Aiming for the bottom with Occam's razor

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A new federal initiative is pushing states to increase college graduation rates. Washington has even produced a guide on how to do this.


If you downloaded the PDF file through the link above, jump to page 6. "Strategy 2: Embrace Performance-Based Funding of Higher Education Based on Progress Toward Completion and Other Quality Goals." This being Bureaucrat-Speak, something I have a passing fluency in, I will summarize.

Get more people to graduate.

For that matter, after you look over the whole document and I shall summarize it for you.

Get more people to graduate.

This being a federal effort aimed at states, I believe it's time to whip out Occam's Razor and trim this down to reality. But, before I slice & dice, I need to point out a few more things.

The federal boyos want to increased college graduation rates to get us ahead of Korea, which presently leads the world in college graduation.

The US, in case you are wondering, is tied for 9th place with Israel, Belgium and Australia. Canada is in second place.

I note, just for obfuscatory purposes, Israel is home to nearly daily terrorism attacks, Australia is home to the world's top 20 most poisonous critters and, according to Douglas Adams, "Belgium" is considered to be an extremely profane word among more advanced galactic civilizations. Perhaps I will earn a Rory for this column.

Returning to the actual column, the idea behind this federal push is to get more people to graduate.

Yes, I know I have repeated that several times, but it's important. The "College Completion Tool Kit" makes much of that idea. So I must do so as well.

The US Department of Education file also lists a few things which can be done to increase college graduation rates:

• Increase financial aid

• Keep tuition costs reasonable. This is a MAJOR matter in my state, Georgia. Here, the university system Board of Trustees has jacked tuition and jacked tuition. Why? Because our state lottery pays for college. Yes huh. Since college is then free to students, the price goes up.

• Tighten up high schools and make college-prep work the standard, not the option.

• Figure out ways to help adults, past the typical college age, get into college.

• Make transferring between colleges easier.

This being a federal mandate in the form of a suggestion, the state legislatures will take steps to see that is enforced.

Now as distasteful as this may be, put yourself in the position of a state paper pusher. The federal paper pushers are suggesting you increase college graduation rates. Being a suggestion, this will shortly become a mandate and your job will be linked to how well you manage to accomplish this or how well you can pass the blame for not achieving the goal to someone else.

Here it is time to whip out the sharpened steel blade Mr. Occam so kindly gifted to us.

Occam's razor as defined by Wikipedia: Occam's razor (or Ockham's razor), often expressed in Latin as the lex parsimoniae, translating to law of parsimony, law of economy or law of succinctness, is a principle that generally recommends selecting the competing hypothesis that makes the fewest new assumptions, when the hypotheses are equal in other respects^. For instance, they must both sufficiently explain available data in the first place.

Occam's razor as defined by a Redneck Genius: Whatever is the simplest and easiest. Go with that.

Razor in hand, full bureaucrat brain crunching ahead, what do you do?

Pass the buck. Which begs the question, to whom do you pass it? Obvious answer, the colleges and universities and the board of trustees.

Situation solved for the bureaucrat.

But now the colleges are left with the problem.

What do the colleges do? Remember, colleges have a vested interest in protecting their turf, which pretty much is preventing reality from the real world becoming a part of the educational efforts. In other words, colleges are interested in educating people, not training them. (I note with much sadness this is even becoming the case in the vocational-technical institutions across the nation. They are becoming far more interested in theory than practice.)

Think. Slice this one down to the barest minimum (which is a hint of what will be done). Chop chop.

What do colleges do?

They lower graduation standards. Never mind how low standards are right now. There's always room to deteriorate more.

Situation solved. Immediately.

Graduation rates go up. Colleges protect their turf. Tuition remains the same. Entry requirements remain the same. Class sizes remain the same. Professorial requirements remain the same.

Tenure might be a minor issue as professors who refuse to play the game and pass students who really ought to fail might be eased out.

As for concerns that this impinges on academic freedoms, ethics, morals and a whole bunch of other even more nebulous concepts, well, I can only say you don't know much about the way the education system in this nation works. Passing the failing students along to the next teacher in line is de rigueur.

Never mind the graduates are even less prepared for the real world than they are now. The requirements from the federal guys are met. Never mind we'll continue to slip across the globe in performance and real-world achievement, the requirements are met.

Graduation rates are up and that's the goal.