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Start of college can be harder on parents than freshmen

Posted on September 5, 2010 by

IOWA CITY — The hour when Ariana Kramer will begin her college career is fast approaching — and her parents are in an office supply store, disagreeing about hanging files, of all things. “She’ll need them,” her mother says. “I don’t think so,” her dad counters. Ariana, meanwhile, walks dreamily through the store, offering no opinion on this particular decision. She is, in fact, confident that she will have what she needs when she starts her freshman year at the University of Iowa . FRESHMEN: Class of 2014 doesn’t know cursive, Clint Eastwood BY THANKSGIVING: Some first-year students want to call it quits NAVIGATING COLLEGE: Authors offer updated advice She has mom, the family organizer, with her, and dad, the calm encourager. And they have “the list,” which mom printed from one of those “what-you’ll-need-at-college” websites. New laptop. Check. Comforter with matching sheets. Check. Laundry detergent. Body wash. Antacid. Check. Check. Check. Mind you, Robin and Paul Kramer aren’t those crazy college parents — not like the mother who, as relayed by one dean of students at one California college, stayed in her daughter’s dorm room with her for four nights to help her adjust (until the daughter’s roommate complained). Nor have they ignored barricades intended to keep parents from trying to register for classes for their children, or crashed student-only orientation events, which officials at universities across the country say happens more and more. Still, even for average parents, the letting go is difficult — more so, they and many others say, than it was for parents of college-bound freshmen in decades past. Robin Kramer recalls how her own parents, who never attended college, dropped her off with a trunk full of belongings at Drake University , also in Iowa, in 1978. She set up her room and attended orientation without them there. “It’s just what you did then,” she says. It was much the same for Paul, whose father took him to the University of Wisconsin in 1977 and then went fishing. “It was a culture shock,” he says. “I wasn’t sure I was going to survive.” Perhaps that is part of what makes this “process of leaving,” as Robin calls it, more difficult. It is, all at once, overwhelming and exciting for everyone involved. But some say it’s often hardest for parents, who remember the days of college when there were fewer support systems in place for students. “I’m supposed to shed a few tears and then send her to the world, right?” the rational Robin tells her emotional self as she considers 18-year-old Ariana, the eldest of their two children. That remains to be seen. ‘Cut the cord!’ So how did we get here, anyway? It’s not that saying goodbye was easy for parents of past generations. But these days, moms and dads have gone from reading books that tell us how to raise The Happiest Baby on the Block to new handbooks such as The Happiest Kid on Campus: A Parent’s Guide to the Very Best College Experience (for You and Your Child) . YOU and your child? Linda Bips, a psychology professor who advises parents on letting go, used to carry scissors into workshops. “Cut the cord!” she would tell them. It evoked the chuckles she was looking for. “But I don’t do that anymore, because no one would listen anyway,” says Bips, a professor at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pa., and author of Parenting College Freshmen: Consulting For Adulthood . The process, she has learned, has to be gradual. Marshall Duke, a psychology professor at Emory University in Atlanta, has been giving those kinds of talks for three decades and also has noted more parents struggling. For one, they’re more connected than ever, by Facebook and text messages and, increasingly, online video chat. They’re also often paying huge sums of money on their children’s education. “So they think that gives them license to intervene as they would in other investments,” says Duke, who also encourages parents to take a step back, even when it goes against the fiber of their very being. He wants them, in effect, to let their children falter, to figure things out for themselves, to become adults. For Ariana Kramer, it means giving up the comfort of what she freely calls the “bubble” she grew up in, the quiet home and highly ranked schools in suburban Chicago where her main task in life was to study hard and get herself where she is today. In physical distance, it wasn’t so far from the working-class neighborhoods where her parents grew up. The Kramers both marvel at the freedom they had as kids, riding city buses as preteens and able to stay out with friends until the street lights came on. That was their signal that it was time to go home. They went to neighborhood schools. Their friends lived across the street. They walked home for lunch. “When we were growing up, there were no Amber Alerts,” says Paul, who is 50. After they finished college and married, the Kramers eventually moved to their current home. Paul worked his way into medical sales and Robin, who is 49, created an at-home job for herself by managing businesses of lawyers and other self-employed professionals. It became apparent how different their children’s lives would be when they found themselves arranging “play dates” and driving them from activity to activity. “You had to be so much more involved,” Robin says — partly because, like a lot of people, they had fewer children to focus on than the average family of generations past. Ariana worked in the summers, eventually becoming a counselor at a Wisconsin camp she attended for years. That helped her become more independent, she says. But even she’ll acknowledge that the thought of taking the train or bus into the city, as her parents did, is still daunting. Over this