Community Colleges As Remedial College

I'm responding to the Washington Journal April 2nd, 2012 reading of a newspaper article on offering courses and training to students who are below the norms expected of college students in particular subject matters and writing and mathematical skills.  It was aired on C-SPAN.  The article suggested various kinds of educational institutions that offer students behind a chance to catch up.

I favor the well-known option of the community colleges.  Indeed, the movement, known then as the Junior Colleges, was conceived by educators at the University of Chicago at the turn of the Twentieth Century; and the first one was in Joliet, Illinois.  The University was apparently dissatisfied with their incoming batch of university students and felt they needed intensive training in the basics preparatory to University entrance.  The idea of an "entrance" into higher education is precisely the origin of the community colleges.  Nor is it expected that all the students who take the additional training ever go on to the University level. Because educators at an early time in the movement realized that some other form of education should be made available to those who don't go on, vocational education program offerings have become an integral part of the training community colleges present their students.

I believe the community colleges--I have taught at a few of them--do a great job, particularly in preparing students who otherwise could not maintain the standards of performance expected of them in the University setting.

It is not a disgrace for a student to need additional preliminary training for advanced placement.  Someone who enters college with no particular major, but then decides to become a nurse will need to take prerequisite rudimentary courses in the biological sciences, surely.   

I concur with those who phoned in their opinion to the Journal that remedial education with the aim of qualifying for some University education ought to occur outside of the high school setting, where the student is locked into an age advancement, step system.     

"Occasion On Topic" Format

I'm introducing a new format in the Ruminations blog series.  It's called "Occasion On Topic."  Because I don't travel as much, being "holed up" in Omaha, Nebraska for an unspecified period of time, I am using the TV, radio, reading, and attending local talks as mechanisms to find materials on which to ruminate.  It is true, I used to rely on the marvelous forum offered at some Osher Institute for Lifelong Learning ("OLLI") near  my residence, but alas, there is no Osher Institute location here in Omaha, but in Lincoln, Nebraska.  I tried to get the local community college, Metropolitan, to take an interest in offering a current events course which would meet my needs for stimulation and got nowhere.  So much for that!  However, the course's format has been very popular at Osher sites, particularly, at UTEP in El Paso, where some 150 seniors gathered each week.

But I believe an "Occasion On Topic" series will do the trick for me.

The Series' Format

1.  The Occasion and My Response.  I'll listen to a talk or read up on some topic that interests me--whether from radio, TV, the newspaper, etc.--and will write down notes that will form my reflective thoughtful response to a particular topical presentation.

2.  I'll post the item to include both the occasion of my hearing or reading something to which I am responding and my collected thoughts (on the topic in light of this occasion!).

And, that's it!  The reader may be able to go back to the Occasion as posted, should he so desire.