works differently, and everyone has a different rythm. Some people
know what they want to do for the rest of their lives at 13, some don't know
into their twenties. Everyone should be able to adapt their college experience
to their own needs and wants.

~~~
yummyfajitas
_Some people know what they want to do for the rest of their lives at 13, some
don't know into their twenties._

In general, when considering a big ticket (e.g. $100,000) purchase, I usually
wait until I know what I want to buy before writing a check. Maybe these
twenty-somethings should do the same.

~~~
allenp
I think there is too much pressure for a lot of high school graduates to
immediately attend college for this to be feasible. A lot of people spending
$100k+ on tuition probably spent at least half that on their high school
tuition, so the whole "oh just wait until you're ready" thing doesn't really
hold water for the parents that are paying the bills.

The real problem, I think, for these students is not in their inability to
choose a major (since the large majority of them choose something), but in
their lack of experience to provide them a basis for understanding what they
are really interested in combined with external pressures regarding what are
acceptable fields to pursue.

------
ax0n
I got hired away from college and in some ways I still kind of regret not
finishing. I'm glad that in my career, you don't really need a degree to
succeed. A lot of my peers are degree-less, but having at least a Bachelor's
does seem to give people an edge in the hiring process. For that, I usually
blame HR.

I did complete 4 years of high school in 3 years, though, by hitting college
classes at night for high school credit, taking one or two credit classes
through the school district each summer and by limiting the number of non-
credit or decreased-credit school-day options such as study hall or teacher
aide. I do wish that it was as easy to buck the college system. Usually,
though, pre-reqs are structured so you have to push though no fewer than eight
semesters in order to accomplish everything to get your Bachelor's.

~~~
sketerpot
I've found that you can often skip prerequisites if you just don't tell
anybody you didn't take the required classes. If I had done things properly, I
wouldn't have been able to take most of the classes I really enjoyed.

~~~
elai
Maybe way back when they didn't really use computer systems to track classes.
Now if you don't have the prereqs in the computer system, the computer wont
let your register, therefore the teacher wont have you on your class list and
you wont be able to get a grade on your transcript.

~~~
sketerpot
I just graduated from college a few months ago. The prerequisite system is so
full of special cases, and so riddled with verbiage like "or equivalent
classes, or permission of the instructor", that they didn't even bother to
track prereqs by computer. (Also, I spent a semester in another country, and
the records didn't transfer. Essentially, that semester was a black box in
which I could plausibly be assumed to have taken any class. Maybe that
helped.)

I'm surprised that other schools track prereqs by computer. That sounds like
it would be very rigid and high-maintenance.

------
wallflower
My law school friends bemoaned the fact that it is literally impossible to
finish law school in anything less than 3 years because the governing board
makes it unfeasible (basically milking the future lawyers for an extra year of
tuition (talk about ethics), ridiculous class scheduling)

~~~
tokenadult
Undergraduate major sequences can work that way too. Depending on how
frequently classes are offered, and with what other conflicts with other
classes, it can be impossible to complete a major sequence in less than four
years from college entry even for a student who has advanced courses in the
major and a year or more of AP credit upon college entrance. Some colleges
make that four-year experience worthwhile, but at other colleges that is
mostly marking time.

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yummyfajitas
The first thing we should do before reforming college is to decide what our
goals are. Then we should figure out how to achieve them.

Unfortunately, most stated reasons for college/education in general serve as
justification for the existing system.

~~~
tokenadult
_most stated reasons for college/education in general serve as justification
for the existing system._

That sounds right to me. What would you suggest as reasonable goals for after-
high-school schooling that would make for a better system?

~~~
cschneid
I agree with the grandparent post. We need to define why college exists in the
modern system.

In the more distant past, it was purely academic. Research, experimentation,
etc. Somewhere in the last century the goal of schools shifted to be an
unfocused trade school. "Learn to write well, every job needs that!".

I'm not opposed to either approach, and believe that both need to exist in the
world. But the idea of a 4 year college falls awkwardly in between those two
ideas.

I think the reason we are in this situation is because we confused cause and
effect. Back when college was a much more limited institution, the smartest
and best connected went to school. They then got the best jobs, and earned
more money. People saw that and said "Aha! College leads to better jobs". What
they missed was the "Aha! Smart people get the best jobs!". So the push to get
everybody into college started, since it would guarantee the student's
financial future. That of course hasn't been sustainable, and it has ruined
the bachelor's degree as a useful resume signal that you are part of that top
tier of people.