past summer, she took on household duties — doing laundry, loading the dishwasher, learning how to write a check — to help prepare her for that real world she’s anticipating. In August, she moved in to her dorm at Iowa on the first day possible, so she had extra time to get her bearings. “I like simple,” she says. “I need simple.” Times are a-changin’ By many estimations, the Kramers are a low-drama family. But even they are having their prickly moments when they arrive in Iowa City, and that’s to be expected in this time of heightened emotions, experts say. Ariana rolls her eyes, for instance, when her mom suggests that she put her class assignments in her BlackBerry calendar. “Mom, I’m not like you. You’re way, too, uh …” — Ariana pauses and chooses her words carefully when she remembers her words are being monitored by a reporter — “better organized than I am.” It’s all part of the subtle push and pull that has been happening all summer, her mother says. One minute it’s “I can do it myself!” The next, Ariana is asking, “Mom, can you help me with this?” Robin is having her own internal struggles, trying to step back but finding it a challenge. “Let’s be real. As a mom, sometimes it’s just easier to do it yourself,” she says, as she stands amid boxes and unpacked suitcases in the room Ariana will share with a roommate. It’s nothing fancy, your basic 1920s-era dorm room, upgraded with an air conditioner that is welcomed on a late summer day in muggy Iowa. “Thank God I have you guys. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be able to do this,” Ariana says, as her mother deals out tasks. Per Robin’s instructions, mother and daughter unpack her clothes first, as Paul sets up the clock radio, the portable telephone and the microwave. For him, the dorm room and this whole visit make him a bit wistful: “I wish it were me,” he says. That, too, is a normal parental response to this transition, says Bips, the Muhlenberg College psychologist who’s also a baby boomer and remembers “never trusting anyone over 30″ back in her own college days. “Life is more serious as you get older. There’s more loss. There’s more responsibility,” she says “So I would guess people in their 50s, who have to pay for college and worry about their jobs and the economy — yeah, wouldn’t it be nice to go back?” Some parents also feel nostalgic as the realization hits that their role — one of their main purposes in life — is changing, says Duke, the Emory psychologist: “If it’s a first child — my gosh, that’s a sobering signal about the progress of life.” Increasingly, colleges and universities have noted the support parents need in letting go, so much that they are starting to formalize the goodbye. At St. Olaf College in Minnesota, incoming freshmen are shown a video with their smiling, crying parents waving goodbye as one big group. First-year students at the University of Chicago, meanwhile, walk their parents to the university gate as bagpipes play in what some university staff call the “parting of the seas.” At Drexel University ‘s LeBow College of Business in Philadelphia, a goodbye reception includes an unofficial “crying room,” set up with tissues and a counselor. It’s kind of a gentle joke, but one that’s meant to send a message. “The idea was that we understand this is a major change for everybody,” says Ian Sladen, LeBow’s assistant dean of undergraduate programs. “It’s just as tough for parents — probably tougher, really.” But in the end, the message from universities and colleges is the same: Parents, please go home. At the University of Iowa, there is no formal goodbye ceremony. The university does, however, have an orientation and newsletter for parents and an advisory board, where any concerns are addressed. Meanwhile, Ariana also is taking a class called “The College Transition,” a relatively new course that helps freshmen ease into college life. “I clearly need a course like that to survive,” she says, her eyes widening for emphasis. Courses like these, often referred to as “University 101,” are becoming more common on college campuses. The aim is to turn out students who are independent and ready for the workplace — without their parents in tow. “It was almost a badge of honor 30 years ago when students couldn’t make it,” says Sladen at Drexel. “No one would be proud of that today.” And that should help put parents at ease, he says. ‘Make the most of it’ After nearly three days together in Iowa, the moment for Ariana to say goodbye to her parents and 16-year-old brother Chase finally arrives. Her parents get a little philosophical over sushi. “If they ask you ‘What’s the best time of your life?’ I think everybody will say college,” her dad says. “So make the most of it.” “Have fun,” her mom adds. “But don’t forget about the academics.” As her parents say goodbye, Ariana takes on the role of comforter. “I’ll call you,” she says as she hugs her mom, who begins to tear up. Ariana grabs dad and then her brother, who’s also starting to cry. She teases him: “If you break anything in my room, you’re in trouble.” They laugh. Chase, of anyone, has seemed the saddest about his sister leaving: “I think she’ll be OK as long as she copes with everything,” he had said the day before. “Oh, she will,” her mom assured him. “She’s a coper.” And it is true, Robin and Paul have faith in their daughter. “Basically, I think she’s very grounded and has a good head on her shoulders,” Robin says. She pauses. “But I’ll still be thinking, ‘Did she remember to do X, Y and Z?’” Ariana’s family departs, and the new freshman looks content, if not a little lost. She leaves her door open (that’s how you meet people, her resident adviser said). She looks around her room. “It’s weird,” she says. “What do I do now?” It won’t be long before she phones home. Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Continue reading →

