In 2005, the state Legislature contracted with a Colorado-based education research company to conduct a study on Nevada schools, which came to this conclusion: If you took 100 ninth-graders in Nevada, 69 would graduate high school in four years. Of that 69, 28 would continue on to college; 19 of those would go on to their sophomore year; only 11 would graduate from college in six years.
"How do we assess the real problem?" asks Stewart Spencer, director of college relations at Nevada State College. "Is it within the K-12 setting? Is it within the higher-ed setting? Most people will tell you it's a function of the two systems."
The world of post-secondary education is complex. Attending college or sending your children to college is part of the American Dream, but it's a dream with many possible interpretations. When we think of college we tend to think of either elite private universities or major public research universities. These are the brands of the college world—think Harvard or Stanford, think North Carolina or Ohio State—the schools with the famous professors, famous mascots, famous teams and huge endowments.
Maybe this makes sense. America is a competitive society, and getting into college is not only a rite of passage bridging adolescence and adulthood, it's a competitive rite of passage, where one first begins to fully understand the adult implications of acceptance, rejection and the need to match up well against your peers.
And yet, of America's 4,000-plus higher education institutions, some 85 percent are "broad-access institutions" with low or no selectivity in admissions, and, according to a Stanford University study, they educate the vast majority of American students. Many of these are community colleges or state colleges or liberal-arts colleges, small places, out-of-the-way places.
There are, then, a corresponding variety of educational customers: Immigrants gaining a foothold in America, empty nesters returning to finish degrees begun decades ago and future entrants of virtually every career path. "How do you differentiate the type of education?" asks Stewart. "A lot of that goes back to the kind of student you admit."
Which is to say, while the abstraction that is "college" should be open to everyone, particular kinds of schools define their particularity by seeking out particular kinds of students. And to that end, the University of Nevada is steadily moving toward repositioning itself in the marketplace. Departing UNLV President Carol Harter has made no secret about her desires to see the university transformed into a more prestigious, major-league institution—the UCLA of Nevada, perhaps. This fall, the UNLV and the University of Nevada-Reno will raise its admissions standards from requiring a 2.5 high-school grade-point average to a 2.75. At issue is a proposal from the universities to raise the standard again to 3.0—a move originally scheduled to take place in 2010 that may come within a year or two. (The Board of Regents has yet to vote on the proposal.)
"It makes sense to select students who have high odds of completing college," says Walt Rulffes, superintendent of the Clark County School District. "Frankly, that's a limited population. It makes sense to have a high standard for admission to the university level. But, if there's a more restrictive requirement to get into UNLV, we need expanded meaningful alternate pathways for students to get into college."
Prestige is one thing driving this move—if the university is perceived as high-quality, theoretically, higher-quality students will attend and out-of-state students may be willing to pay higher tuition. Superior faculty can be drafted. High-quality academic programs can be built. Greater research dollars can flow.
But money is another matter. "What can the state afford to pay to continue to send the majority of students to the most expensive place for the first two years of their education?" asks Jane Nichols, vice chancellor of student affairs for the university and community college system.
"The goal is to make the system accessible and affordable to a number of different student types," Stewart says. "If the state is subsidizing the education, we want to make sure they complete it."
We live in an age of declining standards, pundits seem to be wailing, which may be why the value of professing higher standards is greater than ever.
In 2000 the Board of Regents conducted a study on the educational landscape of Nevada and recommended the creation of a three-tier system. The state's community colleges would occupy the bottom tier, and new programs would be brought in to help students transition to four-year schools. The newly formed Nevada State College would anchor the middle tier, freeing up the universities to occupy the top. Faculty teach progressively fewer courses between the community college and university level; as such, the cost per student goes up.
Still, talks of raising standards at the universities have been going on for years.
Tom Rodriguez, who oversees affirmative action and diversity issues for the Clark County schools, says the regents tried to raise the GPA admissions requirement as early as 1988, when it was only 2.3. That proposed change was voted down. In 1991, the board tried again and "we went through a big battle again. Back then it was basically, they wanted to set the bar higher because kids studied to wherever the bar was raised. In other words, if you set it they'll reach it."
Rodriquez wasn't opposed to the logic, but he points out that at the time, students attending post-secondary schools in Nevada were overwhelmingly white. "There wasn't a great deal of diversity," he says. "So I'm saying this is ridiculous, you're making it so kids who want to go to college can't get in." On the other hand, he didn't feel community colleges were doing a good enough job transferring kids into four-year colleges.
