College Dorms: A Place to Study or Socialize?

Ryan Kerns

College dorms have been a part of the college experience for decades now. They provide a safe, structured environment for fellow students to reside in while they commence their studies. They also provide a relatively efficient way to house students on campus without having to buy many individual places for students to live in. However, what most college officials don’t realize is that this financially efficient way to house students can sometimes be very detrimental to a students’ learning ability. For example, some studies have shown that cramped living environments can sometimes lead to negative pear pressure that students weren’t exposed to in high school and can create many alternative activities to studying and preparing for classes. To help prove this, Bruce Saccerdote did a study, Peer Effects with Random Assignment: Results of Dartmouth Roomate, which proved, “peers have an impact on grade point average and on decisions to join social groups such as fraternities.” Unfortunately, this peer pressure is of the negative type pressuring students to socialize and to do anything other than study. Another study that proves this is a study by Richard Wertz for the University of South Carolina. He claims that in his random sample of over a thousand students, only 52.3% of students living in the freshmen dorms thought that their rooms were a place for study, while over 95% agreed that the dorms were a place to meet new friends. This helps prove that students are exposed to many different opportunities and when given the choice between studying and socializing, unfortunately, socializing usually wins out. So, this begs the question, what can be done about these detrimental effects? Is there any other way to house the students in a more productive fashion?

The Delta Project

Brenden Duncombe-Smith

The rising cost of a college education is an ever increasing problem among public and private institutions. The problem is compounded by the fact that officials are pushing for more students to attend school. However the funding from state governments just does not exist anymore. There have been budget cuts across the board, and colleges have not escaped the cutbacks. Furthermore, more students from lower income families are attending college and require financial aid. This trend further increases the cost of a college education. In fact, the Delta Project, an organization attempting to solve the cost problem, found that the average cost of a college education is twenty six thousand dollars a number out of reach for most families. Unlike other projects the Delta Project, is trying to reduce the spending at colleges without reducing the quality of the education. Instead of trying to find more funding for the schools, they are attempting to do more with the money the schools already have. By reducing the cost of a degree, colleges can afford to offer more financial aid and allow more students to attend their already very selective institutions. All of these efforts to reduce the cost of a college education are even more important in this economic climate. Not only do state governments not have the money to fund a higher education, but also students do not have the money or the ability to receive loans. Overall, the cost of a higher education needs to be reduced and the tact taken by the Delta Project may be just the way to get the job done.

Go Abroad!

Bo Andrews

College is a very exciting time in a young person's life. While the energy to have fun is always high in college, the availability to explore and exploit new areas and ventures is limitless. Studying Abroad underlines the principle of college: enjoy the process while learning to become a better person.



Studying abroad opens one's eyes to the structure and approach certain countries take in order to run smoothly. According to studyabroad.com, finding one's international passion can "broaden [one's] intellectual horizons and deepen [one's] knowledge and understanding of international, political, and economic issues." By witnessing different performed tasks, it becomes easier to relate current domestic issues with worldly problems. Seeing the United States through other's eyes reveals a different view of the United States' government and policies. As studying abroad provides a different viewpoint, it also displays a potential for success through language.
As the population in the US and in colleges grows, more languages are spoken everyday. Fortunately, colleges provide an availability to learn grammar, speech, and text for foreign languages. Going abroad, college students amplify their personal variety. By learning tricks and tips in foreign countries, an student makes a great case for a certain job. Being able to communicate with different types of workers is a huge plus when it comes to finding a good job.
As people, college students want to grow personally. Studying abroad allows students to learn of flexibility, cope with unfamiliarity, and succeed with confidence. In accordance with The Open Doors Report, there are 241, 791 studying abroad in 2008, an 8% increase from the year before. These students are stepping out of their box and reaching those new areas and ventures that they dream about.