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Class sizes are getting bigger, but does it really matter?

Posted on August 26, 2010 by rohit

Two years of cuts in state support saddled the Natomas Unified School District in Sacramento this spring with what school board president B. Teri Burns calls “horribly painful” choices: fewer teachers and larger classes, or keeping teachers but cutting athletics, counseling and after-school programs. Like many districts across the nation, Natomas chose to lay off teachers. So for every three classes of 20 students each that the schools had last year, this year they’ll put 30 students in two classes. The teaching staff in this 10,000-student district will be cut by 100 to 340 next fall. No one’s happy, Burns says: “We have to make choices, and none of them are good.” Conventional wisdom says the smaller the classes, the better the education, because teachers can pay more attention to each child. But while smaller classes are popular, decades of research has found that the relationship between class size and student outcomes is murky. LAYOFFS: Federal funding won’t save many teacher jobs “The research doesn’t show that you get significantly different student outcomes when you go from a class of 25 to a class of 30,” Burns says. With state and local budgets still in flux, it’s hard to know exactly how many teachers will lose jobs this year. But even with $10 billion in additional federal money, part of the $26 billion bill President Obama signed recently, the struggling economy is expected to reverse a decades-long trend toward smaller classes. Education statistics show that school personnel were hired at twice the rate that student enrollment grew from 1999 to 2007. An experiment drives change In the early 1990s, when many states were flush with cash, policymakers championed the findings of a 1985 experiment in Tennessee. The Student/Teacher Achievement Ratio (STAR) project compared academic achievement in small classes of 13 to 17 low-income students with that of students in classes that had 22 to 25 students. The experiment found modest but lasting gains for impoverished African-American students in the much smaller classes in kindergarten and first grade. States extrapolated from those findings to justify spending billions to make relatively modest cuts in class size in all schools, not just in those serving the poor. About three dozen states now fund either voluntary or required class-size reduction programs. In 1996, California launched the first and largest such effort, eventually providing incentives for school districts to lower class size to 20 in kindergarten through third grade at a cost of $20 billion. In 2002, Florida voters approved an amendment to the state constitution that reduced class size over time in all grades. The state estimates that it will cost an additional $353 million this year, on top of the $16 billion the state has spent so far, to meet the requirements. In November, Florida voters will be asked to loosen those requirements to avoid massive spending cuts. A study released in May by the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University found that the Florida program had no effect on student achievement. Research on California’s program also showed no gains in achievement attributable to smaller classes. Michael Kirst, an emeritus professor at Stanford University , says excitement over the program resulted in school districts hiring “all sorts of teachers just off the street” who lacked any formal training. Space shortages forced schools to hold the newly created classes in hallways and closets and on auditorium stages. Nonetheless, Kirst says, the program was popular. “One lesson from California is that with parents, smaller class size is overwhelmingly favorable, and they don’t give a fig about the research that says this is not going to help their kids,” he says. “They intuitively believe that small class sizes will allow more individual attention.” Slippery slope? Dan Goldhaber of the Center on Reinventing Public Education at the University of Washington-Bothell says that “the effects of class-size reduction are pretty marginal,” except in the early grades for disadvantaged students. With rampant teacher layoffs, Goldhaber says, “it probably makes sense … to focus not so much on class sizes but on making sure that the teachers you are keeping are really effective.” But Kirst says school districts are facing “a very dangerous period. We are increasing class size to extremely high levels. “I don’t worry about going from 20 to 25 students that much, or 15 to 20,” he says. “But when you go from 20 to 35 in a year or two, I don’t think we don’t know the effects of that.” Contributing: Susan Sawyers of Hechinger Continue reading →

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L.A. unveils $578M school, costliest in USA

Posted on August 22, 2010 by rohit

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Next month’s opening of the Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools will be auspicious for a reason other than its both storied and infamous history as the former Ambassador Hotel, where the Democratic presidential contender was assassinated in 1968. With an eye-popping price tag of $578 million, it will mark the inauguration of the nation’s most expensive public school ever. The K-12 complex to house 4,200 students has raised eyebrows across the country as the creme de la creme of ” Taj Mahal ” schools, $100 million-plus campuses boasting both architectural panache and deluxe amenities. “There’s no more of the old, windowless cinderblock schools of the ’70s where kids felt, ‘Oh, back to jail,’” said Joe Agron, editor-in-chief of American School & University , a school construction journal. “Districts want a showpiece for the community, a really impressive environment for learning.” Not everyone is similarly enthusiastic. “New buildings are nice, but when they’re run by the same people who’ve given us a 50% dropout rate, they’re a big waste of taxpayer money,” said Ben Austin, executive director of Parent Revolution who sits on the California Board of Education. “Parents aren’t fooled.” At RFK, the features include fine art murals and a marble memorial depicting the complex’s namesake, a manicured public park, a state-of-the-art swimming pool and preservation of pieces of the original hotel. Partly by circumstance and partly by design, the Los Angeles Unified School District has emerged as the mogul of Taj Mahals. The RFK complex follows on the heels of two other L.A. schools among the nation’s costliest — the $377 million Edward R. Roybal Learning Center, which opened in 2008, and the $232 million Visual and Performing Arts High School that debuted in 2009. The pricey schools have come during a sensitive period for the nation’s second-largest school system: Nearly 3,000 teachers have been laid off over the past two years, the academic year and programs have been slashed. The district also faces a $640 million shortfall and some schools persistently rank among the nation’s lowest performing. Los Angeles is not alone, however, in building big. Some of the most expensive schools are found in low-performing districts — New York City has a $235 million campus; New Brunswick, N.J., opened a $185 million high school in January. Nationwide, dozens of schools have surpassed $100 million with amenities including atriums, orchestra-pit auditoriums, food courts, even bamboo nooks. The extravagance has led some to wonder where the line should be drawn and whether more money should be spent on teachers. “Architects and builders love this stuff, but there’s a little bit of a lack of discipline here,” said Mary Filardo, executive director of 21st Century School Fund in Washington, D.C., which promotes urban school construction. Some experts say it’s not all flourish and that children learn better in more pleasant surroundings. Many schools incorporate large windows to let in natural light and install energy-saving equipment, spending more upfront for reduced bills later. Cafeterias are getting fancier, seeking to retain students who venture off campus. Wireless Internet and other high-tech installations have become standard. Some pricey projects have had political fallout. After a firestorm over the $197.5 million Newton North High School in Massachusetts , Mayor David Cohen chose not to seek re-election and state Treasurer Timothy Cahill reined in school construction spending. Now to get state funds for a new school, districts must choose among three designs costing $49 million to $64 million. “We had to bring some sense to this process,” Cahill said. In Los Angeles, officials say the new schools were planned long before the economic pinch and are funded by $20 billion in voter-approved bonds that do not affect the educational budget. Still, even LA Unified Superintendent Ramon Cortines derided some of the extravagance, noting that donations should have been sought to fund the RFK project’s talking benches commemorating the site’s history. Connie Rice , member of the district’s School Bond Oversight Committee, noted the megaschools are only three of 131 that the district is building to alleviate overcrowding. RFK “is an amazing facility,” she said. “Is it a lot of money? Yes. We didn’t like it, but they got it done.” Construction costs at LA Unified are the second-highest in the nation — something the district blames on skyrocketing material and land prices, rigorous seismic codes and unionized labor. James Sohn, the district’s chief facilities executive, said the megaschools were built when global raw material shortages caused costs to skyrocket to an average of $600 per square foot in 2006 and 2007 — triple the price from 2002. Costs have since eased to $350 per square foot. On top of that, each project had its own cost drivers. After buildings were demolished at the site of the 2,400-student Roybal school, contaminated soil, a methane gas field and an earthquake fault were discovered. A gas mitigation system cost $17 million. Over 20 years, the project grew to encompass a dance studio with cushioned maple floors, a modern kitchen with a restaurant-quality pizza oven, a 10-acre park and teacher planning rooms between classrooms. The 1,700-student arts school was designed as a landmark, with a stainless steel, postmodernistic tower encircled by a rollercoaster-like swirl, while the RFK site involved 15 years of litigation with historic preservationists and Donald Trump , who wanted to build the world’s tallest building there. The wrangling cost $9 million. Methane mitigation cost $33 million and the district paid another $15 million preserving historic features, including a wall of the famed Cocoanut Grove nightclub and turning the Paul Williams-designed coffee shop into a faculty lounge. Sohn said LA Unified has reached the end of its Taj Mahal building spree. “These are definitely the exceptions,” he said. “We don’t anticipate schools costing hundreds of millions of dollars in the future.” Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Continue reading →