Nonetheless, in 1991 the regents raised the university admissions standards to 2.5, which took effect in 1994. In 2001 the regents planned to raise standards again. "They wanted to go to 3.0 directly, but we were saying this is crazy, this is really detrimental."
Rodriquez formed a minority coalition to resist the move, but eventually settled for a gradual increase—2.75 this fall and 3.0 in 2010—in exchange for greater diversity efforts on the part of the university system. He thought this was a fair compromise. The universities would get their higher standards, while school district officials would have enough time to prepare their students. Such a plan also would give Nevada State College nine years to grow and prepare itself to handle more students. At the same time, Rodriguez was hoping the regents would commit to making a greater effort at diversity and retention of minorities. "Within the infrastructure there was nothing there. No remedial types of program."
Cut to 2006. Minority enrollment is up, but Rodriguez argues this is a function of a growing population more than any specific effort the university system has undertaken. He's galled by the universities' desire to move up the admissions standard early. "Why the hell don't we just wait? What is this obsession with getting there now?"
The universities think the change would be in students' best interests, forcing under-qualified students to attend community college or state college, with a more nurturing atmosphere and more remedial course opportunities. "They were finding students who were struggling, and it wasn't fair to them," says Nichols.
On the other hand, if the increase to 3.0 is approved ahead of schedule, there will be plenty of students who might not be made aware of the new standard and will be in for a disappointment.
But the numerical grade point isn't the only thing that will change. Previously the GPA required was for all courses students took in their high-school career. Now the GPA will be considered from only 13 core courses —four English, and three each of natural science, mathematics and social science. These courses, rather than electives such as art or music or even foreign language, are designed to give students better preparation for the rigor of coursework at the college level. "You have to spend a lot of time with students to tell them how their expectations may differ," says Rebecca Mills, UNLV vice president for student life. "Students can and do challenge themselves to do that."
But grade-point average alone cannot be the only criterion for admission. For one, it may encourage students to take easier courses to qualify for a higher grade-point average. Under the new system, core classes would also be given a weighted average, an inducement for students to take the plunge without jeopardizing admissions into major universities or eligibility for Millennium Scholarships. "If you don't weight averages you discourage students from taking harder courses," Nichols says. "They're intent to send a message to students. Students will be better off if they take the more difficult course of study."
The universities estimate that under the proposed switch to 3.0, an additional 850 students would be denied admission at UNLV and UNR. This figure doesn't include alternate admissions, which permit the schools to admit up to 500 people as "special admits" based on factors such as special talent or extreme hardship—but far fewer than 500 people typically are admitted this way.
Administrators argue that the presence of Nevada State College ensures that access to higher education in the state remains open to as many students as possible. And NSC, for its part, is ready to step up. "Nevada State College feels, as does the system as a whole, the college is certainly well poised to handle this influx in students," Stewart says.
There are currently 1,110 full-time-equivalents at NSC. The college estimates that figure will rise to more than 3,400 by 2011. Those numbers assume the anticipated increase in admissions standards at UNLV and UNR. Though it is the smallest college in the state, NSC already has a 500-acre campus, with room to expand to 25,000 acres. The UNLV campus, by comparison, is only 338 acres.
The college "will serve the market that for whatever reason cannot take advantage of research university-type education, or they prefer a smaller environment, a more intimate environment," Stewart says.
NSC requires a high-school diploma and a 2.0 minimum grade-point average. They encourage standardized tests to help determine where to place students, but they are not required. But in a society that places greater value on branded products and institutions, will students shunted away from the relative prestige of the University of Nevada find satisfaction in the state college tier?
The Stanford Institute for Higher Education Research published a six-year national study called the Bridge Project that focused on schools in California, Oregon, Texas, Illinois, Georgia and Maryland. The study concludes that these states have created "unnecessary and detrimental barriers between high school and college, barriers that are undermining student aspirations." In other words, there is a disconnect between what students learn in high school and what they learn in college.
This is a factor in Nevada as well. Currently, the only difference between graduation requirements and college admissions is science—the university system requires three years; the school system requires only two. But Clark County has been slow in providing early standardized testing. This school year is only the second year that school officials have allowed sophomores to take the PSAT on the district's dime. "It's a good predicator for kids to enroll in courses in their junior or senior year," says Jane Kadoich, director of the Clark County School District's guidance program. Kids who take the PSAT twice before taking the SAT score 187 points higher than kids who take the SAT cold.
