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Cleveland
Plain Dealer...
Kasich asks for
3-year ‘pathways’ to bachelor degrees at Ohio’s 4-year universities
By Karen Farkas, The Plain Dealer
Sunday, April 03, 2011
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Gov. John Kasich has ordered the state’s four-year
universities to prepare “pathways” to three-year degrees.
But there already are avenues for motivated students to graduate in
less than four years, and other options may not be feasible, some
college officials say.
As part of the governor’s commitment to make college more affordable,
his budget proposal submitted to the legislature requires universities
to prepare plans to offer three-year undergraduate degrees for 10
percent of their programs by 2012 and for 60 percent by 2014.
No other guidance has been offered, and it is apparently up to the Ohio
Board of Regents -- working with legislators -- to decipher what Kasich
wants.
“The vision for three-year degrees is focused on providing options for
gifted or ambitious high school students to help drive down costs and
keep these students challenged,” regents spokesman Rob Evans said in an
email.
“That said, in terms of credit-hour amounts and other details about
what would be required parts of the universities’ plans, that’s all
still being finalized as the proposal is developed in discussion with
the General Assembly.”
If Kasich wants high school students to take college classes at no
cost, they can do that now through the state’s Post-Secondary
Enrollment Options and Seniors to Sophomores programs. And Early
College high schools allow students to earn two years of college credit
at no cost.
If the governor wants colleges to condense four years of classes into
three years, students could save a year’s worth of room and board but
would have to take more classes each semester and courses during the
summer. Currently, that’s how most students squeeze a four-year degree
into only three years -- with or without an established program.
And if the governor would like colleges to develop three-year academic
programs with one-fourth fewer credit-hours, universities could run
into serious accreditation questions.
The most recent U.S. Department of Education statistics, based on
students who entered college in 2001, show that 4.2 percent graduated
within three years, 57.3 percent got degrees within four years and 38.5
percent took more than four years.
Three-year degree programs attract a small percentage of students
because those participating must have a career goal, officials say.
Such programs don’t work for students who are investigating several
majors or for those who work or are interested in many campus
activities. About two dozen public and private colleges nationwide
offer a three-year option, according to experts.
At Manchester College in Indiana, only two of the 15 students who
enrolled in its Fast Forward three-year degree program in 2008 will
graduate this spring.
The 11 still at the college opted back into the traditional four-year
program for reasons such as adding a second major and studying abroad,
said Dave McFadden, executive vice president at the small, private
liberal arts school.
Students initially say they want to speed through college to save money
and get into a career, he said.
“Then they find out what the college experience is like, really like it
and want to do it in four years,” he said.
Idea born at Oberlin
The idea of a three-year degree gained prominence in October 1991 when
S. Frederick Starr, then president of Oberlin College, wrote in an
opinion piece for the New York Times that higher education was too
expensive and that one solution would be to offer students the chance
to obtain a degree in three years.
“Such a degree would automatically reduce the cost to families and
taxpayers by nearly one-quarter,” Starr wrote. “It would bring private
higher education back within the budgets of the hard-pressed middle
class.”
Oberlin never embraced Starr’s proposal.
But in 2009, as tuition and fees continued to rise, U.S. Sen. Lamar
Alexander of Tennessee, a former U.S. secretary of education and past
president of the University of Tennessee, urged college leaders at the
annual meeting of the American Council on Education to offer three-year
degrees.
Alexander’s remarks and the economic recession have led more
institutions to explore and initiate three-year degree programs,
officials said.
But the education council would be opposed to reducing the number of
credit-hours so someone could graduate in three years, said Terry
Hartle, senior vice president for government and public affairs at the
trade association for college and university presidents.
“The notion of saying ‘We will give you a four-year degree with three
years of work’ would inevitably devalue the degree,” he said. “We want
students to have a degree that represents a significant level of
learning and accomplishment. Unilaterally cutting the amount of
workload required is unachievable and undesirable.”
Any Ohio bachelor’s degree program of less than 120 semester
credit-hours must be approved by the Higher Learning Commission that
oversees accreditation, which is required of a school if it wants to
offer federal financial aid. Any exception “must be explained and
justified,” it says.
However, Baldwin-Wallace College in Berea plans to seek approval from
the commission to offer a three-year degree program with 100
credit-hours, which it believes may be the first in the country.
Students who enroll in its program in communications disorders would
take fewer electives.
James McCargar, associate vice president of academic affairs at B-W,
said the college’s liaison to the commission has said there is not a
lot of room for flexibility.
“But we are pursuing it because it is time to start thinking
differently and looking at different options,” he said.
In addition to getting university accreditation, many academic programs
receive accreditation from agencies that set stringent guidelines,
including the sequence of courses, said Wayne Carlson, dean of
undergraduates at Ohio State University.