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Get college textbooks for less by renting instead of buying

Posted on August 20, 2010 by rohit

Joe Turant pointed to the rent-a-text signs in Fairleigh Dickinson University’s Florham Park , N.J., bookstore window last month and told his incoming freshman daughter, Caitlyn, “That’s what you’re doing.” With potential savings up to 50% off the price of a new textbook, the Colonia, N.J., father says renting textbooks will free up money for other things, such as the meal plan. E-BOOKS: iPad the next textbook? Maybe not “If we can get them through rental, great. Otherwise, she’s going to go online to try to find a lower price,” says Turant, who jokingly reminded his daughter that “Dad’s paying.” College students will be able to shop early and save hundreds of dollars on textbooks as more than 1,000 campus bookstores nationwide launch discounted rental programs this fall. The timing is right: The federal Higher Education Opportunity Act, which took effect July 1, says colleges must list required course materials for students during registration. “Students will be able to take advantage of more cost-saving options sooner, and they can save hundreds,” says Nicole Allen, textbook advocate for the Student Public Interest Research Groups. College textbook prices have risen at nearly four times the rate of inflation since 1994, with an average of $900 spent a year, Allen says. Successful pilot programs The rise of rentals means students can see substantial upfront cost savings without having to gamble on buying a used book and hoping the bookstore will buy it back, Allen says. Students can highlight and write in the rentals; normal wear and tear is expected. The country’s two largest college bookstore companies, Follett and Barnes & Noble, embraced the rental option after successful pilot programs last fall. Just 250 college campuses nationwide offered some textbook rental program during the 2009-10 school year, according to the National Association of College Stores. This fall, some 1,300 campuses will offer textbooks for rent. In late July, Follett had 720 of its 860 stores adopt the rental option, says spokesman Elio DiStaola. And half of Barnes & Noble’s 640 campuses have signed on, says Jade Roth, vice president for books at Barnes & Noble College Booksellers. Follett saved students $2 million off the cost of new textbooks in its seven pilot bookstores, including the University of Texas-Arlington, the University of North Florida in Jacksonville, and Rio Hondo Community College in Whittier, Calif., DiStaola says. An online alternative Typically, about 25% of the bookstores’ titles were available for rent. This fall, the stores expect to offer about 40% of titles for rent. “I’ve had students come up and thank us for this,” says Bill Coulter, bookstore director at the University of Texas-Arlington, where 6,000 students chose to rent last school year. “In my 44 years in this business, that never happened before.” “One student came up to the register and saved $300 … he was excited,” says Lee Cobb, textbook manager at the University of North Florida’s bookstore. Chegg.com, a California-based online rental company with 4.2 million titles available for rent — some up to 80% discounted — is expanding, too, by partnering with eight campus bookstores this fall. It partnered with California State University in Fresno in January and saw its number of Fresno users jump from 400 to 1,600, says Chegg.com spokeswoman Tina Couch. Meanwhile, Kyle Smith , 21, a Bridgewater, N.J., political science major at Drew University in Madison, N.J., says he’s excited to see how much money renting textbooks can save him. Drew’s bookstore will offer about 30% of its titles for rent this fall. Typically, Smith shops online for used textbooks. Being able to see the books he’ll need and whether he can rent will help in deciding if he can afford to take a course, Smith says. “Some poli sci courses call for nine or 10 books,” Smith says. “For me, it’s all about the bottom line. If it’s cheaper to rent, that’s what I’ll do.” Continue reading →

