More Americans are getting college degrees than they did about a decade ago, but skills in reading and analyzing data among the well-educated have dropped significantly, according to a national report on literacy released yesterday.
This is a disturbing trend. But, to be honest, this is not particularly surprising. Unless people are asked to regularly think outside their normal area of expertise, very few people develop the problems solving and analytical skills necessary for broad intellectual activity. A degree is not a substitute for a broad education.
Today, in my opinion, more and more college education is about job training, not true liberal education.
"I think these results are really unexpected," said Mark Schneider, the U.S. commissioner of education statistics. A former university professor, Schneider was particularly concerned about the results.
"I think it is a wake-up call to the research and university community," he said. He expects that further analysis of the data will show whether the decline in high-level skills in the college-educated population is among recent graduates or those who have been out of school five or 10 years.
I would hope that the decline is in those who have been out of school longer, but I suspect that the Department of Education is not going to find any statistically significant difference.
If you are wondering what the survey tested, here is a taste:
The survey, done in 2003 by the National Center for Education Statistics, part of the U.S. Department of Education, interviewed 19,000 people age 16 or older in their homes, in much the same way the census is conducted. They were asked to read prose, do math and find facts in documents.
The study was designed to assess not whether people can read a novel, but whether they are competent in the skills they need to be productive citizens. Participants were asked, for instance, to add numbers on a bank slip, identify a place on a map or read directions for taking a medication.
Among adults who have taken graduate courses or have graduate degrees, only 41 percent scored as proficient, compared with 51 percent a decade ago.
Proficiency was measured by the ability to read lengthy, complex abstract texts and analyze information in documents.
Participants' performance was scored as below basic, basic, intermediate and proficient. Below basic included people who were not literate.
However, the report is not all bad news. It would appear that college education does close the achievement gap between blacks and whites:
One positive finding of the National Assessment of Adult Literacy was that African-Americans are making significant gains in reading and math and that blacks as a whole are reaching higher levels of education. For instance, the report showed that the average rate of prose literacy, or reading, among blacks rose 6 percentage points since 1992.
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