The Washington Post - USA (2022-05-02)

B2 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.MONDAY, MAY 2 , 2022

education

how issues of power and

inequity operate in the greatly

invisible computational

languages that comprise digital

tools, platforms, and

applications, especially as a

small number of companies

dominate our online activities

and profit from the data we

produce through online

interactions.”

Many students today want

what I wanted from my

teachers: advice on improving

their writing. One of my

instructors recommended a

book, “The Elements of Style” by

William Strunk Jr. and E.B.

White. It still helps struggling

writers despite being more than

a century old.

Here are some Strunk and

White rules I try to follow, not

always successfully: Write with

nouns and verbs. Revise and

rewrite. Avoid the use of

clarifiers. Do not explain too

much. Avoid fancy words. Be

clear.

I can see why the authors of

the position statement want

teachers to “help learners

develop the knowledge, skills,

and competencies needed for life

in an increasingly digital and

mediated world.” But could they

please put that off for now?

Their students first need more

time for reading and writing.

One exercise for those young

people might be simplifying and

clarifying the council’s position

statement.

whiny,” blessedly simple

adjectives I don’t deny. The

position statement used jargon,

she said, because it “was not

designed for lay audiences.” I

still don’t think a campaign to

“move beyond the exclusive

focus on traditional reading and

writing” is going to please many

parents and legislators.

Education critic and Emory

University English professor

emeritus Mark Bauerlein,

writing in the First Things

journal, said the authors’ use of

the words “decenter” and

“valorize” might seem strange

and new but actually arose

during the big excitement over

deconstructionism 40 years ago.

French philosopher Jacques

Derrida got little notice in the

wider world for his approach to

literary criticism, but he was a

rock star in the upper reaches of

academia back then. “That

NCTE would resort to these old

cliches only shows that the

progressive, forward-looking,

oh-so-modish thought-world of

the drafters of the media

statement is no such thing,”

Bauerlein said.

I don’t quarrel with the

authors’ concern about problems

in schools today. I just wish they

would concede that classroom

teachers have neither the time

nor the power to deal with many

of them. Here’s just one item on

their to-do list: “It is important

for English educators to advance

in our own critical awareness of

encounter intriguing but

impractical ideas.

University of Rhode Island

communication studies

professor Renee Hobbs, chair of

the group that wrote the

position statement, told me by

email that the authors were

describing “a grassroots

initiative driven by teachers”

that began years ago. She said

her work at Russell Byers

Charter School in Philadelphia,

resulting in her book

“Discovering Media Literacy,”

and her studies at Concord

(N.H.) High School showed the

new methods raised student

proficiency in reading and

writing.

She called me “smug and

and persuasively so they can

succeed in college and in life.

My biggest problem with the

position statement is the

authors’ apparent assumption

that their approach will work in

classrooms when they don’t give

a single example of a school

doing what they recommend.

Despite Northern’s warm

memories of the council’s

assistance, she called its new

statement “ludicrous, not to

mention detrimental to students

and teachers alike.”

Of the 10 listed authors of the

statement, only Seth D. French

of Bentonville (Ark.) High

teaches in a public school. Most

of the rest work in colleges and

universities, where I often

members. It has done much

good in its 111 years of existence.

Amber M. Northern, the

senior vice president for

research at the nonprofit

Thomas B. Fordham Institute in

Washington, loved the tips she

got from the council’s quarterly

newsletter when she taught

English in an overcrowded

North Carolina high school. In

her institute’s “Flypaper” blog,

Northern said she benefited

from the council’s “resources for

the overburdened and creatively

challenged educator.”

I noted the council’s new

position statement, on the other

hand, offers no suggestions on

how a teacher struggling to

teach the basics can also, as the

statement recommends, help

students “critically examine

popular culture texts” and

“productively disrupt classroom

hierarchies as learners exercise

the right to freedom of

expression on issues that are

perceived to have meaningful

relevance to their identity and

values.”

The authors say they want

teachers to help students

become “empowered change

agents” ready to disrupt “the

inequalities of contemporary

life, including structural racism,

sexism, consumerism, and

economic injustice.” Students I

have interviewed are interested

in those issues, but in English

class they want to be taught how

to express themselves clearly

Recent scores on
the National
Assessment of
Educational
Progress show no
more than
37 percent of our
children are
proficient in
reading and writing. For reasons
that mystify me, the National
Council of Teachers of English
thinks this is just the moment to
“move beyond the exclusive
focus on traditional reading and
writing competencies.”
“Students should examine
how digital media and popular
culture are completely
intermingled with language,
literature, and writing,” declare
the 10 authors of the council’s
recent position statement,
“Media Education in English
Language Arts.”
They say: “The time has come
to decenter book reading and
essay writing as the pinnacles of
English language arts
education.”
English teachers often tell
their students to avoid jargon.
The authors of this statement
ignore such advice. They say: “It
behooves our profession, as
stewards of the communication
arts, to confront and challenge
the tacit and implicit ways in
which print media is valorized
above the full range of literacy
competencies students should
master.”
The council has about 35,000

A national English-teaching group loses its grip on reality at a terrible time

Jay
Mathews

MICHAEL S. WILLIAMSON/THE WASHINGTON POST

Students work on classroom assignments in September 2019 at

Mount View High School in Welch, W.Va.

