American Council of Trustees and Alumni site

[Anonymous]

A tip from Kathleen Parker's column yesterday: The American Council of Trustees and Alumni has put out a remarkable study of more than 700 major colleges and universities in the United States. If you're interested in which colleges and universities require a very strong general education, the council's website is well worth checking out. Very few schools -- 16, to be precise -- earned the council's A rating. Pretty eye-opening stuff. Here's the link:

http://www.whatwilltheylearn.com/

[Anonymous]

While the intent to have a broad liberal arts base under any college education is laudable (I got a top notch liberal arts education in a surprisingly "D" rated institution), the sole criteria for receiving an "A" is whether the school has an adequate course requirement in at least 6 of 7 specified subjects (writing, lit, econ, history, etc). It doesn't guage the quality of the instruction, depth of school resources, or any of a myriad of topics. The sole data source is the college course guide/catralog. There appears to be no analysis of the rigor for testing out of requirements.

Actually more disappointing than eye opening

[Anonymous]

Hey, another D-level liberal arts graduate here! So my school (in the top 10) doesn't have that many requirements. Big deal.

To a certain extent, I got my general education in high school, and I loved having some freedom to take specific courses in college.

[Anonymous]

I went to an F school. Oops!

Before I came to DC, I was a professor at one of their A-list schools, and no way in hell would I send my kids there. I have nothing but respect for my former colleagues. They are fine scholars and truly committed educators. It is, however, practically an open admission school, and the students tend to be both underprepared and not terribly serious about their education.