WSU worst in nation

[kathy2trips]

If WSU dumbs down their brand, my degree won't be worth the paper it's printed on. WSU needs to bring black students UP, not drag everyone else down. Why does excellence not matter any more?

[Ravine]

What is with the implication that there is a failure on the part of WSU in this matter?
A university does not "graduate" anybody. They make a decision about who to accept. After that, the student takes the credit hours, the university is paid for those hours, and if the student never successfully exits through the graduation door, well, that's on them, and the university has new, hopefully more serious, students entering through the admissions door.
It ain't grade school or high school. The university is no place for students who need nurturing or "a little help."
If your grades, and performance on the entrance exam, were good enough to be accepted into the place, you should be able to find your way to graduation. If you don't make it, the responsibility for that is almost certainly yours.
Unless, of course, your grades and/or performance on the entrance exam were not so hot, and the university accepted your dumb ass, anyway, because they were compelled to satisfy some goddam idiotic quota requirement.

[Zacha341]

That figure seemed low to me too. I did my undergrad at CCS and it was standard to have 15-18 credit per semester load - every semester... With an average 136 credits total for the final bachelors degree. I'd also heard at the undergrad level WSU was easy to get into but hard to complete.

I'm at WSU now and it's a whole different world at the post undergrad/ masters level [[from my experience and program). You're earning at the B and above grade level... or you're not going to get thru and you're foolish to spend your money at that level for a social experiment/ or experience.

Rather than lowering standards Wayne State University needs to partner up with a community college for those needing the remedial work. Such as the:
Henry Ford Community College: University of Michigan-Dearborn set up:

http://www.umd.umich.edu/transferhfcc/

WTF? When I was an undergraduate [[not WSU), my eight semesters of engineering ranged from 18 semester hours to 22 semester hours plus add in a few non-credit, mandatory classes in there.

Even the liberal arts majors were taking 17 SH a semester.

12 SH is not a full load for a full-time student.

[Zacha341]

Yes, my take on it as well. I have several friends who've earned their Masters and PhDs from WSU. And my personal observations those students [[usually over 30 years old often having returned to school for post undergrad studies per job requirements) are/ where more focused and prepared to do what is needed to get thru at the high level of competency and rigor required.

You're paying for your classes and or doing the loans and working full time, kids in high school... elderly parents, etc. time out for "distracting socializing". I don't want to earn anything less than excellent grades -- if you don't perform at the high end of the spectrum at that level you're kicked out post haste!

This is exactly my take on the situation. On the other end of the spectrum, WSU has long been one of the top 10 or 20 producers of African American PhDs and MDs in the nation.

[English]

Zacha, I agree that it's a matter of being focused and understanding how to be a student. I'm not sure how the university will address this issue, though. We're between presidents right now, with an acting pres for another week, and then an Interim President during the national search. It will really depend upon the next president's agenda.

The one thing that I am against is lowering standards. It does no good to increase the quantity of grads without preserving quality... a case in point was that guy from the school board.

[majohnson]

WTF? When I was an undergraduate [[not WSU), my eight semesters of engineering ranged from 18 semester hours to 22 semester hours plus add in a few non-credit, mandatory classes in there.

Even the liberal arts majors were taking 17 SH a semester.

12 SH is not a full load for a full-time student.

Were you also working 20 hours or more a week with a kid at home? Or did you focus exclusively on school work? Most WSU students work at least part time especially the black students.

[majohnson]

Everyone here seems to accept the 6 year standard as relevant.
The 6 year rate is not relevant at WSU. Too many students work and at 9cr a semester a person needs seven years assuming they can finish without going much over the 120cr mark, which is difficult for most students.

[fryar]

So it's because a majority of the students, and particularly the black students, at WSU are something other than that steretypical college student who goes full-time right after high school, not because these students are dispirited? If that's the case due to whatever reasons, we really don't have a problem here, just an oddball college. If not, then we still have an issue worth addressing, though it may or may not be as significant as the statistics suggest at first glance.

