Degrees In Dishonesty

by Walter Williams - October 21st, 2009 - Front Page Magazine

Today’s college students are generally dumber than their predecessors. An article in the Wall Street Journal (1/30/97) reported that a “bachelor of Arts degree in 1997 may not be the equal of a graduation certificate from an academic high school in 1947.” The American Council on Education found that only 15 percent of universities require tests for general knowledge; only 17 percent for critical thinking; and only 19 percent for minimum competency. According a recent National Assessment of Adult Literacy, the percentage of college graduates proficient in prose literacy has declined from 40 percent to 31 percent within the past decade. Employers report that many college graduates lack the basic skills of critical thinking, writing and problem-solving and some employers find they must hire English and math teachers to teach them how to write memos and perform simple computations.

If you graduated from Bertie County High School before 1975, you probably have a better education than if you graduated from Harvard, last year. Even better, since over 91% of Harvard students last year were considered 'honor students', Bertie County graduates from earlier years are among the "best educated" in America, sort of.

Maybe they all should get Nobel Peace Prizes.

The refusal to grade honestly has made Harvard a laughing stock among the world's educators. Even as all standards have collapsed, Harvard is leading the field in making a mockery of the concept of higher education.