Minority Students: Fighting the 'Brain Drain'

Michael Sandt

On Tuesday mathematical education experts urged the federal government to devote more resources in recruiting minority students to math, science, and engineering majors. The professors who advocated these changes stated that as a result of reverse immigration of Chinese and Indian scientists and mathematicians has heightened the need for new students. These statistics seem strange as from 1990 on the percentage of minority students earning bachelor's degrees has grown. However, the proportion of such students majoring in math and science has stagnated since 1990. According to the board attracting students to these fields, where they are traditionally underrepresented, is a difficult task. Despite this, some institutes have had success through programs targeting high-school students. Another problem is the allocation of funds from the federal government. According to Mr. Castillo-Chavez, money acquired from the federal government will bolster the ranks of science and math majors in the U.S. as the elite universities such as Harvard and MIT cannot meet the current demand. While this is indeed a pressing issue, I feel the recession is hampering its progress more so than the ability to recruit minority students. Progress in this issue may not be made until well after the economic woes are well past us. It is, however, interesting that an issue such as this has not received greater attention

http://chronicle.com/article/Minority-Students-Needed-in/48568/

Wait, Wait, Wait.... I'm here to study?

Anna Smoak

I remember when I was ten I gave my mom a list of colleges and asked her to pick one. Among others on that list were Georgia Tech and MIT. She then proceeded to ask me, "At which of these schools would I rather attend a football game?". Of course she was only kidding, and many other factors went into my final college decision. But the glory of having nationally ranked teams in multiple sports is a "plus" to many incoming college freshmen. So while it is important to focus on competing academics, bolstering the athletic program can be an effective way for some universities to compete for top incoming students.

In Division I schools, the actual athletes aren't as big a piece of an assistance to university prestige as is the attraction of sports throughout the nation. As Bob Kustra, the President of Boise State, proclaims in his welcome: "The success of the football program has provided a window to the university" But in Division III athletics, bringing in athletes is important for both, bringing in students to pay tuition, and increasing the diversity of the schools. For Wheaton college in Massachusettes the latter was the case. "For a campus that has only about 16 percent minority students, Geller said athletics recruiting has attracted a more diverse population of applicants." Also, LaGrange school in Georgia used a large donation from an alum to begin a football programming, thus receiving 109 students that had to pay tuition. So they spent money, but in the long run this small college was able to increase its revenue.

It is important not to sacrifice education for athletics, but colleges can improve their academics through athletics. Increasing the standings of their athletic programs just might give some colleges the edge they need to recruit the higher quality student. Not to sound cocky, but I like to think I am the living proof.

Is high tuition necessary?

Anna Smoak

Everyone knows that tuition is rising, at some alarming rates. I recetly turned on the tv to find a journalist reporting that tuition would soon be in the hundreds of thousands. In fact, tuition is currently increasing at a rate higher than that of inflation. But why is tuition growing so high, especially when so many people are suffering from hard economic times? Are colleges just getting greedy, or do they really need the money parents are grudgingly signing over to the college of their childs choice?

Kevin Carey blames the US News and World Reports for the high and rising college tuitions. But what he really means is that college rankings have a lot to do with high tuition. And as colleges keep competing, the tuition will inevitably keep rising. 26% of the college ranking is based on how much colleges spend. According to the above article, this "spending" is due to a mixture of actual college spending, but also research oppurtunities, which depends largely on professor salaries.

One way to stop this problem is to perhaps not weigh so much on the rankings. The rankings are not always agreat indicator of the quality of education. Another possible solution would be increasing the amount of state aid that colleges receive, which has drastically been reduced over the past few years. The fact is, if we want our spending to go down, and our educational quality to go up, we need to increase our government spending on education. So in this case, we need to spend money to save money.

Increasing Lecure Sizes: The Solution or the Problem?

Ryan Kerns

College attendance is increasing very rapidly with the growing need for advanced workers in the 21st century. However, class sizes are also growing trying to make room for these increasing numbers. At first, this may seem like an effective way to go about accommodating the surplus in students. According to Matilde Pinto Machado in his study, Does class-size affect the academic performance of first year college students?, “Due to greater student autonomy, it is even possible that college students benefit from larger classes with stronger competition and peer pressure as well as a larger potential for interaction with other students.” However, many other studies have shown that in most cases, this can hinder a student’s learning ability by taking away personalized attention and the ability to ask questions. For example, my calculus and physics classes have about 200 students in each class, and according to Will Powers at the Associated Press, this is not uncommon. In fact, he claims that, “The National Center for Academic Transformation, or NCAT, estimates that the 25 most common college courses— in subjects like economics, English, psychology and the sciences — account for 35 percent of four-year college enrollment nationally. That means a lot of people are taking a relative handful of courses.” With this increase in the number of people, there is a decrease in the ratio of professors to students. This often causes them to lose essential personalized teaching that is needed to succeed at such a high level of learning. When trying to grasp a difficult concept, students tend to need to ask questions and explore the concept at a personal level. While this was easily obtained through small high school classes, it is a shock for students when they enter an auditorium full of 200 students seeking that same personal attention their freshman year. Making matters even worse, students often feel like they can’t ask any questions during a lecture without being ridiculed by the rest of their peers. This creates a huge problem because questions are essential to understanding new, challenging subjects, especially at the collegiate level.
All of these factors combine to make an already challenging transition even more difficult for students. So, why don’t colleges make more classes instead of making the existing ones larger when they know that it hinders the students’ learning? Or, better yet, how can colleges change the way professors lecture in order to engage the increasing number of students?

