Declining standards should not be ignored (1 Viewer)

[Tabris]

This is from Professor Peter ABelson, he left last semester.

Declining standards should not be ignored
By Peter Abelson - posted Friday, 2 December 2005 Sign Up for free e-mail updates!Sign Up for free e-mail updates!

When the HES reported last month that I had resigned from my personal chair in economics at Macquarie University, vice-chancellor Di Yerbury took the opportunity to dismiss as "extremely, grossly inaccurate" comments I had earlier made about declining university standards. This is a response to Professor Yerbury's charges. Among my comments, reported in another newspaper, were the following factual observations:

* Forty per cent of students fail the second year course that I teach. Some students have failed the course four to five times. At least one student has failed the course six times.
* Foreign students who get a second-year entry to Macquarie after completing their first year with the Sydney Institute of Business and Technology - a private provider on campus - have a failure rate of 66 per cent.
* The summer school has failure rates of 60 to 70per cent.
* In response to the comments that standards at all levels, from high distinctions to passes, have fallen at another large university, I observed that "the same thing has happened at Macquarie University".

These comments were made in response to a telephone call from a reporter and relied on my memory. Nevertheless, they were essentially accurate.

Most of my comments were based on experience with a compulsory second-year course for economics undergraduates, taken five years ago by about 300 students, although numbers have fallen recently to just under 200.



http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=3909


and also heres his background

http://www.anzsog.edu.au/staff/staff_abelson.html

I dont mind if the bar is raised, but to lower the bar for others shouldnt be the case for uni's.

 

[AsyLum]

Like I posted in another thread, its the fine line you tread when you have to be financially viable as well as provide an education. Until such a time when education becomes purely subsidised we won't see an end to it.

 

[glitterfairy]

We see this in dance all the time. It's gotten so bad that we've developed a name for these studios who take money, teach shoddy classes and tell all their kids that they're wonderful - "Dolly Dinkle" studios.

I believe there will always be a fortune to be made in lowering a school's standards to generate more income - whilst some may not wish it to happen, as Mike has mentioned sometimes it's the only way to stay afloat enough to spend money/time on "Real" education.

 

[clairegirl]

i would pay NOT to have to do accg200 or accg253

 

[glitterfairy]

^oh, I'd interpret it more as "dude we're not marking harder - the people coming in these days are just more stupid"

 

[Tabris]

How can the standards be dropping, when they're failing so many people in second year economics? If they were passing everyone, then the standard would probablybe dropping. Also, if the same lecturers keep failing the same bunch of students, doesn't that say something about lecturers?

If "declining standards" means the quality of students coming in, then who knows. Either way, if they don't cut the mustard, then they fail.




Doesn't this quote from the article suggest that the standard is rising, ie. harder than in the past.

My interpretation is that the standards for the prerequisites for ECON210 (i.e. ECON110 and ECON111) are declining. This means, alot of students get easily through these two units and suffer in 2nd year because of the lower standards in 1st year. If standards were high enough, then my guess is that the 1st year units filters the cohort to determine who can do the 2nd year units (which are extensions of 1st year) and who cannot.

 

[sweetish]

Go you good thing. He's just bitter that he's not liked by anyone.

On the point of the thread (if there is one?), this is just a one dimensioned look at essentially 'what is wrong with *this one* aspect of macquarie uni' huffah.

First of all, failure rates are not proper indicators of the 'standards', how exactly is standards measured anyway? By the high achievers or by the low achievers? Most academic recognition of individuals / organisations is for achievements. It doesnt matter how bad a certain aspect of any entity is, take for example Actuarial Studies or something like that, supposedly at Macquarie Acst Stud. is quite up there at least in NSW. Sure there are shithouse students floating around, whether intentional or not, but from a students perspective im looking at lecturers/material/degree recognition etc, not how much people fail. Obviously it plays A part, but if everything is good but failure rates, unless you are shitting your pants, whats there to harm you? OMG the lecturer said im shit! OH LORD what am I going to do...

Yeah ranting on, secondly, students might pick up the slack later on in units. Consistency might be valued, but it has to be accepted that while desired in society, the fact is that not everyone is going to be machine like, like alot of the students on BOS churning out HDs
Then again its a matter of passion, and a want to study certain areas and subjects. Some might fail at the first hurdle (ala a core unit that is a prerequisite) simply because they do not like the unit. They might like say 300lvl units, but despise the 100lvl units. (Law maybe?)
You can't just say oh no, standards falling.
Maybe further looks into what exactly tickles the fancy of students oughta shed some light, and maybe restructure units, degrees, program of study and stuff like that

WOOT one more post, wheres my award

 

[Good_riceZ]

OH LORD used the wrong account, one more post AND saying less BS
hacked!

