College presidents upset. Obama's Ed Dept says rating colleges will be like "rating a blender".

[madfloridian]

Last edited Thu Oct 9, 2014, 12:24 PM - Edit history (1)

I just received a PM in regard to this post I made in May. I am adding this note at 11:38 am Oct. 9, 2014. I think it is clear my post is referring to the terminology of the Ed Dept judging colleges and saying it is like "rating a blender". Nowhere do I refer to stats of rape or violence against women. The PM says that I am going to be quoted and linked to in a new post soon in regard to a column by George Will that says the new college ratings "might" include stats on rape and violence toward women. I was told whether I responded to this person or not, they were going to quote this post from May. I don't know how a non-response would be handled.

I am going to let this post speak for itself. I think the post is clear.

Yes, it is apparently now okay to try to catch someone in a "mistake", but I have been here since 2002. I have gotten more liberal, and some views have changed. But I see nothing in this post that would be changed. I have not seen the referred to post by George Will. It irks me to be told that I will be quoted whether I respond or not. Sounds a little threatening.

I do not think stats of rape and violence against women should be kept secret, but it should not be part of judging the academic quality of a university or college.


Now back to the post as it was written in May.



All I can say to that is OMG.

They have haphazardly been basing K-12 school grades on a single high-stakes test which most feel is just about meaningless. Now they are going to start in on grading colleges, and they have the nerve to compare it to buying a blender.

“It’s like rating a blender,” Jamienne Studley, a deputy under secretary at the Education Department, said to the college presidents after a meeting in the department’s Washington headquarters in November, according to several who were present. “This is not so hard to get your mind around.”

Talk about a condescending attitude?

And good old Arne Duncan's back again with the hackneyed term the "reformers" use to refer to public education.....the "status quo".

Arne's words:

“We have a financial and moral obligation to be good stewards of these dollars,” Arne Duncan, the secretary of education, said in an interview. He said schools often did a poor job of providing information to prospective students and their parents, making the choice of a college complicated. “To defend the status quo, for me, you can’t do that.”

Trust me the status quo is one heck of a lot better than turning schools over to management companies that are NOT regulated and have no oversight.

And now they want to take on the colleges. The college presidents are angry. And according the New York Times article Obama is getting a little belligerent about being questioned about the new policy.

But officials said Mr. Obama had repeatedly told his advisers that he was determined not to let college presidents off the hook. Aides said that after the president pledged to deal with rising college costs in his 2013 State of the Union address, he kept rejecting policy ideas as too timid and demanded tougher proposals.

....Some college presidents accused Mr. Obama and his top aides of being obstinate.

...Ms. Muñoz countered that Mr. Obama had no patience for anyone who attempted to block the effort.

“For those who are making the argument that we shouldn’t do this, I think those folks could fairly have the impression that we’re not listening,” Ms. Muñoz said. “There is an element to this conversation which is, ‘We hope to God you don’t do this.’ Our answer to that is: ‘This is happening.’ ”

In a post from the Chronicle of Higher Education we learn that Arne Duncan told a committee they would go ahead with this even without the funding. BTW they are seeking millions in funding to grade colleges at a time that our government won't approve the unemployment pay extension, when food stamps are being cut, and our veterans are not being properly cared for.

College-Rating System Will Go Forward, Duncan Says

The U.S. Department of Education plans to continue its push for a college-rating system, even if Congress doesn’t shell out the $10-million the agency is requesting to develop the program and put it in place.

When Education Secretary Arne Duncan appeared before a Senate subcommittee that oversees appropriations for education on Wednesday to discuss the department’s proposed budget, Sen. Jerry Moran asked what the agency would do if it didn’t get the money.

Mr. Duncan responded by saying the department would move forward with the initiative, but the money "would be very, very beneficial."

An unfunded mandate?

Arne's policies were not succeeding in the Chicago's public schools. Unfortunately he was chosen to take those policies nationwide with no proof they really worked.

Arne Duncan's failed Chicago reforms and Rod Paige's "Houston Miracle". Becoming national policy?

Even as the Obama administration promotes charter schools as a way to help raise the academic performance of the nation’s students, half of Chicago’s charter schools have been running deficits in recent years, an analysis of financial and budget documents shows, calling into question their financial viability.

..." But even though Chicago’s charter schools brought in $21 million in private money from foundations, corporations and wealthy individuals in 2007 — the last year for which complete information is available — half have run an average of $700,000 in deficits in recent years, with some of the shortfalls reaching $4 million, according to an analysis of Chicago Public Schools data by Catalyst Chicago, an independent magazine on urban education.