[belleislerunner]

WSU has an urban mission unlike any other school in Michigan. While it attracts some of the area's brightest via events like Scholar's Day - that doesn't preclude it from its responsibility to be the incubator for "first generation" college kids across the region that otherwise might not get accepted to a local college.

If you think the worth of a WSU diploma, or any college diploma, is tied to a magazine ranking - then you have deeper issues. You are solely responsible for your career and your life. Colleges provide the tools and resources to help you get where you need to go. Whether you become a failure or a success, is not dependent on the college granting the diploma - but on the drive and passion of the student.

WSU doesn't fail students. Students fail themselves.

[Hermod]

Were you also working 20 hours or more a week with a kid at home? Or did you focus exclusively on school work? Most WSU students work at least part time especially the black students.

1. Scholarship covered 50% of the [[out of state) tutition.

2. Working as a waiter in the dining hall covered my meals [[$450 a year)

3. I was the manager for the Cross-Country, In-Door Track, and Outdoor Track Varsity Teams.

I three or four one-hour classes between 8am and 1pm Monday through Saturday all four years and had four labs 2-4pm Monday through Friday [[one semester, I had five labs, yuck). I always had an 8am class all four years, six days a week. Social life suffered a bit. I might catch a beer or two on Sunday afternoon [[after mandatory church).

I didn't dare to get a girl pregnant, my folks would have killed me.

[Kevgoblue]

If you think the worth of a WSU diploma, or any college diploma, is tied to a magazine ranking - then you have deeper issues. You are solely responsible for your career and your life. Colleges provide the tools and resources to help you get where you need to go. Whether you become a failure or a success, is not dependent on the college granting the diploma - but on the drive and passion of the student.

You don't think the ranking of a college affects a diploma's relative worth and the worth of it's holder, then you're highly dillusional. Have you ever worked somewhere with a person with a degree from Harvard, Yale, Columbia, etc? If so, how did their career path compare to yours? How many short term, "developmental" assignments did they have compared to the norm? And what starting salary do you think they received?
While I question how much more these institutions actually teach than say Michigan State or WSU, there is definately a huge differential in perception.

A very interesting thing about these schools is their graduation rates. "Harvard graduates 97 percent of its students, among the very highest graduation rates in the nation." http://admissions.college.harvard.edu/about/faq.html
Is this because its students are primarly traditional, full time students coming out of economically prosperous 2 parent households? Its seems kind of counterintuitive that what is ranked as the most academically challenging institution in the country has a paltry 3% dropout rate.

[Patrick]

Have you ever worked somewhere with a person with a degree from Harvard, Yale, Columbia, etc? If so, how did their career path compare to yours?

I did and the guy from Yale couldn't understand how to operate a fax machine to save his life.

[fryar]

A very interesting thing about these schools is their graduation rates. "Harvard graduates 97 percent of its students, among the very highest graduation rates in the nation." http://admissions.college.harvard.edu/about/faq.html
Is this because its students are primarly traditional, full time students coming out of economically prosperous 2 parent households?

Absolutely. As a semi-defining element, at least. You will also see many incoming freshmen who went to fancy northeastern boarding schools, who have been on-track for this sort of thing all of their life. They're pretty put together. There is also a lot of "minding," deans and counseling and such. Even if you're not from such a background yourself, even if you retreat into your own little "demographic" [[I don't mean race necessarily, though that's up to each individual), perhaps, the environment is totally conducive to studying full-time and being successful, and if you slip, they look into it. Holding down a job is more unusual, and people certainly aren't off having babies or supporting their parents or what-have-you.

Harvard College absolutely graduates more than 90% of it's freshmen [[who do not opt for 5-year combined BA & Master's programs) within 4 years, and most of the rest within 5.

Now, take all of this with a grain of salt for the following reason: That statistic is for Harvard College. You don't apply there for night school classes if you're 30, holding down a day job and raising a kid or two as a single parent on the side. Harvard College is a traditional full-time four year college. That other guy, he applies to the Harvard Extension School. I didn't research the heck out of this, admittedly, but according to this blog post, that school's dean claimed a 56% graduation rate at a recent commencement, and apparently you can argue that it's really 1%.

