General Education Courses: Challenges and Failures
General education courses are required classes for students enrolled in degree programs at specific higher education institutions. However, since the modules are intended to have general education, they are not part of the major classes of the course (Bok).
Limited Educational Benefits
Regardless of the course being taken, general education classes are intended to offer diverse skills for students with critical thought, problem-solving, communication skills, and other challenges that contribute to a better life. Many organizations that have implemented general education courses believe that the endeavor can provide endless educational benefits. However, with the advancement in education, the immense benefits achieved from general education causes are getting limited by the day. Various issues such as new challenges make it necessary for the general courses programs to be revised. General education courses programs experience multiple problems that have led to its failure to offer a proper higher learning experience.
Lack of Relevance and Scarce Resources
General education courses are not easy to teach and do not offer the intellectual worth of the course undertaken. Over the years, the general education courses have lost their relevance as students take less concentration in these subjects. Tutors, on the other hand, have become scarce making the teaching of these issues difficult. Students majoring in arts find studying subjects such as math as part of the general courses unnecessary (Hanushek). Academically, the general education courses often contain section sizes more extensive than the non-general subjects, thus, teaching these courses seems cumbersome and unnecessary to the teachers and students regarding the specific majors taken by the students. On the other hand, also, some general education courses require little concentration from the students, yet they have similar grading as the core courses in a particular unit. Thus, students tend to score high grades in courses that are not related to their majors leading to questions of the intellectual worth of these courses.
Lack of Review Mechanism and Financial Support
There is also, no mechanism for reviewing general education courses. The general education standing committee indicates that little effort is being made in the following up the importance of the courses once they have been incorporated into a particular program. The education ministry has taken little concern in the reviewing of the general education courses leaving a lot of workloads (Ring). The number of courses in need of review is over 500 courses. There is also a lack of financial support and commitment from university and colleges. This has made the teaching of these units to be expensive to implement fully. Lack of financial support from higher education institutions of learning means the general education courses do not play the role of defining the identity of these institutions hence making them obsolete.
Time Waste and Transfer Issues
The general education courses are expensive and a waste of time. General causes lack of curiosity on the part of students as they are not career-oriented but general knowledge (Shade). Often, these courses consume much of the student's time leaving no room for the students to pursue personal educational interests in the major courses. Making the courses compulsory also contributes to the waste of tuition money. Often, many lecturers do not put the seriousness deserved into the courses like they do with the core courses (Best). Thus, the fact that the courses are made compulsory in many institutions is indeed a waste of tuition money. The nature of general education courses is that they are either too hard or too easy. Since the courses do not have value to one's career, most students who take the general courses often experience burnout effects from reading leading to weak and frustrating results in the core courses.General education courses also often cause problems in the transfer from community colleges. According to (Ravitch), there has been a long-standing crisis when students from community colleges transfer to four-year institutions. Often, mostly, the four-year institutions have a developed standard curricular to maintain their quality of education they offer. It is thus common for students to from community colleges to have their transfer requests rejected due to lack of meeting the required grades despite scoring high grades in junior colleges. For instance, a student scoring a grade of 120 may be rejected since most of the courses done are considered elective by the four-year institutions. There is thus the problem of standardization of general education courses. The senior colleges and state community colleges are involved in a tug of war where they have not agreed on the kind of general courses to be pursued, hence inconveniencing many students wishing to transfer.
Low Standards and Irrelevance to Careers
Like many of the other departments in higher education learning, it is the responsibility of the general education department to train faculty members to ensure the success of the program. However, the program has lower standards among tutors. Many of the potential tutors often opt to major in programs where they can be awarded honors or can be associated with a particular society, i.e., scientific society. General education programs do not offer research activities hence having lower status. It thus becomes a challenge to persuade and train graduate students to have a broad knowledge of their area while acknowledging the limitations to the program (Laird). Also, it is common for many scholars like to make interpersonal relations between faculties. Meeting with colleagues to ensure one is doing a good job is common. However, individuals pursuing general education programs may feel insecure as despite having a vast knowledge in a particular area, may not be able to tackle technical questions in the field of study.
Failed Assessments and Employability
Assessment of the value of general education courses to students graduating from various universities across the country indicates that general courses contribute to negating the educational value. Exams measure the educational success in learning institutions. However, the value of education can be measured by the effectiveness of the graduates in their careers. In many cases, graduating students have shown a decline in the success of general courses; this is contributed by the high dissatisfaction of this courses among students (Anderson). The failure among students indicates a failure in the whole program necessitating the need for a review of these programs.Lastly, general education courses do not offer the skills necessary for employment. The aim of acquiring university education is to have the required skills to acquire a quality job and progress in one's career. However, the information taught through general education courses is not aligned with what businesses and companies are interested in. Often the bulk of the information taught in general courses is repeated or has been previously taught in other lower stages of education making them unnecessary (Anderson). Also, the time taken by students to learn these general courses robs them of the opportunity to be creative for future career development.However, despite the various challenges and failures associated with the general education courses, various reforms are being made to ensure a 21st-century form of education is achieved. The changes were necessitated by the multiple challenges and pressures demanding accountability in higher education learning. Two strategies have been put forward in addressing this issue (Green). i.e., use of general education programs in institutions considered to be the general education praxis or selecting a specific general education model from the 20th century that will be used as a standard form of general education curricular (Bowe). These changes will go a long way in solving issues of scholarships ad intercollege transfers among other issues.In conclusion, the general education system has come under tremendous pressure over the recent times based on its contribution to higher education learning. Various assessment of the program's contributions indicates the failure in several ways. Some of the shortcomings include lack of being career-oriented. Many students take little interest in these courses as they are not part of the core course, this has led to failure in such subjects and general failure in their curriculum. The general education courses are also not popular like other programs, and this has thus led to few individuals training as tutors hence a failure in teaching these courses in many institutions. Notably, the crisis in awarding scholarships and college transfers has been contributed to the study of general courses. While some institutions may consider some units to be elective, the same courses are used in other institutions to consider a student's grade. The failure in the application of general education courses is, however, undergoing significant reviews that will ensure proper higher learning education.
Work Cited
Anderson, Mark W., et al. “Attitude changes of undergraduate university students in general education courses.” The Journal of General Education (2007): 149-168.
Best, John W., and James V. Kahn. Research in education. Pearson Education India, 2016.
Bok, Derek. Higher education in America. Princeton University Press, 2015.
Bowe, Richard, Stephen J. Ball, and Anne Gold. Reforming education and changing schools: Case studies in policy sociology. Vol. 10. Routledge, 2017.
Green, Andy. “Core skills, general education and unification in post-16 education.” Dearing and Beyond: 14-19 Qualifications, Frameworks and Systems (2014): 88.
Hanushek, Eric A., et al. “General Education, Vocational Education, and Labor-Market Outcomes over the Lifecycle.” Journal of Human Resources 52.1 (2017): 48-87.
Laird, Thomas F. Nelson, and Amy K. Garver. “The effect of teaching general education courses on deep approaches to learning: How disciplinary context matters.” Research in Higher Education 51.3 (2010): 248-265.
Ravitch, Diane. The death and life of the great American school system: How testing and choice are undermining education. Basic Books, 2016.
Ring, Gail L., et al. “Using eportfolios to Assess and Improve the General Education Curriculum.” The Journal of General Education 64.4 (2015): 310-333.
Shade, Richard A., and Roger Stewart. “General education and special education preservice teachers’ attitudes toward inclusion.” Preventing School Failure: Alternative Education for Children and Youth 46.1 (2001): 37-41.