The data showed that two-thirds of the schools could not cover core expenses, like salaries, facilities and overhead, without private money. A third needed private money to fill more than 20 percent of their budgets. A recent study by Ball State University found that Chicago’s charter schools depend far more on private financing than those in other big cities, including Boston, Miami and New York.

It's hard to believe that public school teachers and parents across the country who are deeply concerned about Arne's policies are all wrong. It's hard to believe that college presidents around the country who are calling the president "obstinate" abou tpolicies they believe will be harmful are equally wrong.

Too many people in the field of education are stunned and appalled at this administration's educational policies.

It's time to listen to them. There's a word to describe when politicians and basketball players set themselves above those involved in the education system......it's called arrogance.

[NCarolinawoman]

1. Low IQ private-schooled Arnie strikes again.

He loves the cookie cutter approach. It enables him to be a more effective dictator. Should have been fired a LONG LONG time ago.

[madfloridian]

3. Yep, and this makes it clear Arne is carrying out Obama's policies.

I just know someone will pop in here and call for accountability. That always happens. One would think there had never been a test given in schools, that teachers and professors had never been rated or evaluated.

The "reformers" literally have the media in their pockets, and the education community doesn't have the money to fight back.

[pnwmom]

2. Yeah, this is nuts. For example, why should colleges be ranked on how many

of their graduates choose high paying careers as opposed to teaching or social work?

[madfloridian]

4. Yes, that would be part of the plan.

From the 2nd link in the OP

Last year President Obama directed the Department of Education to create a plan by the 2015-16 academic year to rate colleges based on measures of access, affordability, and student outcomes, and eventually to allocate federal aid based on those ratings.

That would fall under student outcomes.

[Starry Messenger]

6. Because it is the new culture of having to show expanding ROI in higher ed.

Among other reasons, equally unsound.

[QC]

20. That happened to my old college--ended up on a list of the nation's worst,

based on the wealth of its graduates.

The catch? It's the state liberal arts college. Major programs? Humanities, fine arts, education, social work.

Probably not a good place to go if you want to make a pile, but if you are interested in entering a helping profession or getting good preparation for graduate school, it's a great option. But that school is now one of the worst in the country, according to one ranking very much like the one Arne is proposing.

This is the problem with the so-called "market-based" approach to education, and this administration is as fully invested in that way of thinking as George W. Bush's.

That needs to stop.

[jeff47]

30. Yeah, income is a bad idea for ranking. Employment rate would be better. (nt)

[jmowreader]

47. They shouldn't be...

OTOH, everyone would like to see four rankings:

1) percentage of students who either graduated or transferred to another institution, excluding students who enroll in short vocational programs you don't "graduate" from like truck driving. The "transferred to another institution" thing is especially crucial for community colleges. We have one in town. It's got a horrid graduation rate; problem is, most of the "non-grads" who didn't sign up to learn to drive truck - those four-week courses drag on the school's grad rate too - are kids from this county who live at home for a year to undo the effects of Lakeland High School without also having to pay room and board, then transfer to another school for their degrees. Those kids all show up as non-graduates; if you zero out all the people who only planned to go to North Idaho College for a year anyway, NIC's graduation rate is decent.

2) percentage of students who receive jobs in the field represented by their highest degree. There's nothing wrong with being a social worker, and there's nothing wrong with holding an MSW. But if 95 percent of the MSW recipients that come out of Alpha University wind up selling cars or real estate and 80 percent of the MSW recipients that come out of Bravo University become social workers, there's probably something wrong with the MSW program at Alpha University.

3) percentage of students who receive jobs at all after graduation, compared to other universities in its state, broken down by major. If there are three universities in your city, two of them place 80 percent of their grads into jobs and the third places 25 percent, then people need to know this. It would not be fair to compare the University of California's job placement rate to the University of Arkansas' rate if California is in a hiring slump and Arkansas is creating jobs like mad, but being able to compare the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville's computer science program to the same program at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock would be more than fair.

4) percentage of underemployed students, with special emphasis to the ones who can't pay their loans back.

[1000words]

5. Soon, everything will be framed as a product for us consumers to buy

[immoderate]

7. Correction:

Rent. You will ultimately have to rent your certifications "from the cloud."

--imm

[DLnyc]

8. One way to bring down the cost of a college education would be

to return to the excellent (and essentially free to the students) public state university systems that we had a few decades ago, before Reagan and others got into their "profit is god" approach.

