At the end of almost half of students’ first two years of college, they made no significant improvement in the areas of critical thinking, complex reasoning and writing skills, based on numbers from the Collegiate Learning Assessment, or CLA. About 36 percent of students made no progress by their fourth year, according to the CLA.

The findings are raising questions in students and faculty members about the value of an education without learning.

Standing still
Students’ lack of progress stems from reasons ranging from a less rigorous curriculum to flawed teaching techniques, according to the book.

Complex reasoning skills were introduced to interdisciplinary humanities senior Jacob Yaeger his freshman year. But that’s not the case for all students, because the university does not make that a high enough priority, he said.

“It’s not necessarily emphasized in college, depending on what college you go into,” he said. “There’s no incentive to go into critical thinking, which is kind of a problem. I think that it’s definitely lacking only because it’s not necessarily required and a lot of people can avoid it in college.”

Although one of the main causes behind students’ lack of academic progress falls on the shoulders of educators, students also need to pull their weight to ensure that they get the most out of their education, said Josipa Roksa, one of the authors of “Academically Adrift” and an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Virginia, in a live Internet chat with The Chronicle of Higher Education on Feb. 14.

“We call for greater accountability among students too,” Roksa said during the chat. “In every college and university, we found students who applied themselves. … Students clearly have to take responsibility for their own education. We have high expectations of them; we are not letting them off the hook.”

Study break
Since 1961, the number of hours students study per week has decreased almost by half from 24 to 14 hours, according to research by professors at the University of California Santa Barbara and the University of California Riverside. Students lack of studying can pose serious problems in the classroom, said Ann Austin, an education professor at MSU.

“The investment of time in learning relates to the amount they learn,” she said.

But for some students, investing time in classes can be frustrating, especially if they don’t feel as though their classes are relevant to their major, said Stephen Rachman, associate chairperson for graduate studies in the Department of English.

“A lot of students here often (feel) if you take the general education classes, it’s like a tithe — a tax that’s being put on them because it’s mandated by the university because it doesn’t have anything whatsoever to do with their educational mission, which is generally their major,” he said. “This university is very much part of that problem because it identifies people saying they should study things based on what their major tells them to study, so that doesn’t lead to any kind of breadth or general education.”

For communicative sciences and disorders sophomore Bridget Molnar most of her effort goes into studying for her major requirements, she said.

“I’m not motivated to put as much critical thinking into those areas because I feel like I need to (focus on my major),” Molnar said.

With the pressure to find a job after graduation, the purpose of college has changed, said Diane Wakoski, university distinguished professor in the Department of English.

“I think one of the problems in the university right now is the misguided national impression that you go to college in order to get a better job and make more money, and therefore college is something you have to do, that’s not high motivation to learn any subject,” she said. “I think everybody is pulling back from the traditional idea of a liberal arts education.”

Students’ goals for college affect the depth of their education, Rachman said.

“It has everything to do with what people think the purpose of college is,” he said. “If people think it’s for fraternities and social networks, then that’s the part of (college) they value and they see the classes as scams or obstacles to overcome or they do the minimum (amount of work).”

Low expectations also contribute to the lack of student progress, according to the book. High expectations and supportive faculty members are key in learning, Austin said.

“High expectations on the part of faculty and high expectations for students themselves are an important part of learning,” she said.

Moving forward
At MSU, some professors and students see significant progress in their students.

“I think students make a good deal of progress,” said Emily Tabuteau, associate professor of history. “I’ve been teaching our introductory seminar, and the difference between what students are doing at the beginning of the term and the end of the term is striking.”

MSU has made strides to improve students’ critical thinking abilitie, and offers resources to help students build those skills, such as the MSU Writing Center and the Department of Writing, Rhetoric and American Cultures, or WRAC.

“The WRAC has a very good writing program to teach critical thinking, critical analysis,” said Cheryl Caesar, an associate professor in WRAC.

Some MSU professors said they have seen students coming into college with a disparity in writing and critical thinking skills — with some on varying levels.

“Students are struggling more than they did when I was here 25 years ago because they’re not getting the same background in high school,” Caesar said. “We have to help them catch up.”

And despite criticism that college students aren’t learning, the study isn’t necessarily an accurate measure of students’ knowledge, said Doug Estry, associate provost for undergraduate education.
“(There is a) whole lot of controversy in the literature about the CLA as an indicator of learning,” he said.

“(It) seems to me I read (that) because students didn’t learn to write longer papers, they didn’t learn to critically think — what’s the evidence that the development of students to learn critical reasoning is directly related to the length of their paper?”

The authors have faced national criticism because of their strong reliance on the CLA.
“We, like the audience, recognize that any measure of learning has limitations and have discussed that at length in the book,” Roksa said.

“If we had unlimited resources and were designing the study from scratch, we would include multiple objective indicators of learning, including general skills as well as subject-specific skills.”
But there are some aspects of knowledge that studies and books can’t measure, Wakoski said.

“There aren’t any ways of testing the wisdom or the ability to think with clarity,” she said.

“Many people really think that if you have those skills, you probably will be on the fringe of society or a dropout because the center of civilization seems to be about all the bureaucratic and nonchallenging and nonthoughtful ways of living one’s life.”

Staff writer Megan Durisin contributed to this report.