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New law, e-books and rentals may make college textbooks less costly

Posted on August 7, 2010 by

On Friday afternoons between work and rugby practice, Brittany Wolfe would rush to the campus library hoping copies of her advanced algebra textbook had not all been checked out by like-minded classmates. It was part of the math major’s routine last quarter at the University of California , Los Angeles: Stand in line at the reserve desk in the library’s closing hours with the goal of borrowing a copy for the weekend. The alternative was to buy a $120 book and sell it back for far less. If she could sell it back at all. “It’s like this terrible game of catch your books when you can,” said Wolfe, a new graduate who estimates she saved $800 a year using books on reserve and who now shares textbook tips as a counselor to incoming UCLA students. “It’s frustrating when you’re already stressed about school. Being stressed about textbooks doesn’t seem right.” Maybe, just maybe, relief is on the way. A new federal law requires publishers to provide textbook price information to professors and calls on colleges to identify course textbooks during registration, giving students more time to shop around. Experts call it a step in the right direction, but not a game-changer. ‘OLD SCHOOL’: Arizona college cuts book costs the old-fashioned way PROFESSORS: Some stopped from cashing in on textbooks At the same time, a robust online marketplace of used books and recent inroads by textbook rental programs give students more options than ever. The prospect of digital books and slow-but-steady growth in free online “open” content loom as developments that could upend the textbook landscape and alleviate the perennial problem of rising prices. “Change is coming, but it’s not going to happen immediately,” said David Lewis , dean of the Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis University Library and assistant vice president for digital scholarly communications at Indiana University. “If you’re in junior high school, you can be sure it’ll be better. If you’re in high school, there’s a shot. If you’re starting college as a freshman, you might see it as a senior. It’s on more and more people’s agenda.” According to a 2005 study by the U.S. Government Accountability Office, college textbook prices increased at twice the rate of inflation over the previous two decades, though not as dramatically as tuition. More recent data from the National Association of College Stores show textbooks costs climbed 14% from the 2006-2007 academic year to 2008-2009. A 2010 survey by the group found students spent an average of $667 per year on required course materials including textbooks, although other studies have put the figure at about $900. In 2008, Congress responded by including textbook-affordability provisions in the Higher Education Opportunity Act. Along with the price-disclosure clause meant to push professors toward cheaper options, it requires publishers to offer textbooks separately from extra items like workbooks and CDs. The practice of “bundling” products leads to markups of 10 to 50% and makes books harder to sell, according to the Student Public Interest Research Groups, which pressed for the reforms. “We have more lower cost options than ever before, and professors are going to have more information than ever before,” said Nicole Allen, textbook advocate for the student PIRGs. Like the music and media businesses, the textbook industry has been revolutionized by the Internet. Although used books have long been an option for students, the Web opened up a world of bargain-hunting beyond the campus bookstore. These days, sites such as BIGWORDS and BestBookBuys let students search several online stores at once. The 13th edition of the seminal textbook “Marketing Management,” which lists for $190 new, can be had for as little as $19.99 used. More recently, textbook rental sites such as Chegg, BookRenter and CollegeBookRenter have arrived, offering rentals at roughly half the cost of buying. Their business model — Netflix goes to college — has prompted college bookstores and publishers to play catch up and offer rentals themselves. Textbook publisher Cengage Learning began renting directly to students last spring and has expanded its online rental inventory to 3,000 titles. Campus bookstore operator Follett will introduce rentals at more than 800 bookstores this fall, and Barnes & Noble will do the same on more than 300 campuses. Earlier this summer, BookRenter, which has contracts with Amazon.com and other online booksellers to fill orders, announced that more than 75 campus bookstores would use its platform to rent textbooks. Chegg keeps its own inventory of nearly 5 million books at a warehouse outside Louisville The start-up aspires to forge direct relationships with students, shipping products in their own packaging, offering a liberal return policy and promising to plant a tree for every order, said CEO Dan Rosensweig , a former Yahoo executive. Behind the scenes, publishers get a share of the rental revenue — something they can’t say about used book sales. Open access textbooks pose a bolder challenge to the status quo. The start-up Flat World Knowledge contracts with authors to write new textbooks and publishes them for free under an open content license, allowing professors to edit the raw material and add their own contributions while giving students access to a Web-based HTML book. Last fall, about 480 professors adopted one of the company’s initial 10 business and economics titles, said co-founder Eric Frank. About 1,200 professors are expected to use 22 titles to teach 95,000 students this fall. The company is betting students will pay a reasonable price for greater convenience. Flat World’s revenue comes from selling everything from $30 black-and-white copies of its books to $3 audio chapters, as well as study aids like digital flash cards. About 55% of students are buying something at this point, Frank said. So far, the main drawback to open access is the dearth of titles, said Albert Greco, a professor at Fordham University ‘s Graduate School of Business Administration and an authority on the textbook publishing industry. Greco and others forecast a major shift in the next five years to digital textbooks, which already cost about half as much as new print editions on CourseMart.com, a kind of textbook iTunes launched in 2007 by the major textbook publishers. That would doom the used book and print rental marketplace, Greco said. As for immediate relief from the new price disclosure law, Greco said it won’t do any good for students unlucky enough to have four courses with brand-new books. “Whether it will help students comes down to, ‘It depends,’” he said. Sophie Stanish, a junior at Fordham University in New York, fumes about paying $200 for a new math textbook she couldn’t sell back and a $10 short-story collection that fetched 75 cents at trade-in. She likes the concept of Fordham’s “E-RES” program — short for “electronic reserve” — in which professors scan sections of textbooks to the extent allowed by copyright law and then put the material online for free. But, she said, “I can’t read off a screen and retain the knowledge as well. It’s a personal thing. I like to highlight.” Other colleges seeking to provide relief have adopted textbook loan programs. At City College of San Francisco, Kathy Gill said she misses class to line up early for a popular loan program for students on financial aid. The limit is two loaned books, so the business major still shops online for used and rental options each semester. “You do get a little bit of a break,” Gill said. “Every little thing helps.” Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Continue reading →

