Christmas WS's!
I read this and started wondering what will college be like for our kids? I know they’re just at elementary school, but time does fly.
The Pew Research Center released a report on college enrollment and ethnicity last week and it’s looking positive. The US hit an all-time high enrollment of 12.2 million college students, ages 18-24 in October 2010. Hispanic and African American enrolment is up to 1.8 million and 1.7 million students respectively and white student enrolment is slightly down – by 4%. Industry pundits are attributing this good news to more students graduating from high school and, therefore, making themselves eligible to enroll in college, as well as the poor economy. Fewer young people can find jobs after high school and more employers are looking for college grads.
Hidden inside the report, though, is the fact that students are taking longer to finish their degrees. For every five students who start in community college – degrees that are supposed to take two years or less – only one finishes within three years. Only around half the students who enroll in Bachelor’s degrees gain it in six years – a degree that should take four. This is prompting experts to ask: will the next workforce generation be less educated than those of us that are in the workforce today? This college graduation statistic has pushed the US from first to 10th in the world.
Reasons given for students spending longer at college are the higher tuition fees and less financial aid that are forcing students to work more while they go to school. Budget cuts have also led to fewer classes, making it harder for students to fulfill their required courses in a shorter time.
As parents of elementary kids we often read this sort of news with interest, but feel unaffected by it. Pay heed, though, this could be our future too. Many of us would like to see our kids go onto college, but what will that college future look like for our kids?
