Students university cheating

[Ben@Forest]

To my dismay two of my grandkids did degrees and achieved 2.1s. one works at an ice cream farm and the other screws computer bits together...what a waste!

Pre-Covid l was told that somebody with a degree was working as an Escape Room host. Pay was £8.50 an hour. Of course they were still young and might go onto other things, but the degree had no great vocational skills and the parent was, frankly, despairing.

[Jdsk]

I sometimes wonder if personal anecdotes are the best way to develop a country's economic and educational strategy.

Jonathan

[Jdsk]

This was exactly the route I took in the 1960's and has set me up for a successful engineering career.

Congratulations.

There have been some new variations on this, but long may that route continue.

Jonathan

[PhilD28]

I was long time advocate of various forms of this system including the Technical College (HNC/HND) day release apprenticeship route until those once superb qualifications were dumbed down.
My final job before retiring was as Director of R&D, a role I really enjoyed, and one that involved lots of EU travel and projects. Possibly one of the reasons I am so pro EU, as those collaborations were so important and successful.

[Jdsk]

I'd be interested in who that was with...

Jonathan

[PhilD28]

I'd be interested in who that was with...

Jonathan

I'll PM you.

[Ben@Forest]

I sometimes wonder if personal anecdotes are the best way to develop a country's economic and educational strategy.

But personal anecdote means you have some experience of what's really happening. Too many young adults have degrees for no good economic reason (though education or learning for its own sake might be seen as laudable) and are in debt because of it.

At the beginning of New Labour they put in a target that you had to be able to get a GP appointment within 48 hours. Surgeries quickly tried to hit the target by telling people to ring back later in the week, thus hitting the target by only booking people in within the 48 hour time frame.

Blair was told of this by a member of the public in a televised focus group or similar, you could see the astonishment and incredulity on his face. He couldn't believe that GPs had sussed out such a loophole. You get to know that by personal anecdote.

[Carlton green]

I sometimes wonder if personal anecdotes are the best way to develop a country's economic and educational strategy.

Jonathan

Well, of course, as an academic you might well think that. However the experience of many people is that academics are all too often remote from the reality of the World outside of their Ivory Tower. Universities are certainly guilty of running courses that have little if any career value to their students ...

[Jdsk]

But personal anecdote means you have some experience of what's really happening. Too many young adults have degrees for no good economic reason (though education or learning for its own sake might be seen as laudable) and are in debt because of it.

At the beginning of New Labour they put in a target that you had to be able to get a GP appointment within 48 hours. Surgeries quickly tried to hit the target by telling people to ring back later in the week, thus hitting the target by only booking people in within the 48 hour time frame.

Blair was told of this by a member of the public in a televised focus group or similar, you could see the astonishment and incredulity on his face. He couldn't believe that GPs had sussed out such a loophole. You get to know that by personal anecdote.

I remember that.

And that target is widely used as an example of how targets are gamed, along with the 4 hr target in EDs in England.

But for any educational system that has ever existed it will be possible to find individuals whom they didn't help. By that logic we wouldn't have any system at all because they'd all have their failures.

Numbers are needed, and preferably the outcomes for the whole cohort who go through the various routes of the system. And then measure it all again as things change.

Jonathan

[Jdsk]

Universities are certainly guilty of running courses that have little if any career value to their students ...

I sure hope so. Because they shouldn't be Stakhanovite factories. There is more to life than employment.

Jonathan

[PhilD28]

Education should be more than about training and preperation for the world of work. It should also promote crital and analytical thinking. English and other language degrees are a perfect example of that.

[Jdsk]

And that target is widely used as an example of how targets are gamed, along with the 4 hr target in EDs in England.

Found what I was looking for... "Goodhart's law":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law

Jonathan

[pete75]

People falsifying their CVs isn't evidence of cheating by university students although it seems widespread. In the days when liquor licensing was a police responsibility I've checked loads and discovered quite a lot of porkies. On one occasion, somebody with a lot of genuine pub experience in another large city and who came with no convictions, had simply reversed his name on the application. Checking it the right way round revealed all sorts of form, including a conviction for arson - when he had burnt his pub down. Another applicant claimed to have been a para. When I went to see him, it was somehow obvious he had not been in any of the armed services for any length of time. When I asked him about his service as a para, he explained it was in the RAF and couldn't grasp that the Parachute Regiment was a part of the Army.

This is the University of Life, rather than academia

No 2 squadron of the RAF regiment are paratroops. A friend of mine served in it during the 1980s when it was based at Hullavington in Wiltshire. That guy could well have been telling the truth.

[Carlton green]

Universities are certainly guilty of running courses that have little if any career value to their students ...

I sure hope so. Because they shouldn't be Stakhanovite factories. There is more to life than employment.

Jonathan

There indeed is more to life than employment but paid employment gives us a suitable and sustainable route to those other things. Wealth creation via employment allows us the means to run a civilised society.

Courses that have little career value are essentially pass times for the wealthy and certainly nothing that Jack and Jill in the street should be asked to either subsidise or finance. To encourage students to take such courses robs them of a secure financial future, lays down a debt somewhere that someone must cover and robs society of an individual who could much more usefully contribute to it. The only winners in that sad situation are Universities and even that has no joy to it, had a suitable course been selected instead then University, Student and Society would all be winners.

Education should be more than about training and preperation for the world of work. It should also promote crital and analytical thinking. English and other language degrees are a perfect example of that.

I believe that you will find that Science based courses do include critical and analytical thinking.

[Jdsk]

I agree on the importance of wealth creation, and higher education is crucial to that in countries such as the UK. And not looking after that is exceptionally dumb.

But that isn't the only purpose of education. I see no reason why those who aren't wealthy shouldn't be given the opportunity of studying a wide range of subjects that might not lead to high pay for them as individuals. PhilD28 has given some examples. Universities offer opportunities in culture, language, sport and travel (maybe that one only applies in sensible countries) that can transform lives.

Jonathan