“In engineering, they are increasing the number of credit-hours they
want students to take,” he said. “There is no way you can get an
engineering degree in three years.”
Carlson said no one at Ohio’s universities really knows what Kasich is
proposing, but they understand the need to reduce students’ costs.
“If we are successful in providing a three-year pathway, my gut
reaction is that we are going to do it through more dual enrollment and
Advanced Placement credit-hours coming in,” Carlson said. “That is the
only way I can see it happening in a large way.”
Ball State University in Muncie, Ind., has offered its “Degree in 3”
program for about 30 of its more than 180 majors since 2005, said
spokesman Kevin Burke.
“Students take a full load during two or three summers as well as
attending during the school year,” he said. Only 32 of the public
school’s 18,000 undergraduates are in the program, but there were no
expectations for the program other than offering an opportunity to get
a degree in a shorter period, he said.
College in high school
High school students in Ohio have several options to take college
classes at no cost.
The Post-Secondary Enrollment Option Program, enacted in 1989, allows
students to take college classes in high school and receive high school
and college credit. The district pays the university out of its state
student funding.
Some 15,000 students participated in the program in 2009, about double
from 1999, according to the Ohio Department of Education. At the
University of Akron, about 600 students are taking courses, said Greg
Bieringer, assistant dean of University College. Those who enter the
university have a little more than a semester’s worth of credit.
The Seniors to Sophomores Program, which began in 2008, allows high
school seniors to enroll full time at a public college and earn a year
of credit at no cost, with funding provided by the school district.
School districts have to partner with colleges. The only partnership in
Cuyahoga County is Cuyahoga Community College’s agreement with the
Cleveland Heights-University Heights and South Euclid-Lyndhurst
districts.
About 20 students from those schools attend classes at Tri-C’s Eastern
campus each year, said spokesman Dan Minnich.
Rhode Island law
Ohio is not the first state to promote degrees in three years.
The Rhode Island Legislature passed a bill in 2009 requiring its two
state colleges, Rhode Island College and the University of Rhode
Island, to offer a bachelor’s degree in three years.
The bill specified that high school students could use Advance
Placement classes or dual-enrollment programs to accumulate a year’s
worth of college credits.
The state Board of Governors for Higher Education developed the
“Bachelors Degree in Three” program and sent it to legislators in
February of this year, said Steven Maurano, associate commissioner of
the board. Legislators will be asked to agree that the state will pay
for the college classes taken by the approximately 40 high school
students who would enter the three-year pilot program, he said.
If lawmakers agree, the program should be in place this fall, he said.
Motivated students at any university already can graduate in three
years. At Kent State University, 38 students -- or less than 1 percent
of an incoming class of about 4,000 students -- graduate in three
years, said spokeswoman Emily Vincent.
Jennifer Carson received her degree in less than three years at KSU
because she had a career goal, wanted to save money and knew she would
have to go to graduate school. Carson, 20, of Hillsboro, Ohio, took
classes from Southern State Community College while in high school and
entered KSU as a sophomore.
“I wanted to get in and out,” said Carson, who received her degree in
speech pathology and audiology in December. “I knew I would have two
more years of school after I graduated. But I had fun. I was very
involved in a sorority.”
Most three-year programs are offered at small colleges or for a limited
number of programs at larger universities, said McFadden, the
administrator at Manchester College, which has about 1,300 students.
Manchester adjusted all 55 academic programs for its Fast Forward
program, which began in the fall of 2008.
“It was all about access for students and the question of
affordability,” he said. “Students were very career-focused, and
families were looking for ways to reduce the costs.”
Students take classes during three school years and online classes the
summers after their freshman and sophomore years. They could save about
$25,000 -- if they get no financial aid -- because of decreased tuition
costs for summer classes and not having to pay room and board a fourth
year, McFadden said.
“We don’t change any academic requirements, and students take the
general education requirements over the summer,” he said. Students have
time to participate in athletics, theater and other extracurricular
activities, he said.
But it will be difficult for large, public institutions with many more
students to offer three-year degrees, he predicted.
“It would compound scheduling issues that already exist and requires a
lot of personal attention by academic advisers,” McFadden said.
OSU’s Carlson said students benefit from four years of college in ways
other than academics.
“One of the first readings of the governor’s statement is that we need
to get students ready for the workforce more quickly,” he said. “It is
kind of interesting that really if you think about the skills that
employers want -- critical thinking and problem-solving and the ability
to write things and talk about things -- require teamwork and
collaborative activities. They all come through co-curricular
activities, expanded student engagement, athletic teams and leadership,
study abroad and service learning.
“You cannot do those and academic requirements in the three years. You
just can’t do it.”
Read it at the Cleveland Plain Dealer
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