Colleges consider 3-year degrees
ACCELERATED PROGRAMS COULD SAVE TIME & MONEY by Valerie Strauss, Washington Post 05/23/09
WASHINGTON, D.C. – In an era when college students commonly take longer than four years to get a bachelor’s degree, some U.S. schools are looking anew at an old idea: slicing a year off their undergraduate programs to save families time and money.
Advocates of a three-year undergraduate degree say it would work well for ambitious students who know what they want to study. Such a program could provide the course requirements for a major and some general courses that have long been the hallmark of American education.
The four-year bachelor’s degree has been the model in the United States since the first universities began operating before the American Revolution. Four-year degrees were designed in large part to provide a broad-based education that teaches young people to analyze and think critically, considered vital preparation to participate in the civic life of American democracy.
The three-year degree is the common model at the University of Cambridge and Oxford University in England, and some U.S. schools have begun experimenting with the idea. To cram four years of study into three, some will require summer work, others will shave course lengths and some might cut the number of credit hours required.
“It will not be easy to produce a low-cost, high-quality three-year curriculum for a college degree, but now is the time to try,” Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), a former education secretary and a past president of the University of Tennessee, told a group of educators this year. “Today’s economic crisis and tight budgets are the best time to innovate and change.”
But critics said they fear that an undergraduate’s academic and social experience would be compromised by shortening it to three years. College would tilt more toward job training and away from the broad-based education many U.S. schools have offered.
“Most high governmental officials who speak of education policy seem to conceive of education in this light — as a way to ensure economic competitiveness and continued economic growth,” said Derek Bok, president emeritus of Harvard University. “I strongly disagree with this approach.”
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May 27th, 2009 at 7:33 am
I agree that something needs to be done about the college scheme of things. More students are taking longer because of (in my opinion) Blatant ill advice from college counselors and admin staff. I have a nephew that is into art, he is very good. His freshmen year he went off to school in ohio, but had to come home due to lack of funds. He has been at KCKCC for a couple years now because they keep changing the requirements on him, and now they say he can’t graduate until he takes one class. A class that they don’t have an instructor for, but he can’t finish until he takes this class.
He’s not alone in that, i’ve heard this alot from young people where the requirments change all of a sudden and they lack one or two classes, so it takes an extra semester or even a year to graduatem, and this is so wrong.
I do like the 4 year college undergrad study because it gives students first time to adapt and see what’s going on. But then the next three years is the actual training and maturing time. Take away one of those years and we will have more than the usual amount of kids coming out of college not prepaired for the real world.
May 27th, 2009 at 10:39 pm
No wonder our nation’s students have fallen behind the rest of the world in education. We are making things much too easy for them. We are constantly being told that Americans are weak in math and science, but someone thinks its smart to deduct a year of college?
May 28th, 2009 at 6:25 am
I think it is a great idea colleges are pondering 3 year degrees. Most of these institutions continue to raise tuition and families are already struggling financially, especially in this economy.
May 30th, 2009 at 7:30 am
First, there’s educational budget cuts. And now there’s a chance colleges will reduce degree completion programs by a year? As a nation, it appears we are starting to devalue quality education for our children. How will we compete with the rest of the world?
June 5th, 2009 at 6:58 pm
Damn, what’s next? Home school?
June 17th, 2009 at 11:06 pm
Maxwell, I understand what you’re saying. However, as Marissa had previously mentioned, we must be careful not to devalue the sacred institution of higher learning in any form or fashion. By reducing these programs a year, we run the risk of tarnishing something once considered to be a prime measurement for personal achievement: a 4-year college degree. I say, if it ain’t broke; don’t fix it.
June 20th, 2009 at 4:51 pm
Education in this country is a joke…we’re goin downhill, and fast.