Experts: 'Weed Out' Classes Are Killing STEM Achievement

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I have 30 years industrial experience and I am seeing more people who have been out of college for less than 10 years that are ill prepared for their jobs. I have the task of mentoring a person who is not capable of the most basic laboratory function and appears to lack the most fundamental knowledge of chemistry. We work with things that can kill if not handled properly. I do not want to risk my life and the lives of my coworkers because someone managed to slide through the system and get a technical degree.

DL of LA 1:11PM May 12, 2012

Science *is* hard and it takes talent and/or dedication. Why waste the time of someone who will never make it by encouraging them to chug along beyond the freshman class? Or even worse, risk letting more unqualified people graduate?
As for grading on a curve, I find the criticism odd as I always thought of it as a favor to the students. With the curve, the best students always get an A. Without it, the best might get a C and three-quarters of the class might fail!
Group projects at the freshman level sound nice, but what would they be about, when the students haven't learned anything yet? It's like building a house collaboratively when none of the participants has learned yet what a hammer is. Basic learning has to be individual, and It's hard to be useful in a group if you don't know the basics.

Ivan of NY 8:29AM May 11, 2012

Engineering is difficult and should be difficult. Engineers are trusted by the public with many tasks and therefore need to be rigorously trained to keep the public safe. If it weren't for the weed out classes I think universities would graduate more unprepared engineers. Why have engineers that are incapable of doing the job? This is will not help the STEM deficit.
Engineers make it through the said curriculum successfully every year. The curriculum and approach should not accommodate younger students with a poor work ethic.

Carrie of OH 8:52PM May 10, 2012

I agree with Doug. I went to Purdue another well known engineering / science school and as a Chemistry major, I had to take the "weed-out" classes. Since I had taken all AP classes in high school, these weed-out classes were a breeze compared to what I later had to experience in college. Every year afterwards, the classes just got harder and harder.
As a freshmen, I had fellow science majors who had to re-take high school trigonometry just so that they could get into the necessary calculus classes. I can understand that not all high schools offer calculus due to lack of funds or qualified teachers - but science-minded individuals who didn't have the basics of trigonometry down - was just sad.

Amanda of GA 8:36PM May 10, 2012

http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/curriculum/math_and_science/
.. contrary to the assertions of many policymakers today.
To the extent that students are leaving the pipeline, the authors found, they tend to be high-achieving students. In other words, young people don't seem to be fleeing those fields because of lack of ability, but because of other factors—such as that they don't find those jobs attractive for whatever reason.
...the loss of high-performing students in STEM was more likely explained by the bursting of the dot-com bubble in 2000—not by college or businesses not doing enough to keep them.
"Students rationally voted with their feet as jobs vanished from an imploding sector of the economy,"....
....
I contacted Salzman, who responded to BHEF's points. He acknowledges that the dot-com bust may have affected students' career choices, but says that ultimately proves the study's point: that STEM choices are market-driven. "I'm not sure [the pipeline is] 'broken,' if students choose to leave a field that is in decline," he wrote in an e-mail.
... The key point is that students are responding to what they know of job market conditions— and that it's not a matter of them not being academically gifted enough.
For instance, Salzman, who has studied labor markets extensively, says his research has shown that mid-level and senior engineering workers voice satisfaction with their careers, overall, but are concerned it won't be a good or stable a job in the future....
top STEM majors may be responding to market forces and incentives," Salzman said by e-mail. "We tried to be very clear that there are number of possible explanations, and that the key point is that enrollments are sensitive to market conditions.
....
He also says when he and Lowell have written on this topic in the past on a similar theme, they've asked critics to provide data backing up the claim that demand for STEM jobs outstrips the supply of qualified talent. No such data has emerged, he said.