Disadvantages of Online Learning

Vinh Nguyen

Although there are some benefits of online education, there are several disadvantages such as discipline and time management, lack of interactions with the professor, isolation from students, and difficulties in transferring credit according to this article. These disadvantages can be the downfall of many students who seek out an online degree.
Since studying on a computer or laptop can be very distracting, especially with social networks such as MySpace or Facebook, one really needs to be self-disciplined to complete online education. Otherwise, all it would take is a message saying," Hello" from a friend and one can lose his or her focus on the tasks or lectures. Moreover since one can choose whenever he or she wants to study, he or she one must be able to manage his or her time well because if one procrastinates, the chance of catching up is minimal, resulting in withdrawals or dropping out.
The second disadvantage of online learning is its inconvenience, especially when one has questions that need to be answered right away. Because one can only talk or communicate via forums, it can take quite a long time to get a response from a professor or online friends. On the other hand, for instance, if one has a question, he or she can just go to recitation sessions to get the answers.
Last but not least, not all credits will be transferred. Thus, one must contact his or her own institution to assure if his or her classes' credits will count when it comes to transferring online courses into future study programs.
In conclusion, online learning can be beneficial but nothing comes without disadvantages. Therefore, one must consider whether online learning is for him or her. Otherwise, one will just lose money instead of saving money and waste his or her time seeking an online degree.

Tipsy leads to Trouble

Bo Andrews

In college, alcohol is a major part of night-life. Wine, beer, whiskey and others continue to produce victims of academic decline. According to a study cited by Virginia Tech, "A" average students consume 3.3 drinks per week. Consequently, students with a "D" of "F" average drink 9.0 cans of beer every week. The same study revealed that students who abuse alcohol are more likely to perform poorly on a test or project. Although "A" average students who consume close to 3.3 drinks per week do not witness negative effects on their academics, they will feel the painful and irritating effects alcohol produces on one's body and mind.
Alcohol diminishes the amount of functional judgement, coordination, and memory brain cells, minimizing one's opportunity to succeed academically. For example, once a mixed drink is consumed, one's long term memory is impaired. Therefore, it becomes especially hard to score high on test because alcohol "reduces [one's] ability to remember information that [he or she] learned prior to going out for drinks." Alongside long term memory, REM sleep cycles--circadian rhythms that one's body is accustomed to-- are also damaged. Alcohol has many obvious effects such as loss of judgement, coordination, and memory; however, one may not know alcohol kills many brain cells that provide nutrients and energy. Not only are brain cells destroyed, but the ability to solve problems and thinking abstractly is restricted while drinking heavily.





"Alcohol use can result in missing class, doing poorly on tests or projects, disciplinary issues, or other problems. The Bacchus Network acknowledges that along with well know alcoholic effects, the ability to solve problems and think abstractly become very difficult for heavy drinkers. For instance, if a student takes a test with a hangover, he or she has trouble solving problems with different required strategies. Because of alcohol consumption, the student's mental flexibility is limited, so using different approaches to problems becomes an extremely difficult task. As one's alcohol level rises, one's ability to interpret stories or solve puzzles decreases. "The brain interprets different events, observations, and happenings in a variety of ways," so alcohol is the barrier to distinguishing "concrete, obvious, and surface reasoning, and abstract thinking." Essentially, alcohol has serious mental and physical effects. The more one drinks, the worse he or she does academically. Although it is difficult to see the effects of those students who drink and do well academically, students who choose not to drink do not have to deal with all the chaos alcohol causes inside one's body.