Another method would be to apply market-based solutions to the problem of education.

The first method would probably lead to much lower cost, higher quality college level education.

The second method would probably lead to much higher cost, lower quality college level education, plus a great deal of profit for a big crowd of predatory "education related businesses".

Probably, given our political system, we will go with the second method.

IMHO

[Vattel]

40. exactly right

[blkmusclmachine]

9. Time to start in on higher ed, eh, Obama?!?!

[BuelahWitch]

10. If they were rating the diploma mills

and "training schools" that charge students exorbitant tuition with little or nothing to show for it, it wouldn't be such a bad idea. However I would guess the ones that will be hardest hit will be the small state schools and community colleges.

[madfloridian]

11. Yes, the ones that can afford all the splashy ads on TV.

Their money is going to those bigtime ads when it should be going into their education system.

[woodsprite]

28. They're the "charter schools" of Colleges and Universities. n/t

[BuelahWitch]

36. And likely enough money to put in the pocket of a politician or two?

Just a guess...

[KurtNYC]

65. Isn't college football an ad for colleges? $5 mil football coaches

and a program that recruits guys to smash their skulls while displaying the college's logo on the side of their helmet.

[tammywammy]

14. It could really hurt community colleges

If they count students that go on to a college/university without getting an associates as a "drop out". Heck, I took a couple of classes at my local community college for my bachelors since I went to a private school for undergrad. It was a much cheaper way to knockout basic classes. Students like I was shouldn't hurt a school. I've highly recommended the CC to other adults thinking about going back to school.

Now I say hit those for-profit outrageously priced tv commercial schools hard.

[madfloridian]

16. You are right. That could be a devastating thing, too.

The whole thing is so stupid, and it sounds like they are going to barrel ahead with it....just like they are doing with public schools.

[jmowreader]

48. They already count them that way

North Idaho College in Coeur d'Alene, ID, has a 73 percent drop rate. I don't think the people who attend school for "certificate" programs like forklift driving and CDL are counted in this - they attend for very short periods; forklift training is two days, hazardous waste operations is a week, CDL is a month and so on and so forth - but the people who attend like you did are definitely counted. Zero out the people who transfer to other colleges after a year and the drop rate goes to 20 percent.

[progressoid]

12. Sometimes I hate logging on to DU.

I'm sure I'd feel a lot better if I were blissfully ignorant of this crap.

[DeSwiss]

13. Welcome to the future!

- And remember: Water is for toilets, Brawndo is for Thirst!

K&R

[center]

[/center]

[woo me with science]

15. Assault after assault after assault after assault after assault after assault

Let this nation never mistake a Third Way Democrat for a Democrat again.

[Octafish]

17. The point is, uh, competition.

For, uh, the wealth and well-being of transnational capitalism in general and its principal holders specifically.

[madfloridian]

26. ....

[Octafish]

46. The only derangement syndrome I see are those who refuse to see what is there happening...

...before our very eyes: the dismantling of public education and the death of democracy.

[Vattel]

18. The United States' university system is, by far, the best in the world.

I fear, however, that politics will eventually mess it up. Student outcome assessments have already added an unnecessary and expensive layer of bureaucracy, and if idiots like Duncan have their way, more bureaucratic nonsense is on the way.

[madfloridian]

22. Trust me Arne WILL have his way. Education has been turned completely over to him.

As billionaire ed reformer Eli Broad said of Arne's appointment:

We feel the stars have finally aligned.

The election of President Barack Obama and his appointment of Arne Duncan, former CEO of Chicago Public Schools, as the U.S. secretary of education, marked the pinnacle of hope for our work in education reform. In many ways, we feel the stars have finally aligned.

With an agenda that echoes our decade of investments—charter schools, performance pay for teachers, accountability, expanded learning time and national standards—the Obama administration is poised to cultivate and bring to fruition the seeds we and other reformers have planted. (emphasis added)

They are smiling all the way to the bank.

[Orrex]

31. Never trust anyone who tells you "The Stars Are Right!"

[msanthrope]

19. There's two libertarian/right wing memes in this OP that I find troubling.....

That's not to say I find the OP libertarian or right wing herself, mind you, but I am troubled by the following memes:


1) "An unfunded mandate?" Unfunded mandate is a right-wing trope used at least since the 80's...in fact, that was conservative argument successfully a used to topple of one of the most effective pieces of gun control legislation by Scalia in the seminal Lopez case.... gun control was struck down because it was an "unfunded mandate." So my hackles rise when a policy of Obama's is described as an unfunded mandate.... used Google and you can clearly see the origin of the phrase.

