Page 328 - Crisis in Higher Education

298 • Crisis in Higher Education

majors, but they may have already made decisions that prohibit them
from taking the high school courses they need, including calculus as a
senior or extra science courses. Second, high school students may have
taken courses in calculus, chemistry, or other subjects and received a
good grade, but their knowledge is insufficient. Grade inflation at the high
7
school level is a significant problem. These problems are addressed in the
following sections.

14.2 ADDRESSING CURRICULUM OVERLAP

It is unclear what determines if a course is a high school or a higher edu-
cation course because these entities offer many courses with the same or
similar titles and contents. For example, high schools teach world history
and American history, and so do two- and four-year institutions. Both
entities offer English composition. Higher education teaches college alge-
bra, which tends to cover the content of first- and second-year high school
algebra. At the same time, many high schools offer calculus, which is gen-
erally regarded as a higher education course. Both institutions offer for-
eign languages, biology, chemistry, and physics, yet there is minimal effort
to coordinate curriculum to avoid repetition.
This is further complicated as universities parse the same topic to create
specialized courses that are designed for specific audiences. For example,
universities may offer: Introduction to Physics (for nonmajors), General
Physics (for majors), Technical Physics (noncalculus), and Physics for
Science and Engineering Majors (using calculus). These courses cover
many of the same topics but with different applications and different
mathematical rigor. This can cause problems for students who transfer
from majors that require general physics to majors that require physics for
science and engineering majors.

14.2.1 Transition from High School to Higher Education
It seems clear that students should not spend time and money in higher
education repeating coursework taken in high school. The question is:
How do we address this overlap? Institutions and their faculty would
argue that high school courses in world history, algebra, economics,
and other fields are simply not rigorous enough to meet their standards.