Online Education, a viable alternative?

Michael Sandt

It seems that in recent years the prospect of online college education has taken on a more mainstream image. More people are now willing to enroll in online education as it is now perceived that the benefits gained from higher education are near equal to those provided by a traditional college education. A study conducted by the Department of Education reveals that online learning can be at least as effective as traditional learning in producing measurable outcomes. Perhaps a great sign for the online education business which is booming right now. Others dispute this claim. In another study in which professors at traditional colleges were polled, seventy percent of them viewed online education as either "inferior" or "somewhat inferior".

It is easy to see why online education has become such a popular alternative. The classes are tailored to your schedule, it's cheaper, more easily accessed, and provides nearly all the benefits of a traditional education. The only pitfall I can see in online education is the acceptance of a diploma by employers. Until the corporate world begins to treat University of Phoenix degrees with the same consideration they would give to MIT degrees, traditional college will remain the most popular method of higher education. That being said, in the near future don't be surprised when your boss has a degree from University of Phoenix.

Dangerous College Hazing

Brenden Duncombe-Smith

In recent years, hazing at universities has received a lot of public attention. However, as recently as 2008 the University of Maine conducted a study at 53 institutions and found that the majority of varsity athletes, members of Greek life, and members of performing arts organizations were hazed. Though the most frightening statistic is the fact that 90 percent of students who underwent treatment defined as hazing did not think that they had been hazed.

The problem is not just that hazing exists, but also how dangerous it can be. There are numerous reported cases of students dying from hazing related drinking. Not to mention the vast number of cases of hazing related physical injury including broken bones. Although more disturbing, is the fact that these hazing related injuries and deaths were common knowledge, and yet hazing still continues to happen. In 2000, President Charles Vest of Massachusetts Institute of Technology took responsibility for the alcohol related hazing death of a student.

However, enforcing hazing laws is a very difficult process that usually ends in failure. Mainly because students don't realize that they are being hazed or that it is against the law. Some students actually protect the organizations by saying the they voluntarily participated in the activities.

Bottom line hazing is a very serious and deadly problem on many college campuses. Many laws have been passed to prevent hazing but they are hard to enforce. Overall there needs to be more awareness, and more preventive action taken by universities and students alike, in order to make sure that there are no more deaths from hazing.

The College All Nighter: Is it Really Worth It?

Ryan Kerns

A major problem that many college students face is the act of procrastination. However, what makes this lazy habit even worse is that it leads students to resort to extreme measures such as “all nighters” and excessive caffeine intake in order to make up for it. College all nighters are predominate during the week of finals because students decide that staying up all night to study for their upcoming test is more important than getting a decent night’s sleep. This often leads to extreme amounts of caffeine to be ingested in order to keep their bodies awake. Although the extra hours of studying seem like it would do students better than going to sleep, students do not take into consideration the consequences when they force their bodies to stay awake for long periods of time. More specifically, studies have shown that in most cases, staying up all night and ingesting extreme amounts of caffeine does students more harm by decreasing their concentration and increasing their stress levels.
According to Pamela Thacher, an associate professor of psychology at St. Lawrence University, in her research study for the Science Daily, “two-thirds of the students reported that they had pulled at least one all-nighter during a semester and that those who did it regularly had lower GPAs.” This can be attributed to the effects of sleep deprivation. According to Dr. Gary K. Zammit at shuteye.com, “lack of sleep can lead to errors in work, impaired concentration, and poor work performance”: not ideal conditions for taking major tests and finals.
However, the effects of sleep deprivation do not even take into account the effects of excess caffeine on the body. For example, according to collegeconcerns.com, “caffeine exaggerates the amount of stress that a person already has,” as if the stress of a final wasn’t bad enough. All of this stress compiles on your body and has many negative implications of its own including irritability and poor performance in everyday activities (including finals).
So, based on the numerous negative effects of pulling all nighters, what are some better ways to study, and how can students better prepare themselves for finals? And finally, is pulling the infamous all nighter really worth it?

e-Succeed

Bo Andrews

Online education is the most effective way of learning. According to the US Department of Education, face to face learning is becoming obsolete, and online education is becoming attractive. The government tested 51 factors in a study to find the driving factors behind online education. Opportunities for communication and extensive learning time allow students to thrive in an online college world.

