(Tuesday’s piece on Jason Arday — the black University of Cambridge professor who appears to have made up much of his resume — has spurred heavy reader response, including a fascinating email from a professor about the existential crisis in education.
I’ll publish his note shortly. But first I had to give you this unbelievable-but-true story from the University of Michigan. Yes, it’s back-to-school week at Unreported Truths!)
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This week, the University of Michigan said it would no longer record grades for most new students in their first semester, for fears that they can’t handle the pressure.
“We believe that covering grades will help students start strong and curb the mental health crisis unfolding among college-aged individuals,” the school announced.
Yes, one of the nation’s top public universities will run like a kindergarten.
It’s about learning to play with the other kids, Johnny!
And why stop with the first semester, Michigan? Why should these “college-aged individuals” — who can vote, drive, serve in the military, work, be imprisoned, start companies, and even be paid millions of dollars to play college sports — ever have their college experiences ruined by the pressure of grades?
By the way, Michigan charges annual tuition of almost $70,000 for out-of-state freshmen.
This is insane.
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($88K per year, grades not included)
Alex, You are missing a far bigger point, I fear. This is the voice crying in the wilderness of a long time medical educator...
Most medical schools stopped giving grades about 10 years ago because the current mix of folks enrolled (for various demographic and "distance travelled" reasons rather than for the ability to be competent doctors) were not up to performing at anything near historic levels. So, by AAMC diktat (for practical purposes) they all went to pass/fail where the cutoff point could be hidden (and it is).
This was fine until those same students had to go take national boards where the same problem (many folks NOT qualified to be doctors) reared its ugly head again. The solution? They converted boards to pass/fail, too, with an unknown cutoff.
It is not that there are not good students...there are. But many, many are not qualified and never will be. They have made it impossible for anyone to tell.
My advice? Do not see a doctor under 50...there are many good ones, but you will never be able to know if you have one.
With luck some of the current noise will correct this problem, but there is a cohort out there that will never be corrected. Should scare the daylights out of all patients.
Not telling them the truth about their performance is not going to "solve" any "mental health crisis". To the extent there is one, it has been caused in large part by coddling children from reality.