2). Colleges and universities rely on the US News And World Report college and university ranking every year... I went to a school that actively courted parents based on their ranking. So colleges and universities don't mind being ranked by a corporation... but they apparently mind being ranked by the government. This is a libertarian theology frankly.... having a private corporations do what the government should be doing.

Madflo.... I don't think you are either libertarian or right wing.... but I think your arguments suffer when you are not careful in your use of sources...

I'll bet most college presidents don't want the government to rank them.... given that the government has economic data such as college aid application fulfillment rates, and crime and violence statistics.... I'm betting they'd rather have a magazine rate them.

[wavesofeuphoria]

25. Hardly "libertarian" memes ...

1). Read up on "unfunded mandates" ... PL 104-4 .. Unfunded Mandates Reform Act (UMRA) .. I'd say the concept of unfunded mandates are a bit more than a mere "right-wing trope".

From Wiki ... UMRA allows the United States Congress to decline unfunded federal mandates within legislation if such mandates are estimated to cost more than the threshold amounts estimated by the Congressional Budget Office.[48] UMRA does not apply to "conditions of federal assistance; duties stemming from participation in voluntary federal programs; rules issued by independent regulatory agencies; rules issued without a general notice of proposed rulemaking; and rules and legislative provisions that cover individual constitutional rights, discrimination, emergency assistance, grant accounting and auditing procedures, national security, treaty obligations, and certain elements of Social Security".[48]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unfunded_mandate

2) Colleges apparently DO mind "corporations" (US News & World Report is a magazine) ranking them ... when methodology is in question.

https://baylorlariat.com/2011/09/30/us-news-college-rankings-disputed/

The National Association for College Admission Counseling released a report this week calling into question the criteria used by U.S. News and World Report, a magazine widely known for its annual ranking of America’s best colleges.

The report cited NACAC members’ dissatisfaction with U.S. News’ emphasis on class rank and standardized test scores. The NACAC comprises 11,000 high school and college admissions counselors, David Hawkins, director of public policy and research for NACAC, said.


Weak sauce.

[msanthrope]

33. UMRA was a Newt gingrich 104th Congress special....don't you remember?

"Unfunded mandate" is a conservative war cry since the 80's, and language matters.

Your second point rather backs my point....if corporations aren't getting the job done why shouldn't the government do it? After all...we expect parents to pay a hefty price. Why shouldn't the government advise where it is best spent?

[wavesofeuphoria]

34. Let's see ..

1) UMRA ... Clinton's remark on signing it ...

Today, we are making history. We are working to find the right balance for the 21st century. We are recognizing that the pendulum had swung too far, and that we have to rely on the initiative, the creativity, the determination, and the decisionmaking of people at the State and local level to carry much of the load for America as we move into the 21st century.

President Bill Clinton, “Remarks on Signing the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act of 1995,” Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, vol. 31, no. 12 (March 22, 1995), p. 455.

Yep ... totally Newt's baby.

2) Geez. The colleges aren't opposed to rankings .. but to rankings with questionable methodology. Notice that point ... hence their issue with this new Duncan junk.

Do you also advocate the government advising people where their money is best spent regarding housing, autos, real estate, jewelry, investments? ... We are expected to pay a hefty price for those things ...

[msanthrope]

42. Proposed and passed by Newt's congress..used by Scalia. It's not liberals

who use the phrase. Google unfunded mandate and the ACA and feast your eyes.

I actually do expect the government to advise me where my taxpayer-subsidized and insured loans are best spent....and the government does do that through regulatory schemes, licensing, and sometimes, ratings. You can ignore them if you wish.

[Blanks]

57. I remember Newt's war on 'unfunded mandates'...

This war against public school reform is a conservative battle (though it's fought by the liberals here).

I've been trying to stay out of it - because frankly, the bullying that we hear about in schools is clearly an example of children mimicking the behavior of the adults that are placed in front of them.

Schools need reform - period. Just like highways need refurbished, sanitary sewer facilities need maintenance. Even if the system isn't broke (and I believe it is) it needs updated periodically, and it is long overdue.

What I see here is a yearning for the good old days. The days when teachers didn't have any accountability. The days when a crazy dentist from Texas who believed that dinosaurs were on the ark - was extensively editing the textbooks that half the country was using. Did teachers fix that: no.

Fighting for going back to the way things were is what conservatives do - progressives are for progress.

