This ^^^^^^^
But far, far worse.
It is stunning. Of course, I see it most up close and personal at PSU - and it is incredible.
Kids come in - without anything close to the type of background to have any chance to jump into, for example, an engineering program. ZERO.
And their way of dealing with that (and, SO often, the PARENTS way of fdealing with that) is:
"Where can I go (community college or whatever) to take a class to meet some required course - that I can't even come close to "passing" at UP?"
As if that is some magic elixir - just get a check mark and move on - completely and utterly unprepared.
The real shame is - and if you speak openly and honestly to real faculty - is that these situations don't simply result in the student "flunking out". Oh no, they result in the student being passed along all the way through to graduation. With grades just "good enough" to "earn" them a degree.
Why? Honestly, anyone paying attention knows why. It is so the University can get that $200,000 out of them - and the college/department can keep that "student unit" in their college/department. Why? Because that is how the budget to each college/department is now calculated (thanks Dr B) - so department heads/deans tell their faculty to make sure they don't fail anyone, and to keep them moving down the line - so they get their $$$.
That is the way it works. Period. Full stop.
The faculty member who doesn't pass them along is likely to get a thorough "talking to" from his department head or dean.
Here is the bottom line:
1) Scads of woefully unprepared incoming students. At PSU this is largely because the enrollment yield is atrocious, and the need for $$$ (ESPECIALLY THAT OOS TUITION MONEY) so great - that PSU is, relative to its past history, scraping bottom on who they admit.
So factor in the overall disgraceful performance of K-12, and then multiply that by the fact that PSU is now taking from a far lower level of the K-12 kids coming out.
It doesn't take a Rocket Scientist to know how that works out.
2) A university driven by the sole mission of "revenue generation"
3) Parents who view Higher Education as a commodity that they buy for their kids (and, in fairness, why shouldn't they? That is how the school views it). And when they write the check, they expect (demand?) that the school provide them with a freshly minted degree of their choosing.
(While I don't see it as up close and personal, from what I hear tangentially, the same conditions apply wrt Private K-12 schools. It is a ^#%$ show that is rolling downhill like a freight train. Where the same "I am going to buy my kid a commodity - and the school is damn sure going to give it to me" applies)
Alas. Doesn't have to be this way.