World Wide Learn finds that online college carries valuable benefits that drive its students' cyber enrollment. As the world's premier online directory of education assures, "students can 'attend' courses anytime, from anywhere," it also provides "student-centered learning." Students can run on their own schedule and work at their own pace. The modern world consists of new technology and fast pace. Alongside, online education allows students to experience new technology that is applicable to real world situations. To survive in the real world is something; however, online education leads students to thrive as they become "exposed to knowledge" in modern business. Use of email, online research, and other tasks will become much more familiar and easy to conquer.
Online Education provides service for not only average age students, but also adults. Buzzle.com sees flexibility as necessary in older peoples life and by having a service at your own time, it is easier to complete other adult responsibilities such as cooking dinner or picking up kindergarten carpool. Online education has created a window of opportunity for a wide variety of people and it continues to grow (30% each year) as more people experience its benefits.

The Facts Behind Dropping Out

Michael Sandt

A report published in November of 2005 by the AP examines the demographics and reasons of college dropouts. Among the most startling statistics in the report is the apparent effect of race on whether or not a student will graduate. According to the report 57 percent of white students finish their degrees while only 44 percent of hispanic students and 39 percent of black students do. We often put the blame on the high school education these dropouts recieved but isn't the application process supposed to select those likely to succeed at an institution? While I do feel that a dropouts are an inevitability of the education process, the sheer amount that do as indicated by these statistics is baffling. These 2005 statistics are reinforced by a department of education study which places the dropout rate for the first year at 30 percent and 50 percent overall. If higher education is creating a society of half educated dropouts aren't we doing something wrong?

Cheating and Plagiarism in College

Brenden Duncombe-Smith

Recently there has been a notable increase in cheating and plagiarism at colleges and universities. Due to the widespread use of cell phones and the internet, it is now possible for students to download term papers online or text each other answers during a test. However, there are new solutions to help prevent against this type of plagiarism. For instance, a website called TurnItIn.com will check student papers against billions of sources including web pages, books, articles, magazines, and all of the other papers submitted to the site. Sites such as this could be the perfect answer for many professors; however, some believe that this is the wrong way to prevent cheating and plagiarism. Timothy R. Austin, dean at the College of the Holy Cross, suggests that professors design their assignments to discourage cheating. For example, professors should assign texts that online essay sources are unlikely to have written or require students to turn in drafts. Lawrence M. Hinman, writer for the Washington Post and professor of philosophy at the Values Institute at the University of San Diego, thinks that the best solution would be for professors to create assignments that engage students and peaks their interests. All of these are great ideas, but alone these ideas aren't fool proof. There will always be students that have absolutely no interest in doing the work and will cheat regardless of the assignment. Ideally, the assignments themselves would be enough to discourage cheating. However, since that is not the case, resources like TurnItIn.com could provide the final anti-plagiarism tool for professors, thus ensuring academic integrity.

The Technology Transition

Anna Smoak

The world is becoming more and more technology based everyday. It is required in almost all colleges now that the students own laptops, and use them as the primary means of communication. And even more than that e-books are becoming more and more popular. While e-books may be more cost effective and easily accessible, they lack the ability to write on their margins or easily turn the pages. Specifically, they aren't hard texts.

Yes e-books are more cost effective, and more environmentally friendly. Mr. Humphrey, a Professor at Arizona State University argues: he is excited that the device will let students bring all 17 assigned texts to every class. That way they can look at all of the texts at once.No problem. That AND the e-books are more cost effective? Don't let these words fool you. E-books are more cost effective for the publisher. There is no cost difference, in most cases, for the consumer.

E-books are also argued to be more environmentally friendly. Not having to use hundreds of pages of paper for thousands of copies of a textbook. But this is not necessarily true since it takes power and energy for the laptops, or desktops to run while reading the e-book.

E-books simply cannot replace hard copies of textbooks. The constant focus on the screen can strain your vision, making reading take longer. It can prove difficult to find what page you are supposed to start reading from. And it can take longer and reduce the effectiveness of writing notes in the margins, or underlining. E-books shouldn't be a requirement for college courses for those of us that just function better with hard copies. And there aren't as many advantages to e-books as publishers would have you believe. Let the student choose what they want and they will learn the materials better and more effectively.