Doug De Clue of FL 1:46PM May 03, 2012

This whole STEM initiative sounds great but there really is NOT a shortage of engineers and technicians out there at all, not even close. This is just another attempt to push down salaries for engineers by C level executives in this country to be more like what engineers earn in places like India where they might typically make $20,000 to $25,000 a year vs. $60,000 to $110,000 a year here depending on major, specialization and experience. It is another tool like H1B visas to drive down salaries.
Lawyers and doctors protect their wages by making their schools as difficult to get into as possible. Engineering schools tend to be the same but are more likely to let you in then weed you out as opposed to not letting you in.
As a Georgia Tech grad I would describe this article as "Sun rises in east - sets in west.. Film at 11" or otherwise as "thank you Captain Obvious".
Georgia Tech is a notoriously difficult "weed out" school even amongst engineering schools and yes the basic point is absolutely true but you really can't do much about it by the time you get to the college level.
Georgia Tech was much tougher in my day just 25 years ago when they didn't have majors like "Public Policy" and were much more a male centric engineering and hard sciences school than they are now and I'm sure they were even tougher 25 years before that.
The problem is that high school and middle school are far too easy for students here in this country. If you want to succeed in an academic subject that requires actual skill and knowledge well you need to be acquiring that knowledge much earlier and in much greater quantities but our middle schools and high schools coddle students and generally lump them all together regardless of whether they are the next Albert Einstein or Forrest Gump which basically means classes are dumbed down as much as possible to the Gump side of the curve so that there aren't a bunch of angry parents because every parent believes their kid is "above average" when the truth is some people have to be "below average".
I took Algebra I in 8th grade, Geometry in 9th grade, Algebra II in 10th grade, Trigonometry in 11th grade and Calculus I and Plane Analytic Geometry in 12th grade. That's more math than most college graduates take by the time they graduate. Likewise I took 4 years of sciences in high school and 4 years of English and 2 years of French in high school. On top of this I read a lot of books that had nothing to do with the classes I took. I may not have been "cool" in high school but I did manage to learn something. Even with all of that Georgia Tech was not easy and I managed to graduate only through sheer will power.
If we want to get more science, technology and engineering and math graduates then realize that we need to be starting MUCH MUCH sooner to fix the problem in grade school and that we will need to spend a great deal more money on students education to hire more and better teachers and reduce classroom size.

Doug De Clue of FL 11:54AM May 03, 2012

The starting point of scientific literacy is having a strong foundation of science learning in both elementary and secondary experiences. In order to increase student comprehension and retention of science standards, it takes money to provide knowledgeable teachers, aligned curricula (both horizontally and vertically), and science/technology materials such as glassware/probeware/specimens/computers or tablets, etc. We need to dramatically increase the funding for science education in general as well as in specific courses designated as STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) so that college freshman are literate in science and can handle the “weed out” courses.

P_SimmonsBrooks of TX 8:53PM April 22, 2012

easy problem to solve.
unprepared students who need remedial courses should go to primarily teaching univ such UMBC, Duquesne, etc. with friendly remedial programs.
well prepared students can go to primarily research univ, and would not be weeded out.
check out:
‘A’ Is for Achievement, ‘E’ Is for Effort
Letters to the Editor, NY Times
22 Feb 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/23/opinion/l23grades.html
To the Editor:
If I follow the students’ logic that effort should be rewarded with high grades, then I should be content to have the heart surgeon or airline pilot who worked really, really hard in medical or flight school — whether or not that individual shows exceptional expertise or talent, not to mention mastery of the requisite skills. No thanks.
Stacy Hagen
Gig Harbor, Wash., Feb. 18, 2009

lv of IL 11:08AM April 21, 2012

When I switched majors to a more difficult tech career, I had quite a rude awakening. The classes were HARD and my math skills were inadequate. I had to study double hard just to bring my math skills up to where I got a C in my first calculus course. Mind you, I had nearly a 4.0 GPA in high school. This was a shock to me. I almost did quit. I finally graduated with a 3.85 GPA in Applied Statistics but it was a hard adjustment and lots of studying. At one point, I thought I wasn't capable of the work but then I realized that everyone else was working hard too.
I have a friend who went to MIT and was a brilliant man. He once threw his Calculus book off a bridge in frustration. But he kept on. He eventually became a rocket scientist with an advanced degree in Astrophysics. At some point he met the author of that Calculus textbook and asked why do you make it so hard? The answer? They do it on purpose to make students struggle and weed out the "riff raff." They do it out of snobbish pride to keep others out of the smart club. Textbooks could be written better to make it easier for students to learn but they are not.
Encourage your high schoolers to take on the tough subjects. Find them alternate ways to learn: tutors, videos (Did you know there are online videos that teach almost anything? Check out Khanacademy.org) and different textbooks. Let them know that those who master those hard subjects are the ones who get jobs first!

Tammy Kihlstadius of MN 10:57PM April 20, 2012

I'm a little worried about people who think that not wanting a weed-out course is equivalent to not wanting people to take responsibility. The point is most people are probably capable of doing better but may need remediation or to retake courses. Given the demand for STEM majors, it makes no sense to tell those interested to do something else because they do not qualify at the moment.
As to criticisms of group work, there are a lot of different ways it can be done to avoid skimming etc. , anyone teaching ought to be keeping up with the pedagogy on the matter rather than dismiss it. Aren't these people designing bridges, maintaining power grids, etc. going to have to work together in these endeavors? So why teach them solely in a different manner that promotes the opposite behavior? STEM majors are often criticized for their lack of social/writing skills, so we need to address that problem as well.

Carver of WI 2:04PM April 20, 2012