Its seems kind of counterintuitive that what is ranked as the most academically challenging institution in the country has a paltry 3% dropout rate.

I can see where you're coming from, but I take the opposite view, that it's pretty counterintuitive that a clearly less reputable school like WSU [[I'm not saying it's bad, but Harvard?) would graduate less than half as many of it's subset of highly-graduating students. It's basically paltry.

I scanned through the tables of data linked to in that piece, and with a few exceptions [[Rice and UWisconsin/Madison come to mind) the public universities seemed to have pretty low graduation rates, in the 40-60% range maybe IIRC. Maybe this is just a thing about public universities and their setup - maybe their public mission makes them give more marginal folks a shot, maybe a subtle incentive to admit greater numbers because funding may be tied to student population. Then again, maybe they're far more about the "Extension School" crowd, who quite naturally won't graduate after 4 years [[and there's nothing wrong with that), possibly due to the school's public mission.

In which case you don't have a problem at WSU, although the statistics could be interpreted as an indicator that race can often be taken as a proxy for "well-offness," even today - i.e. a greater portion of the white student body is full-time/classical college, although even here there would be many part-time folks, than the proportion of black students that is full-time. This could be related to access to funds/grants/loans. But that's not a worry for WSU in particular, more of a national social/domestic policy-type issue.

If, on the other hand, people are dropping out like crazy, that's a real issue. Leaving aside the race issue, are 50% of the white kids [[and, fine, 90% of the black kids) dropping out or downgrading to two night classes a semester in order to work? That sounds like WSU may need majohnson's #3 in a big way.

[fryar]

I did and the guy from Yale couldn't understand how to operate a fax machine to save his life.

Well, it's hard. Faxing is hard work. [[Couldn't resist, with the Yale reference )

[Hermod]

Well, it's hard. Faxing is hard work. [[Couldn't resist, with the Yale reference )

I am a pretty good engineer, but reloading paper trays in copy machines and printers has often challenged me. Much easier to just call out "the machine is out of paper" and accept the dirty looks from the secretary responding..

[English]

Today, the Excellent Schools Detroit Coalition posted their 2010 DPS School Report Card:

http://www.excellentschoolsdetroit.o...lity-scorecard

Want to know what's going on with the black graduation rate at Wayne State? Look at the high school rankings and corresponding test scores. The ACT is an imperfect predictor of college readiness, but it does bear some relevance.

[mwilbert]

It is way harder to get into an Ivy-type school than it is to graduate from it. The reason most people who are reasonably qualified to be in college don't graduate is personal or financial issues. People with serious personal or financial issues are unlikely to make it into a selective school in the first place. Some people develop those issues once they are there. Sometime, people have children, which can be problematic. I knew one guy who just got homesick for Nebraska and left, and another who had been really straightlaced in high school and couldn't handle the drugs he started using once he got to college, He became mentally ill and couldn't finish school.

The other thing to keep in mind that a school like Harvard isn't really part-time friendly. Financial aid is for full-time students. The tuition is based not on credit-hours, but on semesters, so there is an incentive to take as many classes per term as you can handle. If you do want to attend part-time, the cost per hour is significantly higher. So people aren't likely to take more than six years to graduate unless they decide to do something else. A friend of mine finished his S.B. degree five years ago after a 25-year break, but he was a full-time student whenever he was going to school.

At Wayne, on the other hand, you don't have that level of screening, and so you have a lot of people who can't finish for those personal/financial reasons. It is possible that some people are admitted who are not reasonably close to being ready for college work, so people will fail to graduate because they can't do the work. You have a tuition policy that doesn't particularly disadvantage part-timers, and unlike at an Ivy-type school you may have a lot of trouble getting the courses you need to complete requirements when you need them. I would expect that the graduation rates would be a lot lower at Wayne. The issue I see is that Wayne graduation rates [[adjusted for incoming test scores and demographics, roughly measured, by Washington Monthly), seem to be sub-par. Of course it is possible that those adjustments are inadequate, or that the six-year graduation rate is not the correct measure.

I'd be interested in something like 10-year graduation rates if they were available, but I've never seen data like that. My intuition says that it wouldn't change things much, but intuition is not a reliable guide.