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One-third of teens with ADHD delay high school degree or drop out

Posted on July 31, 2010 by rohit

Teens with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are more likely to drop out of high school or delay completing high school than other kids, a new study has found. Researchers analyzed U.S. data and found that nearly one-third of students with the most common type of ADHD either drop out or delay high school graduation. That rate is twice that of students with no psychiatric disorder. “Most people think that the student who is acting out, who is lying and stealing, is most likely to drop out of school. But we found that students with the combined type of ADHD — the most common type — have a higher likelihood of dropping out than students with disciplinary problems,” study senior author Julie Schweitzer, an ADHD expert and associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the University of California, Davis , said in a university news release. “This study shows that ADHD is a serious disorder that affects a child’s ability to be successful in school and subsequently in a way that can limit success in life,” she added. Developing methods to help students with ADHD graduate high school could have significant long-term societal benefits, according to Schweitzer. “If you don’t have your high school degree, you’re going to have less income. You can’t buy houses and cars. People who drop out of high school are more likely to be reliant on public assistance. This is a disorder that has serious long-term impacts on your ability to be successful and contribute to society, not just in school, but for the rest of your life,” she said. The researchers also found high drop-out rates among students with other mental health disorders. The rates were 26.6% for those with mood disorder, 24.9% for those with panic disorder, and up to about 20% for those with post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, generalized anxiety disorder and social phobia. Smoking was also associated with a high risk of dropping out. The study found that 29% of students who smoked failed to complete high school on time, compared with 20% of those who used alcohol and 24.6% of those who used drugs. The study was published in the July online edition of the Journal of Psychiatric Research . Continue reading →

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87% of Hispanics value higher education, 13% have college degree

Posted on July 30, 2010 by

WASHINGTON — More than 10 years have passed since she gave up her pursuit of a degree in computer science, but Yajahira Deaza still has regrets. “I feel incomplete,” says the 33-year-old, a customer service representative for a major New York bank. Her experience reflects the findings of an Associated Press-Univision poll that examined the attitudes of Latino adults toward higher education. LATINOS: Students face barriers Despite strong belief in the value of a college diploma, Hispanics more often than not fall short of that goal. The poll’s findings have broad implications not only for educators and parents, but also for the U.S. economy. In the next decade, U.S. companies will have to fill millions of jobs to replace well-trained baby boomers going into retirement. As the nation’s largest minority group, Latinos account for a growing share of the pool of workers, yet their skills may not be up to par. Aware of the challenge, some California State University campuses are reaching out to Hispanic children as early as the fourth grade. “Aspirations for higher education are very strong among Hispanics, but there is a yawning discrepancy between aspirations and actual attainment,” said Richard Fry, an education researcher at the Pew Hispanic Center. Indeed, the poll, also sponsored by The Nielsen Company and Stanford University , found that Hispanics value higher education more than do Americans as a whole. Eighty-seven percent said a college education is extremely or very important, compared with 78% of the overall U.S. population. Ninety-four percent of Latinos say they expect their own children to go to college, a desire that’s slightly stronger for girls. Seventy-four percent said the most important goal for a girl right after high school is to attend a four-year college, compared with 71% for boys. Enthusiasm about higher education hasn’t been matched by results. Census figures show that only 13% of Hispanics have a college degree or higher, compared with 30% among Americans overall. The poll revealed some of the roadblocks: Latinos do not have enough money, yet many are reluctant to borrow. Family obligations intervene. Parents and teachers provide only lukewarm support. Fifty-four percent said their own parents either did not expect them to go to college, or did not care either way. After graduating high school, Angel Vasquez of Port Arthur, Texas, wanted to go to a technical school to become a diesel mechanic. First he wanted a six-month break. No, said the grandfather who raised him: Go to school immediately or get a job immediately. Now 23, Vasquez works as a technician for a company that repairs buildings damaged by water and mold. “My grandparents raised me pretty good, and I understand where they were coming from,” he said. But “I seriously wish I would have gone to school because I could be making double the money.” In the poll, just 29% cited poor grades in high school as an extremely or very important reason for not going to college. “A main takeaway here for policymakers is that there are a lot of things that are inhibiting Hispanics, other than their academic performance,” said Michael Kirst, a Stanford University education professor. “They have really major barriers that are more intense for this population.” Affordability was the top reason for not completing a college degree, cited by 54% as “extremely” or “very” important. Financial pressure is magnified by a reluctance to borrow that appears to be cultural. The second most common reason for not finishing college was family responsibilities, cited as extremely or very important by 52%. Deaza, the New York bank employee, said that is why she had to leave her computer studies back in the late 1990s. A single mom-to-be, she was expecting her first child, a daughter who’s now 11. Deaza is married with three children now, and says she has a lot to be thankful for. Still, she feels bad not having her degree. “I feel it the worst when I’m trying to find a job,” she said. The AP-Univision Poll was conducted from March 11 to June 3 by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago , using a sample of Hispanic households provided by The Nielsen Company. The margin of sampling error is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points. Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Continue reading →

