Capstone as a measure of education? Not enough.

[Suu]

WTF is this shit?

I am NOT taking a test to graduate.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

WTF is this shit?

I am NOT taking a test to graduate.

Bet you will.

[McGrupp]

It seems to me that if they are going to base everything on tests we should be able to test out of college. (I know I would finally get my BS if they let me do that)

If we're just going by testing it seems redundant to having 16 years of school, 12 of which are pretty much just 'jail for children because we don't know where else to put you'.

[Cramulus]

WTF is this shit?

I am NOT taking a test to graduate.

my bet:
You probably won't take it to graduate.

It may be that college professors, who rely less on federal budget than K-12 teachers, will put up with less teach-to-the-test bullshit, and this will never take off.

It may be that you're job hunting months later, and they will ask you for your CLA+ scores, and you will enter "n/a" and you may or may not hear back.

The companies who score the CLA and publish the prep books/courses will set up websites which compare colleges based on their average graduate's CLA scores. They will send pamphlets and "how to choose a college" guides, which include CLA comparisons, to high school resource centers.

and gradually, it will become a thing

It seems to me that if they are going to base everything on tests we should be able to test out of college. (I know I would finally get my BS if they let me do that)

Yep. Years down the road, if the CLA is adopted and becomes more relevant than GPA, then it will also be more relevant than a bachelor's degree. Kids will take CLA prep courses and ace the damn thing through diligent cramming.

Already, there are so many ways to get a cheap college degree (like from University of Phoenix and other online colleges), employers are taking a second look at how much a college degree is really worth. I can see why some employers would want a more reliable indicator of achievement.

And let's be honest - lots of college degrees do not prepare you to enter the workforce outside of your narrow specialization. Most people learn their job skills on the job, not in college. So why do I have a bachelor's in psych again? I wouldn't trade my college education for the world, but frankly, I had the skills to do my current job basically right after high school. College taught me discipline, but the actual skills I use in the office were learned on the job.

So, as a brief devil's advocate position: for a lot of kids, taking a CLA prep course and skipping college will be the right choice. You get into the workforce, but you don't get saddled with a half lifetime of student loan debt.

Merely taking a CLA course and scoring well will not cut it for a lot of industries. Like, if you're going into education, obviously a CLA will be a poor substitute for an actual certificate. But only 27 percent of college grads have a job related to their major. When you major in Latin and then go into Real Estate, you gotta wonder if there is a better way.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Already, there are so many ways to get a cheap college degree (like from University of Phoenix and other online colleges), employers are taking a second look at how much a college degree is really worth. I can see why some employers would want a more reliable indicator of achievement.

Speaking as an employer, there is already an indicator.  The capstone.  That's really all I look at.

[LMNO]

Question:  My capstone has nothing whatsoever to do with my current job.  I really don't know what would happen if, in an interview for a finance job, they asked me for it and I handed the woman a CD with skronky indie rock on it.

[Suu]

URI is not one of the schools that administer it.

If employers actually ask for this, they're going to be weeding out a lot of older, and potentially better educated candidates. Like it was said, I don't think professors are going to be down with this.

[Junkenstein]

Already, there are so many ways to get a cheap college degree (like from University of Phoenix and other online colleges), employers are taking a second look at how much a college degree is really worth. I can see why some employers would want a more reliable indicator of achievement.

Speaking as an employer, there is already an indicator.  The capstone.  That's really all I look at.

Question - As an employer, who would you be more likely to hire:

A- Graduate with relevant Capstone
B- Non Graduate with approximately the same length of time as it takes to gain the qualifacation employed in a relevant position.

I ask because I've always leant towards demonstrations of actual skill and experience more frequently than a relevant qualification. It's usual cost more in terms of wages but I seem to deal with less fuckups(people and events) actually in the workplace. Better to hire the guy who's built a couple of walls rather than the guy with a bit of paper in wall building kind of thing. There seems to be a push in the UK for more skill based qualifications but I've not dealt with that much yet. I'm expecting most of them to be a joke at best and useless at worst.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Question:  My capstone has nothing whatsoever to do with my current job.  I really don't know what would happen if, in an interview for a finance job, they asked me for it and I handed the woman a CD with skronky indie rock on it.

Well, hopefully you'd offer more than the CD.  You'd offer the notes dealing with how you organized things, how you dealt with technical problems, etc.

That's the really important part, IMO.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Already, there are so many ways to get a cheap college degree (like from University of Phoenix and other online colleges), employers are taking a second look at how much a college degree is really worth. I can see why some employers would want a more reliable indicator of achievement.

Speaking as an employer, there is already an indicator.  The capstone.  That's really all I look at.

Question - As an employer, who would you be more likely to hire:

A- Graduate with relevant Capstone
B- Non Graduate with approximately the same length of time as it takes to gain the qualifacation employed in a relevant position.

I ask because I've always leant towards demonstrations of actual skill and experience more frequently than a relevant qualification. It's usual cost more in terms of wages but I seem to deal with less fuckups(people and events) actually in the workplace. Better to hire the guy who's built a couple of walls rather than the guy with a bit of paper in wall building kind of thing. There seems to be a push in the UK for more skill based qualifications but I've not dealt with that much yet. I'm expecting most of them to be a joke at best and useless at worst.

Given the choice, I always go with experience.  Thing is, Intel just opened a facility in Arizona, and scarfed up every single experienced PLC geek.  So I needed one straight out of school.

So the capstone became the most important part of the hiring process.

[LMNO]

Question:  My capstone has nothing whatsoever to do with my current job.  I really don't know what would happen if, in an interview for a finance job, they asked me for it and I handed the woman a CD with skronky indie rock on it.

Well, hopefully you'd offer more than the CD.  You'd offer the notes dealing with how you organized things, how you dealt with technical problems, etc.

That's the really important part, IMO.

Also, I realize I didn't actually ask a question.  I'll see myself out.

[Suu]

Question:  My capstone has nothing whatsoever to do with my current job.  I really don't know what would happen if, in an interview for a finance job, they asked me for it and I handed the woman a CD with skronky indie rock on it.

Well, hopefully you'd offer more than the CD.  You'd offer the notes dealing with how you organized things, how you dealt with technical problems, etc.

That's the really important part, IMO.

Also, I realize I didn't actually ask a question.  I'll see myself out.

In this instance, something like references from professors and previous employers/intern coordinators would be helpful too. Not everyone gets a job in their fields.

I did not do that well on my undergrad capstone. I didn't fail, but I got a high C/low B. This is mostly my own fault due to poor topic choice, and I still got good feedback on it. However, my GPA over all is very high, and I have excellent recommendations. This is also why I need to rock my master's thesis.

[AFK]

My capstone got me my first job in this field.