We need to reevaluate how important exclusivity is to universities, reevaluate
how kids can be trained for high end jobs (can you do a trade school for
computer programming?). It may be as simple as a marketing campaign saying
that plumbers and mechanics can't be outsourced and make a ton of money.

~~~
yardie
It was also pushed along by the Vietnam war. Kids didn't want to be drafted,
and a lot of teachers didn't want to see their brightest as gun fodder. The
only way to get around the draft was to get into college. Thus began that
sneaky grade inflation problem that all highschools and colleges swear doesn't
exist.

------
zck
One of the downsides of taking less time to graduate is requiring earlier
decisions. Many students don't graduate with their major unchanged from what
they thought it at the time they matriculated. Personally, by the time my
freshman year was over, I had taken only three courses total in what would
become my two majors (math and computer science), and one didn't count (C.S.
for non-majors). I had no idea what I wanted to major in when I went to
college. I needed that time to decide. Of course, moving one year of college
into summers would make for the same amount of work each semester, but
temporally compressed, at the cost of removing all your intra-college summers.
No summer internships, no summer jobs. That means you can't go work for
google; you can't work for Fog Creek. You can get an internship during school,
but that won't be full-time; just a day or two a week. For many students,
they'll be away from their families for most of those three years, which would
consist of nearly-constant work.

------
larsberg
I've always thought that even after four years, that really is just barely
enough time to get decent awareness around developing software. Assuming you
were a CS major the whole time.

The only thing worse than being bad at what you do is being bad at it and not
knowing it.

~~~
dustingetz
the decent programmers I've worked with all have a passion for software and
learned it informally. Uni is notoriously bad at training software engineers.

------
seanc
The CEGEP system in Quebec is quite good. 3 years High School , 2 years CEGEP
(sort of like community college), and then 3 years university for a bachelors.
Foreign students like I was do a year 0 (they really call it that, at least at
McGill) at a university, and then meet the Quebec students in our major the
next year.

So like the French system, there are more chances to get off the train and
have a useful credential, plus many students do the freshman year close to
home for less money.

------
valeriekcats
I'm 57+ and it has taken me since 1999 to get my AA and I still have to make
it another 2+ years to get my BA. I work to make ends meet I support a
disabled mother, husband and grandson...........I want my Masters and I'll
take the time it takes to get it. Psychology is not a simple study and these
morons want us to do our degrees in 3 years with 40 units per year........I
still take 24 and I still don't get a full night sleep........be real PLEASE!

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asciilifeform
Yes, let's bleed an extra cube-farm year out of every serf.

------
Torn
World University rankings for 2008 -
[http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-
uni...](http://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-university-
rankings/2009/results)

Seems the US does indeed have a lot of the top-ranking universities up there

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HistoryInAction
A basic round up of webtalk about this subject:
[http://www.theatlanticwire.com/opinions/view/opinion/Pros-
an...](http://www.theatlanticwire.com/opinions/view/opinion/Pros-and-Cons-of-
Blitzing-Through-College-1333)

------
dustingetz
You guys talk about undergrad like you're there for the education. Hackers,
moreso than 'normal' people, need college to develop social skills and other
soft subjects. Grad school is for real learning.

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sellis
Shouldn't your major play a factor in how many years it takes?

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steveplace
It probably shouldn't, however colleges have a monetary incentive to extend
your duration as a student.

~~~
harry
As I work at a good sized institution I gotta disagree. The effect I actually
see is that students who spend more time at our university take up
disproportional resources and end up costing the university money - Since
students who take >4 years typically fill up required courses then drop out -
the courses aren't filled efficiently. There are many other reasons as well
for a University to want "graduate in 4", but that's the first ones to come to
mind.

It's a major program here and the administration has been researching and
passing new tuition policies. You can read a report done by the Office of
Institutional Research and Planning here at KU:
<http://www2.ku.edu/~oirp/GIF/GIF_TaskForceReport_090205.pdf>

~~~
steveplace
I'll take your data over my anecdotes anytime ;)

------
edw519
College doesn't take four years now. I finished in 3. AP credit from high
school, 2 summer sessions, and a few extra courses was all it took.

Anyone ambitious enough can do it. The first thing to do is stop thinking like
the crowd.

Default thinking is for most people, but not everyone. I suspect most people
here already know that.

~~~
tokenadult
What was your major? Can any entering freshman with no previous courses in the
major department finish in three years? (That was barely possible for my major
at my alma mater, back in the 1970s.)

Were you working to pay your bills while going to college? That makes a
difference for a lot of students too.

Props to you for doing something besides the default.

~~~
steveplace
It depends if you're willing to take classes over the summer as well, it's
certainly possible.

~~~
tokenadult
Willingness to take classes during the summer can be constrained by the
necessity of working for expenses during the summer.

~~~
scott_s
Also by what classes are offered during the summer. In the computer science
departments I've been in, junior and senior level classes aren't offered
during the summer.

------
Daniel_Newby
As usual, they are trying to fix government meddling with austerity measures.
As usual, it will not work.

"Meanwhile, tuition has soared, leaving graduating students with unprecedented
loan debt."

Because the government subsidized interest rates and abolished underwriting
standards. The latter was done by making it impossible to write off student
loan debt in bankruptcy, meaning lenders could give a student loan to anyone
with a pulse and still write it down as an asset on their books. Higher
education is just another part of the monetary bubble.

"Because of the recession, Harvard is laying off workers and Stanford is
selling a billion dollars of its endowment."

No, that's because their money managers stashed the grocery money in
derivatives, turning a liquidity crunch into an insolvency crisis. (And thus
answering the question of whether the MBA and quant muppets were trained to be
thieves or trained to be idiots.)

