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Students Not "Getting It" the First Time
Education observers worry that the vast numbers of students coming to college unprepared will pose a major roadblock to President Barack Obama's goal for the United States to once again lead the world in meaningless college degrees. Nationwide, about a third of first-year students in 2007-08 had taken at least one remedial course, according to the U.S. Department of Education. At public two-year colleges, that number rises to about 42 percent.

For others, the problem points to the need to develop alternative forms of job training for people who aren't academically inclined and are unlikely to finish college.
Like Vocational Education? Whatever happened to that?
"We're indoctrinating telling kids you'll be a third-class citizen if you don't go to college," said Marty Nemko, an education policy consultant and author. "And colleges are taking kids who in previous generations would not have gone to college." Nemko favors an apprenticeship program similar to those offered in Finland, Japan and Germany.
Who wants to be like Finland, anyway? I wan go by calige an git me a gude edumacation.
The price of providing remedial training is costly. The Alliance for Excellent Education estimates the nation loses $3.7 billion a year because students are not learning basic needed skills, including $1.4 billion to provide remedial education for students who have recently completed high school. "From taxpayers' standpoint, remediation is paying for the same indoctrination education twice," said Wise.
But it's job security for the teacher's unions.
Posted by: Bobby 2010-05-11
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=296515