Rulffes says the university system is proposing summer academies to give some students extra help in math and science before heading to college. With more and more information being generated, and a growing list of what students need to know, "there really is a growing gap trying to get more curriculum into the same school day," he says. To address this, Clark County will unveil several model schools to experiment with a longer school day.
Statistics are mixed about whether the kids entering college really are prepared. Kadoich says that 43 percent of Clark County students who graduated in 2005 went on to a four-year school; another 29 percent went on to a two-year school, with the rest split between various work, apprenticeship or military options. And, notes Coburn, retention rates and graduation rates are higher. Between fall 2004 and fall 2005, 72 percent of UNLV full-time first-time freshmen returned; 76 percent returned to UNR.
At the same time, nearly a third of Millennium Scholarship recipients attending CCSN required at least one class of remediation, compared with one-half of all non-Millennium students. And when standards to retain the scholarship leapt in 2003 from 2.0 to 2.6, eligibility dropped by a third.
Rulffes says that federal labor department statistics point out that only 20 percent of jobs in the country require a college degree. "Maybe it's not a tragedy for some of those 89 students to go into other pathways," says Ruffles. "On the other hand, if we prepare every kid as well as we can to go into college, we give them options."
The school district is moving more toward a dual-purpose curriculum. One would prepare students to attend college. The other is more narrowly tailored to particular occupational interests, but should not be thought of as vocational—it would include programs such as journalism, medicine, finance, law enforcement and culinary arts.
There still is the sense that everyone who comes out of high school is in some ways equal. The dual-track idea brings that into question, and perhaps in a good way. Because while everyone is not equal in their talents or ambitions, perhaps we should focus instead on making sure education is up to the task of providing for the needs of its students.
It is commendable for UNLV and UNR to commit themselves to excellence, and it's inevitable. As Nevada grows, the fortunes of the state will grow—people will begin to expect a superior university to match those in the states they left behind. In the late-19th century, major American cities began a then-unprecedented effort to elevate the masses with the formation of libraries and museums. Most of the nation's pre-eminent private research universities were also founded between Reconstruction and the turn of the century. Whatever we may think of the sometimes elitist cast of those ambitions—whose culture will elevate what group of masses?—Las Vegas is involved in an agenda not so dissimilar. It may be now that what we're doing is promoting the city through culture, of which the universities are a part.
Las Vegans already have pride in UNLV, and a university that has gained a national reputation for excellence can only help. Ordinary citizens and the specially gifted should all not only be proud to call the university their own, but should be able to see some reason to attend.
A move to 3.0 is still only a move to a B standard—that seems a reasonable goal, and there are other ways for students to earn a place even if their grades are not stellar. One thing admissions committees can take better advantage of is the subjective essay. Not only would the essay give testers a better indication of a student's verbal skills (far better than the test of esoteric vocabulary that currently constitutes the verbal side of the SAT or ACT), it would allow a student to make a case for himself or herself as a unique individual and not as a set of numbers.
Nevertheless, there seems little reason to speed up the admissions standards increase. Certainly, any move like this should happen only if programs are in place to ensure that more Nevada high-schoolers are ready for the rigors of college, here or elsewhere. Allowing the standards to shift on schedule, in 2010, should give local school districts extra time to work on integrating their curriculum demands with the demands of college.
Still, as Las Vegas tries to make its mark in higher-ed, let's remember that a major publicly supported institution should still set as its mission the education of a broad cross-section of its citizens. UNLV could do well to emulate a school such as Ohio State, which takes in a large number of students yet manages to hold its own as a well-respected research institution. There can be ground, inside a major university, for a wide range of missions. The community colleges can help shore up the lower end of the spectrum, and make sure students either gain valuable skills to take into the work force—even if they're remedial ones—or help them transition into other schools.
Which leaves Nevada State College. I remain unconvinced that there is a genuine need for a "middle tier"—or that it must be constituted as a separate school. Rather than ask NSC to stand in the poorly defined area between community college and university, why not turn NSC into a niche school, a liberal arts school that cultivates special academic strengths?
But that is unlikely to happen. As UNLV attempts its march up the ladder of academic powerhouses, one wonders if there is any ceiling. What about raising the standards further? Mills says university officials have yet to talk about it. "We'd want to look at the impact of this—whether it impacts students positively. We want good students to come to the university."
But building a reputation depends on more than finding good students. Mills' point of view is one that Rodriguez reinterprets thusly: "We don't let just anyone in here. This is the place for the best and the brightest."