BY LILAH BURKE

Vanessa Valenciano had high
hopes for the certificate she
earned at public Aims Community
College in Colorado. After all, col-
leges have been advertising these
kinds of credentials as the next
best thing to a degree.
But when Valenciano tried to
get a job in the subject that she’d
studied — automotive upholstery
— she couldn’t. There weren’t any

near where she lived, and those

farther away required work ex-

perience she didn’t have.

“Here in this area there’s really

nothing, and I guess I didn’t real-

ize that,” she said. The certificate

that took her months to get and

today costs about $2,000 has gone

unused as Valenciano now tries to

start her own business in another

field.

Certificates are the fastest-

growing kind of credential in

higher education, touted as solu-

tions for the growing number of

people who want workforce train-

ing fast and don’t have time for a

degree.

Some certificate programs pay

off. On average, workers with cer-

tificates earn about 20 percent

more than those with only a high

school education, according to the

Georgetown University Center on

Education and the Workforce.

But new research from the non-

profit National Student Legal De-

fense Network and scholars at

George Washington University

shows that nearly two-thirds of

undergraduate certificate pro-

grams left their students worse off

than the typical high school grad-

uate, making an average of less

than $25,000 per year. The analy-

sis used data from 2015, the latest

available at the time, though more

recent government statistics pro-

duce a similar conclusion.

And while most of those failing

certificate programs are at for-

profit colleges, which have long

been criticized for leaving gradu-

ates with low earnings and some-

times extreme debt, nearly a quar-

ter are at public colleges and uni-

versities.

The Education Department has

proposed regulations that would

set a similar earnings threshold

for career certificate programs in

every sector, and for all degree

programs at for-profits. Programs

from which graduates earn less

than the median salary for a work-

ing person with only a high school

diploma in his or her state would

lose access to federal financial aid.

A certain high ratio of student

loan debt to earnings would also

trigger such a cutoff.

“The goal is not necessarily tak-

ing funds away and shutting down

programs. It’s encouraging insti-

tutions to make better programs,”

said Eddy Conroy, senior adviser

in education policy at the left-

leaning think tank New America.

“If you come out of any program in

higher education, you should be

able to make more than the aver-

age high school graduate.”

But public universities, com-

munity colleges and nonprofit col-

leges have now joined for-profit

institutions in pushing back

against the proposed regulations,

which the Education Department

is likely to formally introduce this

summer with the goal of finalizing

a rule by Nov. 1.

Public and nonprofit colleges

often leave students with less debt

than their for-profit counterparts.

But regulation advocates say that

debt is not the only way to meas-

ure what students give up for a

degree.

“Students still do spend time

and money,” said Stephanie Celli-

ni, professor of public policy and

economics at George Washington

University and co-author of the

research analysis that found most

undergraduate certificate pro-

grams don’t pay off. “They incur a

cost; they’re out of the workforce.”

Meanwhile, some certificate

programs result in very low earn-

ings.

Take a legal secretary certificate

at one university, for instance,

whose website advertises that a

legal secretary can make $29,534

to $48,910. But the reality is that

the program’s graduates earn a

median of $18,495 three years lat-

er, according to the most recent

Education Department data.

That program isn’t run by a

for-profit college, but by the on-

line arm of Purdue University, In-

diana’s state flagship.

“We are proud of our graduates

and their successes,” Thomas

Schott, a spokesperson for the on-

line arm of Purdue, wrote in an

email. He said the numbers don’t

reflect individual circumstances

of graduates, who may, for in-

stance, choose to work part time.

Most low-payoff undergradu-

ate certificates at public institu-

tions are at community colleges.

Graduates with a nursing assis-

tant certificate from Triton Col-

lege, a public community college

in Illinois, for example, earn a

median of about $18,000 per year.

(Triton said the data on its stu-

dents’ earnings was collected in

2014.) While the George Washing-

ton study didn’t specify why some

certificates have low earnings,

other research shows the ones that

do are clustered in certain fields of

study, such as cosmetology.

“There seems to be a misper-

ception a lot of the time that high-

er education is just a golden tick-

et,” said Preston Cooper, a re-

search fellow at the Foundation

for Research on Equal Opportu-

nity who studies educational re-

turn on investment. “That turns

out not to always be the case.”