Is College Worth It During A Recession?

Vinh Nguyen

Everyone knows the economy is currently in a downturn and no one knows for sure how much longer this recession will last. Consequently, complications arise. During this time especially, one of the popular questions that people ponder upon is whether students should take out loans for their college tuitions and will they be able to pay back their loans and profit from doing so.

According to this article, Darla Horn, who graduated in 2005 with more than $80,000 in debt, had no problem paying off her loans until she lost her job as an information technology recruiter. For that reason, many prospective students are not going to their first-choice schools due to their financial status.

According to U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics, the unemployment rate for college graduates increased up to 4.7% from 2.8% last year in July. Moreover the article from USA Today states that, "the employers expect to hire 22% fewer graduates from the class of 2009 than from the class of 2008 according to the National Association of Colleges and Employers." These statistics show how bad the recession has gotten and many prospective students will change their minds about going to colleges.

Nevertheless, one way to cope with the recession is going to community college. According to a survey done by Campus Computing Project, more than 90% of community college's enrollment increased from last year and 86% of community college reported an increase in full-time students. For example, Alyssa Griffin from Ohio, plans to spend her first two years at a Columbus State Community College and then transfers Capital University. By doing so, she will end up saving about $40,000.

So as I am about to publish this post, I am wondering to myself, "Am I making the right decision paying almost $40,000 per year for one of the most prestigious public universities?"

College Partying, Is it really as bad as they say?

http://alcoholism.about.com/od/college/a/casa070315.htm

Loud music, drinking, recreational drug use. Is it a good time at any average college or is it a terrible accident waiting to happen. According to a study conducted by the National Center on Addiction and Substance abuse at Columbia University, the rates of binge drinking and substance abuse are up among college students. The study states that for college students, a surprisingly high 22.9 percent meet the requirements for dependence on either alcohol or other drugs. This compared to the general population which boasts only 8.9 percent of the reaching this level. The most alarming statistic however, is the amount of college students that participate in these activities has remained the same while the intensity of abuse has grown over the years. While the study does give us some valuable insight into what appears to be an epidemic at college campuses nationwide; I for one have seen little evidence or the degree of this degree of abuse. When I walk around campus on weekend nights I see college students having a good time with friends in those few days we get between classes.

Michael Sandt

Sports over Smarts: How much is too much?

Anna Smoak

Gender	Athlete Status	Count	Percentile rank of GPA	Difference in rank of GPA (athlete minus non-athlete)
Male	Non-athlete	11,227	47	--
	Recruited athlete	4,195	37	-10
	Non-recruited athlete	1,959	44	-3
Female	Non-athlete	17,323	55	--
	Recruited athlete	3,017	51	-4
	Non-recruited athlete	2,071	53	-2

A recent study done by the NCAA compares the GPA of athletes versus that of non-athletes at a select few division III schools. Not surprisingly the results showed that the male athlete's GPA was significantly lower than that of the non-athlete, and the woman's slightly so. Why is this? Has athletic pride now surpassed the academic pride we once held to so high a standard? While many people believe the typical "athlete" is a lower quality student, that is an unfair generalization... for now.

Thomas S. Dee conducted an experiment of his theory: stereotype threat. The results from his experiment indicate that when students identify themselves as an athlete, they are very aware of the fact that the general population expects them to not be academically competitive with the other students. This causes the athletes to "psych themselves out" and thus perform worse in the classroom.

Stereotype threat is just one theory, however. Could it be that universities are simply admitting a lower quality student when looking for an athlete to give them that competitve edge? While this is true for some universities, it is unfair to generalize this "dumb jock" perspective onto all student athletes. When I was applying to college I went to talk to the MIT women's basketball coach and she was sure to emphasize that I had to get into the school first, then I could be on the team.

So while there has been a downward trend in the land of college athletics, this is just the generalization of a few colleges results. For example, let's not forget the 45 University of Alabama student athletes named to the SEC honor roll in 2008 and 2009. For now most universities are in a stable state, but one push in the wrong direction could lead to a very slippery slope. Stay competitive: in the classroom and out.

