BellaOnline Forums Education Colleges Study: Most College Students Lack Skills

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Hmm...interesting. One of my friends recently told me that she wished there was a "real world" (not as in the MTV show - lol!) type class offered college....which kind of makes sense, I guess? I mean, they have Freshman Seminar type classes to acclimate you to college -- why not Senior Seminar type classes to acclimate you to the "real world?

Would you take that, though?

I don't know if I would have....

Thoughts?

I think there needs to be a class for freshman that covers things like bill paying and how credit cards are bad. Credit card companies are on campus pushing cards, but there is noone there saying that this is not a good idea because it is going to take you 20 yrs to pay them off. I know family members that are freshman that can't balance a checkbook. I taught one how to write out a deposit slip. He didn't know how to drive thru the window and deposit money. Also campus safety could be covered like don't take drinks from people you don't know. It seems so simple, but there is a group of kids out there that have no clue.

Do they have something like this? I have been out of college for a few years, so I am not sure.

Sometimes. Sorta.

Usually I think they do drum into you the "how to avoid rape/date rape" stuff. At least at my alma mater they did...within the first two weeks of my freshman year they had us all so talked up about the "1 in 4 women of this age will be raped" or whatever that statistic is (this on a campus where nothing like that really happened--it was a teeny school) that my roommate freaked out to the point that when she got back from work after dark, I'd have to come out the back door of the dorm and watch her walk the 30 feet from the parking lot to the dorm because they had her so convinced she was going to get raped.

I don't consider how to pay bills or write a check to be a college class. You learn that sort of thing at home. Schools can't do everything--that's why they find it hard to teach basic skills, because they're doing what the parents ought to be doing. And if you're in college, you're plenty old enough and smart enough to go research this for yourself. School should be for education (what a concept!) and parents need to take back on the responsibility of teaching life skills. If students learn to research, they can make up any gap in their knowledge in that area.

I understand what you are saying, but I am not saying it needs to be a full year long or even a full credited class. The College Host said that students were asking for a real world type class which I would think would be stuff like budgets and checks. It is sad to think that parents (think they) are too busy to teach the basics. School should be for education, but parents are not doing their jobs to educate kids at home. I would have rather taken a life basics class, but I was too busy taking PE classes like bowling, tennis, and walking in college to get my PE credits which I don't feel had anything to do with getting a good education.

We actually had a class much like that in high school, it wasn't required to be taken and I think if I remember correctly was geared more towards the special needs sector of the senior/junior class. I could be wrong on that point...it was nearly 10 years ago (eek!) But they did teach you to balance a check book, keep house, budget, skills on job finding things like that.
I also went to a business college so lots of accounting classes were required anyways and my mother was a town tax collector for 15 years...I get 'the look' whenever I tell her I havevnt balanced my check book in a while =]

Yeah Wendy, I have heard that business majors have to take some classes like that. Maybe instead of making it an upper-level business class, they can make it a lower-level elective that's maybe 1 credit hour. That way anyway that wants to take it can, and you might also get more people taking it because they need an "easy" class to fill hours.