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18 states, D.C. named Race to the Top education grant finalists

Posted on July 29, 2010 by

ATLANTA (AP) — Eighteen states and the District of Columbia were named finalists Tuesday in the second round of the federal “Race to the Top” school reform grant competition, giving them a chance to receive a share of $3 billion. Education Department officials provided The Associated Press with a list of the finalists ahead of a speech by Education Secretary Arne Duncan . The states are: Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia , Hawaii , Illinois, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland , Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and South Carolina. Duncan was expected to officially announce the finalists at a speech at the National Press Club. The competition rewards ambitious reforms aimed at improving struggling schools and closing the achievement gap. Applications were screened by a panel of peer reviewers, and finalists will travel to Washington in coming weeks to present their proposals. In all, 35 states and the District of Columbia applied for the second round of the application. The 19 finalists have asked for $6.2 billion, though only $3.4 billion is available. Dozens of states passed new education policies to make themselves more attractive to the judges. New York, which was a finalist in the first round but did not win money, lifted its cap on the number of charter schools that can open annually from 200 to 460. Colorado passed laws that would pay teachers based on student performance and can strip tenure from low performing instructors. Two states, Tennessee and Delaware, were awarded a total of $600 million in the first round. Their applications were praised for merit pay policies that link teacher pay to student performance and for garnering the support of teachers’ unions. Tennessee and Delaware also have laws that are welcoming to charter schools. In the first round of the race, some stakeholders were reluctant to support applications tying teacher evaluations to student test scores. Armario reported from Miami. AP Writer Michael Gormley in Albany, N.Y., contributed to this report. Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Continue reading →

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Job outlook brightens for new grads, but barely

Posted on June 11, 2010 by

To get a sense of the job market new college graduates face, consider the latest crop of nurses from Santa Rosa Junior College . Just eight of the 55 students are leaving with job offers — and that’s considered good news. Last year, no graduates of the California community college’s associate degree nursing program had a job in hand. “We’re excited that finally something is happening,” said Sharon Johnson, the program director. This year’s slightly better performance is one of many signs around the country that 2010 is a better year than 2009 for landing that first job out of college — but not by much. New nurses are looking for something — anything — as the down economy has slowed retirements in their otherwise promising field. Teachers also face intense competition for positions that in their case have been made scarce by state and local budget cuts. Even graduates with sought-after degrees had less than sizzling prospects. Fewer than half of U.S. accounting majors could boast job offers this spring, one study found. There are signs of life. Employers plan to hire 5% more new college graduates this year than they did a year ago, according to the National Association of Colleges and Employers, which also polled the future accountants. The road to recovery appears long, however. In 2007, about two-thirds of soon-to-be graduates in the association’s student survey reported having job offers in hand that spring. Just three years later, about 40% could say that. “It’s been a little depressing,” said Lauren Wiygul, who will earn a master’s degree in secondary English education from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, this summer. She applied to more than a dozen private schools and every public district in the Atlanta area. After someone in human resources for the system in Georgia’s Gwinnett County mentioned a possible language arts opening, she took a day off work, traveled to Atlanta and personally delivered her resume to 13 middle and high schools, hoping to introduce herself to principals. She met a lot of sympathetic secretaries but not one principal. She has yet to get an interview. “One principal, she wasn’t rude, but she just e-mailed back, ‘Positions are posted on our website,’” Wiygul said. “I have worked really hard to be able to teach. I just feel stuck.” Education majors have it toughest of the 2010 grads surveyed by the association of colleges and employers. Fewer than one in four had received job offers this spring. The list of least sought-after majors included the physical sciences (such as chemistry and physics), languages, English, history or political science and journalism. Along with perennially popular accounting, the most attractive majors to employers were business administration, computer science, engineering and mathematics. The private sector outlook didn’t improve last week when the Labor Department announced U.S. businesses added just 41,000 jobs in May, an indication employers are not yet ramping up hiring despite other signs of economic recovery. The department offered better news Tuesday, saying job openings rose in April to their highest level since December 2008. Some college career counselors report encouraging signs. Trudy Steinfeld, executive director of New York University’s Wasserman Center for Career Development, said banks and consulting firms that were invisible a year ago are “staffing up like crazy.” But at the University of Texas at Arlington, associate director of career services Cheri Butler is advising students shut out of bank jobs to seek finance department positions in government, health care and education. Wayne Wallace, director of the University of Florida’s Career Resource Center, said that regardless of the field, the watchwords for new graduates are patience, flexibility and short-term sacrifice for long-term gain. “Graduates, if they are willing to be geographically mobile and reasonably flexible about what they’re willing to do to start out, tremendously increase their odds for success,” he said. Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business devised a plan to improve the chances for graduates in its residential master’s in business administration program. It included a dean’s letter to 26,000 alumni, an electronic booklet featuring students’ resumes and a job bank run by students with jobs for those still searching. That last effort was dubbed “The Lonely Hearts Job Search Club.” “A simple plan, delivered to the right people with a clear objective, can go a long way in helping students during a challenging economy get to where they want to be,” said Erik Medina, the school’s director of graduate career services. Last month, 74% of students had job offers at graduation, compared with 66% last year, he said. For nurses, the long-term forecast is excellent. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects 22% job growth for registered nurses by 2018 as baby boomers age and nurses emerge as cheaper primary care alternatives to doctors. But for now, jobs for new nurses are relatively scarce. More experienced nurses are putting off retirement or working extra hours, some because their spouses have been laid off, nursing school officials say. “I look at this like an air pocket,” said Marla Salmon, dean of the University of Washington School of Nursing. “The fact is we’re still climbing in terms of the number of nurses needed. But the recession has definitely slowed hiring.” Salmon said she is encouraging graduates to think creatively. That could mean residencies — part of a doctor’s career path but a relatively new development in nursing — and mentored job-sharing arrangements. The tough market has caused some nursing graduates to lower their expectations, accepting jobs in long-term care and community health centers rather than top research hospitals. Corey Fry, who will graduate this week with a master’s degree from the highly regarded University of California , San Francisco School of Nursing, cast his search for nurse practitioner jobs nationwide. He’s joined professional organizations and honed his networking skills. After reading an article by a University of Maryland nurse practitioner, he sent the author an appreciative e-mail and attached his resume. He has a phone interview there this week, and leads in St. Louis and Oregon. “We’ve talked as classmates and we all agree our first job might not be our perfect job, but we need to get that first job,” Fry said. “Then you can move beyond that if you need to.” Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Continue reading →