College Curriculum: The Real Problem

Ryan Kerns

Higher education in the United States today is suffering greatly from a not so obvious problem: the curriculum. Over the past couple of decades, there has been a tremendous increase in how specific the curriculums of bachelorette degrees truly are. Instead of students learning a wide range of topics, they are focusing more on their current choice of major. This causes students to “neglect” other courses that are not needed for their study. While this does allow for students to become more focused on their major and to prepare themselves for the workforce in that very specific area, it leaves no room for other classes that may be essential later on in life. Many students change their major throughout their college experience and end up on the short end of the stick when it comes to catching back up in the curriculum required for their new field. Unfortunately, the problems do not end there. Many students will stick to their original major throughout college. However, when they encounter the real work force that their major includes, they find that they do not enjoy their career. So, they try to find another job only to find that they are seriously lacking the necessary skills required to become successful. This creates many unhappy or unemployed people. According to Deborah Dezure of State University Online, “Business and industry leaders decried the inadequate skills of graduates who were unable to problem-solve, communicate through writing and speaking, engage in ethical decision-making, work in teams, and interact effectively with diverse others.” All of these skills could have been obtained through a much broader curriculum as opposed to a very specific major based one. This is one of many curriculum debates that professionals have been discussing for years. For example, Dr. Frederick Rudolph explains in his scholar journal: Curriculum. A History of the American Undergraduate Course Study since 1636, that he has been comparing different curriculum strategies throughout history since 1636 and is yet to find the right answer. So, how do higher education professionals develop a diverse curriculum that better suites the needs of the students’ future instead of preparing them specifically for their major? And when will the professionals start to realize that they are hindering the students’ opportunities in the future?

Run Farther, Score Higher

Bo Andrews

Everyone goes to college in hopes to succeed; however, not everyone knows the easiest way to succeed. A recent study done by the California Department of Education display a positive correlation between younger age students' physical activity and "academic performance." In the experiment the CDE performed in 2002, 954,000 students were to take the SAT-9 assessment and then perform six fitness tests, such as cardiovascular endurance and upper body strength. The more physically active students are, the more likely they will perform well on tests.
To be easy enough, physical activity could include, walking, running, or swimming. All these physical activities lead to healthier positive vibes as seen through research done at the 2001 Society for Neuroscience Conference. "A trio of studies," as they researchers at the conference called it, explains that daily physical activity improves mind functions and benefits the health of neurons. Alongside, physical activity takes one's mind off academics, thus leading to greater attention span during actual school hours.
Also, in an undergraduate study conducted at Texas A&M, 40 women were selected randomly to participate in aerobic, "physical," activity. According to Martha Brennan, author of the study, "the main benefit from aerobic activity was that women who exercised regularly felt more positive about academics." Their research definitely makes one give physical activity a shot.



Throughout these results, it is obvious physical activity is good for a college student. Trying the graduate with honors, smart students should take the initiative to be physically active. Physical education does not have to be a requirement; however, physical activity could easily help one succeed.

The Amethyst Initiative

Brenden Duncombe-Smith

Almost everyone agrees that college drinking is a huge problem. An Associated Press study found that from 1999 to 2005 157 college students drank themselves to death. This, among many other statistics, paints a frightening picture of college drinking. Some believe that the problem may be a result of the 21 drinking age limit. The Amethyst Initiative is set on ending the debate. The Amethyst Initiative is a collection of around 100 chancellors and presidents of Universities dedicated to debating the 21 drinking age limit, however the underlying intent is to attempt to get the drinking age lowered to 18. Mothers Against Drunk Driving are worried that this would only lead to more alcohol related danger on campuses. George W. Dowdall, author of College Drinking: Reframing a Social Problem is "concerned that the movement places too much emphasis on the minimum drinking age, one factor among many shaping college drinking." . He is also worried that the Amethyst Initiative is disregarding studies and organizations that show that the drinking age works. However, no matter how the debates go or which side claims victory, the real question is whether or not the experiment is worth the risk. It is doubtful that any such conclusion to the debates will be decisive enough to prove that in no way will the safety of the newly legal drinkers be in jeopardy. It could, in fact, have an even worse effect and push binge drinking on kids under 18. Although the Amethyst Initiative's goal to make college safer by debating about the legal limit is noble, their efforts are misguided, and they should instead be focusing on other methods to end alcohol abuse on college campuses.