A Hechinger Report analysis of

the most recent Education De-

partment data, which was re-

leased in March, found that

20 percent of public, 45 percent of

nonprofit and 66 percent of for-

profit undergraduate certificate

programs with enough finishers

to publish earnings data would

fail the department’s proposed

test of whether graduates make

more than people with only high

school diplomas.

Some disciplines would fare

worse than others. Of the 653 cos-

metology certificate programs

with published earnings data, for

example, 640 would fail the test.

Emmanual Guillory, director of

student and institutional aid pol-

icy at the National Association of

Independent Colleges and Univer-

sities, who represented nonprofit

institutions in negotiations with

the Education Department, said

the earnings threshold could be a

good idea, but other concerns

prompted him to vote against the

regulations. For example, he said,

the department did not propose a

mechanism for institutions to ap-

peal.

“I understand that the depart-

ment’s trying to address the bad

actors. I believe that they should

be addressed,” said Guillory. “I just

want to make sure that before any

official action is taken, that we

know for sure that the data is the

most accurate data in order to

make that action.”

The institutions also voiced

concerns about the lack of time

they had to consider new language

for regulations. Other critics have

argued that tying government

funding to graduates’ earnings

could incentivize institutions to

enroll fewer students of color and

first-generation students, as work-

place discrimination and other

factors can dampen their eventual

earnings. Certificate programs

that serve more underrepresented

minority students have lower

earnings, according to research by

scholars at Vanderbilt University.

Ernest Ezeugo, high -

er-education policy director at

Young Invincibles, a nonprofit fo-

cused on issues that affect young

adults, occupied the only seat at

the negotiations meant to repre-

sent students.

“There’s something morally de-

funct about the idea that we

wouldn’t protect students across

all backgrounds from attending

programs that can’t actually meet

the promises that they make for

the majority of their students,” he

said.

At the heart of conversations

about accountability are ques-

tions about the responsibility of

any individual higher education

institution. When the labor mar-

ket has set a low wage for, say,

certified nursing assistants — jobs

that pay less than $15 per hour —

should colleges stop educating

workers to do those jobs?

“You might have a really high-

quality credential — really well-

designed, great content — and still

have poor earnings outcomes,”

said Michelle Van Noy, director of

the Education and Employment

Research Center at Rutgers Uni-

versity. “I certainly agree that the

poor earnings are a real problem,

but I don’t know if that means

early child-care workers shouldn’t

get training.”

At least one college has taken a

hard look at graduates’ earnings

without being prompted by new

regulations. Texas State Technical

College opted in 2011 to tie its state

funding to the earnings bump it

imparts, calculated as the differ-

ence between students’ earnings

five years after graduation and the

state’s minimum wage.

Since then, the income of its

graduates has increased 140 per-

cent, said Michael Reeser, chan-

cellor. But the policy has meant

some difficult decisions, including

closing more than a dozen pro-

grams in fields including culinary

arts, agricultural technology,

chemical technology and comput-

er maintenance.

“Like any sort of change in a

product mix, when it impacts peo-

ple, it is really, really hard,” said

Reeser. “But on the other hand, we

owe it to the taxpayers who sup-

port this college to constantly be

spending their taxpayer funds in a

way that produces the highest

benefit for the student and the

employers.”

This story about certificate programs

was produced by the Hechinger

Report, a nonprofit, independent

news organization focused on

inequality and innovation in

education.

Colleges balk at proposed c ertificate program regulations

Nearly two-thirds of

undergraduate

certificate programs left

students worse off than

the typical high school

graduate.

Call for a FREE Estimate

888-670-4342 | harryhelmet.com

*Offer expires 5/31/22. Valid on initial visit only. Min. purchase required. Cannot be combined with other offers. †Subject to credit approval. Interest is

billed during the promotional period but all interest is waived if the purchase amount is paid in full within 12 months. There are no required minimum

monthly payments during the promotional period. Financing for GreenSky consumer loan programs is provided by federally insured, equal opportunity

lender banks. From ForbesAdvisor.com, 3/2/2022 © Forbes Marketplace Operations, Inc. 2022. NMLS #1416362. See website for state licenses and

more details. Licensed, Bonded, Insured. © 2022 Lednor Corporation

Senior, Military &

Law Enforcement

Discounts

Before

After

Never Clean Your

Gutters Again!

®

Eliminates clogged gutters,

keeps debris and animals out

Patented nose forward design,

no vertical openings

Patented hi-performance, anti-

corrosive, multi-layer finish

Only product tested to handle

up to 22” of rain per hour

Installs on and reinforces

existing gutters

Approved by all major roofing

manufacturers

SpSpring Fring Fever Saleever Sale!!

20

%

OFF

*

20

%

OFF

*

0% Financing

Available

†

Or Payments from

$40/mo

†

0% Financing

Available†

Or Payments from

$40/mo

†