I'm not suggesting that we should do everything the way the administration says to do it, but what I see here is complaining about EVERYTHING that the administration does when it comes to education.

Can you see how it looks more like conservative behavior than progressive behavior to me?

[msanthrope]

61. I can absolutely see how it looks like conservative, rather than progressive behavior. It's all the

more alarming when the progressives begin to attack the policy with hashed-over 80's-90's memes.

Having been a public school teacher before going to law school, I think you are dead, dead on with the remark about bullying, and even more dead on with the idea of nostalgia.

Here's two threads that I have bookmarked---the anti-ACLU/progressive/civil rights of students sentiments expressed is enough to shock you.....


http://journals.democraticunderground.com/msanthrope


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x587633

TO THE JURY--it is not against the TOS to refer to prior threads. In fact, this process is assisted by the helpful, Admin-provided search box up top to the right.

[Blanks]

67. I don't know of any other profession that doesn't have oversight...

School reform is practically identical to health care reform in one way: The folks being reformed don't like it.

They tell stories from their perspective and wonder why the people who have endured a bad experience in that arena aren't enraged right there along with them.

Yes, privatization can be (and usually is) bad. I don't like the idea of corporations profiting (exclusively) from our children's education, but we need a 'common core'. Whether the test questions that they have right now have problems is immaterial - we need a common core. We had this same debate about local control 20 years ago, and teachers won. Education did not improve - local control is an instance of states rights. States rights is another conservative issue.

There's nothing progressive about the stance that the educators on DU have about the direction of education in this country.

School district superintendents are very often 1%ers too. Where's the outrage among educators that some school district personnel make so much while teachers make too little. It's an industry (yes, it's an industry) that needs more oversight.

[msanthrope]

69. School reform on DU tends to be teacher-centric, rather than child-centric, and I think that's where

support is lost among rank and file Democrats who are struggling to put their kids through school...there's critique of the administration, but no real alternative presented that tells parents that there's a cogent plan to reform to benefit their kids.

I share your concerns about "local control" because we've seen what that's done to science curriculums, in particular. I've found that much of the anti-common core threads on this site have a stunning level of anti-intellectualism....here's an example of what I mean:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024082337


To the Jury: it is not against the TOS to use blue links to prior discussion. Admin facilitates this by including a helpful searchbox at the top of the page.


Yes--Common Core needs tweaking, just like the ACA, but it is what we need as a country--less local control over curriculum, a more elevated expectation of what a high school diploma means. At the same time, we need to protect and retain the good teachers we do have.

In my profession, the market and disciplinary boards tend to weed out the worst, and nudge the mediocre.

[BuelahWitch]

37. Deflect, delay, deny, destroy n/t

[Vattel]

39. +1000

[msanthrope]

43. Deflect what? I happen to think rating colleges is a great idea. nt

[BuelahWitch]

44. Of course you do

[msanthrope]

45. Knowledge is power. I like the idea of a federal rating. I hope they include crime stats

and other financial stats that a magazine would not.

I am tickled, however, that apparently "college presidents".....members of the 1 percent, with their salaries and contracts, are the victims here.

[madfloridian]

21. This thread is pretty much done for now....because....

it is implied now that colleges deserve it just as public schools deserved it...that government grading is good for what ails them.

That Obama's policy is good for them, and since those on the right oppose it as well...that it must be good.

So this thread is heading either for the junk pile or for a bunch of other nonsense and false rhetoric to follow. Either way is destructive, nothing to do with honest discussion.

So it is just another day where the digs must begin and no policy of Obama's is judged by merit.

[woo me with science]

24. Ignore the Third Way garbage.

Everybody is very familiar with the Third Way schtick here, and it has no credibility anymore.

[BuelahWitch]

38. Here, here!

I second this!

[noiretextatique]

51. second second

I think I am more weary of them than the GOP. At least the GOP doesn't pretend to give a fuck.

[madfloridian]

23. Obama "determined not to let college presidents off the hook."

Just like he is not letting public schools and public school teachers "off the hook".

There is so much about attitude shown in that comment.

It shows that he thinks of all this as a punitive measure for bad schools and bad colleges who are trying to get away with something.

Think about that for a moment....the president seems to have a punitive attitude toward schools and colleges.

[wavesofeuphoria]

29. The contempt is palatable.

But, it's due largely to a view of education being a product rather than a process. My disagreements with NCLB and RTTT is that fundamental difference coupled with "profitizing" learning and education.

[woo me with science]

41. +100000 Utter contempt.

This is your country under corporate rule.