[majohnson]

Okay, now take your experience. Would you create a system out of students who work and study? How might that affect graduation rates?
Did you need remedial classes?

How can we use this news piece to better understand a wider reality?
We can't build an education system that relys on especially devoted people.

I don't have any children either, I probably would have dropped out if I needed to care for a child. It sounds like you were connected to your community during your time at university, that is great. I think some students withdraw from family/church a bit for more personal time but that may add to the stress and fatigue they experience.

1. Scholarship covered 50% of the [[out of state) tutition.

2. Working as a waiter in the dining hall covered my meals [[$450 a year)

3. I was the manager for the Cross-Country, In-Door Track, and Outdoor Track Varsity Teams.

I three or four one-hour classes between 8am and 1pm Monday through Saturday all four years and had four labs 2-4pm Monday through Friday [[one semester, I had five labs, yuck). I always had an 8am class all four years, six days a week. Social life suffered a bit. I might catch a beer or two on Sunday afternoon [[after mandatory church).

I didn't dare to get a girl pregnant, my folks would have killed me.

[majohnson]

I am enjoying this thread.

I often wonder how I can help DPS high school children better set themselves up for university. I have to admit I have only really [[had time to) helped people in my family. I offer advice to two older family members still attending WSU when appropiate.
I attended Davis Aerospace and I would like to return one day to encourage students to really work hard and set themselves up for sucess at the university level.

I think study groups would really help WSU students, black and otherwise.
To many students are cruising along with Cs and could benefit from the discipline and expectations provided by a group setting.
I also know a OCC adjunct and he tells me stories about his students. Typically the distracted students have the most problems. A distracted student might miss the last half of a semester because of a changed work schedule etc. Children and work seem to be the most significant issue.

[English]

Wayne State has begun to set up numerous learning communities across all disciplines. There is a stark contrast between those who participate and those who do not. However, we can't force adult students to attend.

[Danny]

Wayne State University, unlike other colleges and universities, every undergrad MUST pass a least 3 English Classes, one Math Proficiency Class and 3 Language Classes for your general education requirements. Then go declare a major and a minor to get your degree and finish up the major courses and pay your remaining dues. [[ Financial Aid and other Scholarship and loans will take care the rest.) Then you can graduate. It's a straight and simple system. Just don't make all the bad decisions and follow your academic advisor. Do provide your advisor your academic plans and stick with it. Beat the system's criticism of individual dogmas by using their laws against them and you will achieve your destiny for a dream career and get the piece of the American Apple Pie.

Most black students from the ghettos are ill prepared for college these problems:


1. Uneducated schools

2. Messing with their peers

3. Broken homes with broken parents

4. The flow of drugs, sex and alcohol

5. Street crime

6. Lack of solidarity

7. Racism


I should have put RACISM into the top, but I leave it in the bottom.


WORD FROM THE STREET PROPHET

You all folks can put RACISM to the top of list before the other problems for African Americans.


Neda, I miss you so.

[belleislerunner]

WSU has a mission to provide an outlet for those "first generation" college kids to enhance their lives. A student who arrives at WSU with a Presidential Scholarship is arguably just as likely to graduate had that student chosen MSU, Michigan or Columbia. For this discussion, let's disregard that population.

Academic preparation is key but I would hypothesize with WSU - financial pressures are more likely the culprit than academic preparations. Let's look at two oversimplified examples.

Brooke lives in Macomb Twp and graduated from Dakota HS with a 3.0 GPA. She has two parents each making 40-60K. Neither went to college but they stress how college is important to get ahead and are supportive and cosign on her loans and may provide limited financial support. Brooke works part time as a waitress on Hall Rd and graduates in 5-6 years with about 15-20K in student loan debt. She majors in marketing, gets a job at Campbell Ewald in Warren making 40K. A typical stable future for a 24 yr old.