 

[iambored]

yeah i don't know what i think about this topic - where do you draw the line with raising standards at uni, but still giving everyone the chances they are entitled to?

presumably he thinks that students who have failed subjects multiple times shouldn't be at uni at all. but i don't like the idea of kicking students out and basically telling them they are not welcome at uni. it's like with uais - to get a low uai and be told you aren't welcome in uni isn't fair because so many people get into uni a different way and do well.

 

[H?]

I was really, really bored (as compared to iambored ) and read the full report from the Economics Society - it's quite an interesting read into the opinions of the Heads of Economics at the Unis.

There seems to be a big concern for, at least for first year subjects - English proficiency and student-staff ratios - both of which seem to have changed for the worse in the past few years.

link: http://www.ecosoc.org.au/docs/Report on Student Standards 2004.pdf

I'm all for giving people chances - hell, I'm one of those people that got in through the TAFE "back door" - but a line must be drawn, standards wise so the degree that you eventually receive is not one that has been devalued.

 

[prusso]

i agree with a few things his said, but alot of his shit is bullshit.

for example ive passed comp115/125 yet i still dont no how to program even a simple program.

on the other hand if the bar is set any higher, our country as a whole will be smarter, but there will be less qualified people around...i guess in saying that id rather have less, smarter qualified ppl than more under qualified ppl.

 

[lcf]

A family friend who works in an Australian univeristy as a lecturer/tutor noted that he failed many of his students because they didn't satisfy the course requirements - however the univeristy forced him to pass those said students as they were international students (therefore full fee paying, more revenue for the uni - if the uni looses them, they lose money) So money is a huge factor in passes in certain subjects and situations.
I guess univeristies wouldn't look to good if their international students kept failing so - they have to pass a 'quota' - does this means in the near future, quality of jobs etc in various industries is going to plummet?

 

[AsyLum]

I think its pretty much common knowledge that happens lcf, and like I stated, its a fine balance in maintaining the dichotomous relationship the two have.

I'd be more interested in the numbers of International Students who get employed in Australia after graduating, and the number who go back.

As for skills/quality, I think we're forgetting that graduate jobs for the most part, still require an interview process, and with poor communication skills, its going to be a tough ask to get through that in an English speaking country.

 

[Sweet_Lemon]

degree qualification only contribute as a part of getting a job, there's more to learn throughout life.
conclusion: everyone hav their own interpretation to this article

 

[iambored]

But are there many people with degrees who can never find a job and so work in an area where their degree isn't needed? I seem to have the general idea that although it might take a long time even for high achievers to find a job, everyone finds a job eventually.

 

[AsyLum]

Sure, but they'd be fairly limited I would assume, and would most likely be labour jobs rather than office ones

edit: Though I could be wrong, the Dr Patel shit really is an eye opener :|

 

[iambored]

*googles* i don't know how big that story was last year but i sure missed it. you wonder how someone so incompetent keeps working, and there are so many of them (just not always in such an important area as surgery :S ).

i'd love to know how that relates to uni standards. probably the general trend of better marks = better performance, with exceptions. i don't think it's fair that the exceptions (of low marks, good perfomance) miss out if uni standards are raised, especially when there are the exceptions (of high marks, bad performance) still getting through.

 

[AsyLum]

Its the problem with using any cut-offs, you are effectively cutting off someone, and its just the value of theoretical knowledge which is valued initially from Year 12 > Tertiary.

Tertiary for the most part appears to be quite a bit more 'focused' and skills/specifically based, and weeds out for the most part those who probably shouldn't be doing the course.

At the same time, the fact that universities are in effect financially responsible institutions means that they need to maintain that aspect of things, and whether thats where the problem really begins.

As to the correlation of jobs, it seems that in times of high demand/low supply, various 'filters' will be bypassed for the need to fulfill that demand, as in the case of doctors and nurses (and i fear also for teachers). But thats just the way the world works unfortunately.

I think there needs to be further education needed to fulfill purely vocational/skills based alternatives to university or other entry ways into university. But more importantly I think there really needs to be something to address this misconception from a lot of parents that getting a degree = job and that uni = prestige = job. I've heard so many kids come forward on open day all asking about their actual area of interest only to suddenly interrupt/get interrupted with "but my parents want me to do B xx". Its a troubling trend which doesn't seem to get any better unfortunately.

 

[prusso]

i blame lecturers

samantha sin accg105
abaya comp115

after u have these 2 u wanna kill urself.

 

[lcf]

I did this IPT HSC course last year, and this little asian woman kept talking very fast in bad english, she would put up a slide for a few seconds and whip it down, only to tell us at the end we didn't need to copy any of it cause she was giving us photocopies -_- that and she got confused in every aspect of what she was explaining - is that her? one of the reasons i decided to stay away from computing subjects at macquarie