[Starry Messenger]

27. I can't find the link right now, mad

But AFT's position paper on higher ed points out that these market reforms are driven by foundations like Lumina. They have some daft theory that since people with education get better paying jobs, that this correlates somehow to actual job creation. I'm not getting it 100%, but I think that is the gist. I'll try to find the paper later.

[QC]

32. K&R

[TBF]

35. Arne is in way over his head -

Mr. Basketball is now up against some of the smartest minds in the country and they know how to play chess.

I do not see this ending well for Mr. Duncan.

[msanthrope]

49. It's done, actually...what the "college presidents" are furious about, and what the OP didn't

mention is the federal subsidy consequences.

Of course, college presidents are pissed....accountability for federal dollars is being sought of them. The repukes in Congress HATE this proposal.

[QC]

50. kick

[aikoaiko]

52. Let slip the PhDs of war.

Let slip the PhDs of war.

[whistler162]

53. So what is the college presidents ideas?

keep hearing complaints about ideas but no ideas from the complainers.

[liberal_at_heart]

56. Maybe college presidents wouldn't have to market their colleges like blenders if the state and

federal governments funded universities the way they used to decades ago.

[QC]

58. Bingo!

Appropriations for higher ed have been on the decline since the Reagan years.

This is a major reason for state universities becoming so expensive.

[msanthrope]

63. Rutgers' President is the highest paid college president in America. I'd say he's getting plenty of

government money, wouldn't you????

[whistler162]

64. Maybe if the colleges used the money for education

instead of sports venues and professors that barely teach the state and federal governments wouldn't be on their backs so much about finding ways to rate them.

Maybe if we did have a better/improved, because it already exists and has for more decades tan either of us has been around, consumer report on colleges and universities it would help.

[liberal_at_heart]

68. The government hasn't been properly funding colleges for decades now, since Reagan. Are you saying

that what Reagan did to the university funding was justified? The reason colleges spend money on fancy buildings, sport venues, and part time professors is because the state and federal funding has dried up. They are trying to attract affluent students who can afford a higher tuition bill. If the state and federal government would properly fund universities there wouldn't be a need to do this. Republicans hate our public school system and are trying to get rid of it and democrats are being complicit in its destruction. That's why I am an independent. I have an autistic son in special education who does not get the proper education and I hold both parties responsible. Democrats need to be fighting for more funding and start fighting against state standardized testing, Race to the Top, and Common Core.

[msanthrope]

62. They want a corporation to do the ratings. And they are furious that Pell grants will be tied to

performance of their universities.

Imagine that---being held accountable for the taxpayer money that will flow to your institution!!

[Teamster Jeff]

54. Rating, testing, measuring

All to give the illusion that they're doing something to improve education.

It all ends in Privatization. Follow the money.

[ProSense]

55. Well,

But officials said Mr. Obama had repeatedly told his advisers that he was determined not to let college presidents off the hook. Aides said that after the president pledged to deal with rising college costs in his 2013 State of the Union address, he kept rejecting policy ideas as too timid and demanded tougher proposals.

...the rating system needs to change. It's currently a scam.

Obama Dings U.S. News & World Report’s College Rankings

President Barack Obama on Thursday took a swipe at private college rating systems, singling out the U.S. News & World Report as he announced a new plan for a federal college rating system based on affordability that seeks to eventually tie taxpayer dollars to rankings.

"Right now, private rankings like the U.S. News & World Report puts out each year encourage colleges to game the numbers and rewards them in some cases for costs," Obama told students at the University of Buffalo in New York. "Are they helping students from all kinds of backgrounds succeed?"

http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/obama-dings-us-news-world-reports-college-rankings

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023513980

Making Public College Presidents Millionaires Correlates With Increased Student Debt, Study Finds
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/19/college-presidents-student-debt_n_5353665.html

Rutgers, NJIT presidents make list of highest-paid public college leaders
http://www.nj.com/education/2014/05/rutgers_njit_presidents_make_list_of_highest-paid_college_leaders.html

[Aerows]

59. It seems to me

that they are doing all of these things to set educational facilities up to fail so they can then say "See, they don't work, DEFUND!"

It doesn't seem like arrogance. It seems almost like willful malice.

[BuelahWitch]

60. Sounds that way to me too n/t

[KurtNYC]

66. College is archaic and highly resistant to change

A degree is an expensive purchase and consumers should have as much information as possible to guide that purchase.

If a college can grade and assign a GPA to every student/customer, why should the same colleges oppose being graded and ranked?