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No class: 4-day school weeks gain popularity nationwide

Posted on June 4, 2010 by

FORT VALLEY, Ga. — During the school year, Mondays in this rural Georgia community are for video games, trips to grandma’s house and hanging out at the neighborhood community center. Don’t bother showing up for school. The doors are locked and the lights are off. Peach County is one of more than 120 school districts across the country where students attend school just four days a week, a cost-saving tactic gaining popularity among cash-strapped districts struggling to make ends meet. The 4,000-student district started shaving a day off its weekly school calendar last year to help fill a $1 million budget shortfall. It was that or lay off 39 teachers the week before school started, said Superintendent Susan Clark. “We’re treading water,” Clark said as she stood outside the headquarters of her seven-school district. “There was nothing else for us to do.” The results? Test scores went up. So did attendance — for both students and teachers. The district is spending one-third of what it once did on substitute teachers, Clark said. And the graduation rate likely will be more than 80% for the first time in years, Clark said. The four days that students are in school are slightly longer and more crowded with classes and activities. After school, students can get tutoring in subjects where they’re struggling. On their off day, students who don’t have other options attend “Monday care” at area churches and the local Boys & Girls Club, where tutors are also available to help with homework. The programs generally cost a few dollars a day per student. Experts say research is scant on the effect of a four-day school week on student performance. In fact, there is mostly just anecdotal evidence in reports on the trend with little scientific data to back up what many districts say, said University of Southern Maine researcher Christine Donis-Keller. “The broadest conclusion you can draw is that it doesn’t hurt academics,” said Donis-Keller, who is with the university’s Center for Education Policy, Applied Research and Evaluation. Many districts that have the shortened schedule say they’ve seen students who are less tired and more focused, which has helped raise test scores and attendance. But others say that not only did they not save a substantial amount of money by being off an extra day, they also saw students struggle because they weren’t in class enough and didn’t have enough contact with teachers. The school district in Marlow, Okla., is switching back to a five-day week after administrators decided students were not being served well by attending school only four days. The 440-student district tried the shorter week the spring semester this year to save $25,000 in operation costs. “It was harder on the teachers. We were asking the kids to move at a quicker pace,” said district Superintendent Bennie Newton. “We’re hoping the four-day week won’t come into play next year.” The move by Peach County in Georgia gets mixed reviews. Parents like Heather Bradshaw worry that their children are getting shortchanged on time with teachers. “I don’t feel like they’re having the necessary time in the classroom,” said Bradshaw, a single mother with a fourth-grade son at one of the county’s three elementary schools. “The schedule has slowed him down.” Other parents prefer the shorter schedule and don’t mind the hassle of finding a babysitter one day a week. “It makes the children’s weekend a little better, so they get more rest,” said LaKeisha Johnson, who sends her fourth-grade daughter to the Boys & Girls Club on Mondays. The trend of four-day school weeks started in New Mexico during the oil crisis of the 1970s and has been popular in rural states where students have to commute a long way. Other districts have used it as a way to try to fix schools with a long history of poor student performance by shaking up the schedule and giving children more time to study outside of school. Georgia, Oklahoma and Maine have changed their laws in the last couple of years to allow districts to count their school year by hours rather than days, allowing for a four-day week if needed. Hawaii schools were off every other Friday this year for schools to save money, giving them the state with the shortest school year in the country. From California to Minnesota to New York, districts — mostly small, rural ones with less than 5,000 students — are following the trend, hoping to rescue their bleeding budgets. For Peach County, the four-day week was enough of a success that the school district is trying it again next year, Clark said. The move saves $400,000 annually and is popular among teachers and students because they get extra rest, she said “Teachers tell me they are much more focused because they’ve had time to prepare. They don’t have kids sleeping in class on Tuesday,” she said. “Everything has taken on a laser-light focus.” Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. Continue reading →

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