Marc lives in Eastpointe and graduated from East Detroit HS with a 3.0 GPA. He was raised solely by his mom who makes 35K as a machine operator. She never got a college degree. The family credit is poor due to single parent struggles and to prevent being gouged on loans, or ignorant of the financial aid available, Marc signs up for classes at WSU using a credit card. He works during the day at Best Buy in Roseville for $10/hr to pay the rent and commutes for classes 2 nights a week. After 3 semesters, he realizes he's now 5K in credit card debt that is rapidly escalating and drops out of college. He tells himself he'll go to MCC. His future is probably limited to bouncing from retail to retail job up Gratiot hoping to make it to management.

The difference is largely financial means. Both students had a similar GPA [[i.e. met the requisite admission requirements). WSU does a noble job admitting students who might have slightly lower GPA's in the noble pursuit of helping them be the first to graduate. Yet Brooke [[suburban student) is more likely to succeed because her daily financial responsibilities were either on hold or deferred. Marc doesn’t have that luxury [[urban student). His first concern is how he will make his car payment/rent and realizes that work must come first. College is great if he can fit it in. It's elementary to suggest Marc should just get a Pell Grant, Stafford loan or Sallie Mae because urban students often don't qualify, are gouged on interest rates or fear debt all together.

So well "learning communities" and tutors are great - and may marginally help those who are struggling academically, I'd argue the bigger chasm is the growing divide between single parent/lower economic households being able to afford a college degree and the middle/upper middle class stable families paying for a college degree.

Schools like WSU/Oakland/GVSU who continually raise tuition to levels in their "peer" group inclusive of schools like Michigan/MSU pose a growing threat of unattainability to those in the Metro area who need them most.

Solely looking at parental income, I'd hypothesize that on average U Michigan parents have the highest household incomes, MSU second highest, followed by GVSU/Oakland/WSU etc. So it should come as no surprise that the graduation rates mirror those of income. Should it be this way? No. But to avoid the reality of daily life/paying bills is reckless.

WSU should do soul searching as to its tuition increases. While sold as a means to "maintain or raise the caliber of the institution" - they probably disproportionately serve to undermine/lower the graduation rate of those who need the degree the most. Of course, this could be applied to any general state school - but WSU is the topic du jour.

Acadamic prepartion is important. Cost is even more so.

[mwilbert]

I'm not sure Wayne has any choice about raising its tuition costs. State support for Michigan public universities relative to both tuition revenue and inflation have been falling for decades. This means tuition has to be higher, which disadvantages the poorer part of the college population. I don't know the numbers for Wayne, but someone fairly reliable told me yesterday that inflation-adjusted support for U-M has fallen 80% since the mid-50's, which is a big reason it is the probably the most expensive public university in the country.

Michigan either does not want or thinks it cannot afford to subsidize the public universities enough to make undergraduate education affordable to the poorer part of the population, but I don't think we can blame that on the universities. Where I would fault a school like Wayne is that they probably could do more to lower their costs. You would think a school with a large commuter, part-time population like Wayne could be a leader in things like online education, but it doesn't seem to be.

[maxx]

belleislerunner:
Is your hypothetical Mark who doesn't know about financial aid very likely?

Danny:
Racism in Detroit? DPS? WSU? Please explain how Detroit students come in contact with racism today and how it affects them.

[maxx]

Today, the Excellent Schools Detroit Coalition posted their 2010 DPS School Report Card:

http://www.excellentschoolsdetroit.o...lity-scorecard

Want to know what's going on with the black graduation rate at Wayne State? Look at the high school rankings and corresponding test scores. The ACT is an imperfect predictor of college readiness, but it does bear some relevance.

Well, let's see:

UD Jesuit HS is at the top with an average ACT comp of 24 in 2009.
Then come Renaissance and Cass Tech. considerably behind with ACT comp avs.
of 21.8 and 20.1. All the rest are below the Michigan average [19] starting with Comm. & Media Art HS, Universal Acad., Aisha Shule, and Davis Aerospace. The Detroit av. for 2009 was 15.6. King HS was 12 on the list followed by Univ. Prep., Winans Acad., and Western Internat.. All the rest were below the Detroit average. It looks like they averaged together the ACT avs. for 2008 and 2009 to get the final rankins.. I can't scroll it over any farther than that column.