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Comment by pflats | Hacker News Reader

This is a consequence of the concerted effort by educators to increase post-secondary enrollment in the United States. Presumably, the students likely to enroll in a math or science program were (by and large) already heading to college 25 years ago.

As a metric for high schools, students enrolling in and graduating from a 4-year college is one of the most important numbers in the all-important school ranking. Students weak in the maths and sciences are encouraged to do just this: finish Algebra II, finish Chemistry, enroll in a liberal arts program, and choose a few "gimme" classes to cover whatever core curriculum the school requires. This makes the high schools look a lot better in their rankings, which is what matters to many superintendents and principals.

And then we get this.

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I'm not sure it's all on the educators' side. It's also been pushed strongly by parents, because for the last few decades having a degree versus not having a degree has been the single best predictor of getting a white-collar job. Doesn't even matter what the degree is in; a 4-year degree qualifies you to get past the "need degree" HR screen in all sorts of generic office jobs, and the pay gap between "generic liberal arts degree" and "high-school diploma" has been large and growing since the 1950s.

Completely agreed. I'm not sure which is the chicken and which is the egg, though: the push for more college-educated students, or the degree screen for jobs.

They are mutually re-enforcing. I suspect the degree screen for jobs came second, though.

Let me get this straight - you're arguing that increased college enrollment over the past 25 years is some sort of conspiracy perpetrated by secondary school administrators to better their own rankings?

I think GP is arguing that the incentives are such that no conspiracy is needed.

Ever since society generally decided everyone needs to go to college, all sorts of little incentives have been adding up all over the place to create the effect of getting everyone in the system. That's not the single cause of everything, it's a snapshot of a broader trend that has affected the entire process from top to bottom. You could play the "zoom in on one aspect and mock the idea it could be the cause" all day long with all sorts of little causes... but that would just be a rhetorical game trying desperately to avoid the totality of the situation which is clear as day.

Not at all. The increased college enrollment over the past 25 years is a nationwide push from the highest levels of government, academia, and business to get more students to enroll. Over the years, though, this goal has become somewhat divorced from its intentions.

I teach math (and used to teach CS before budget cuts) at a high school level. I've advised my mathematically weak, sometimes special needs students to do exactly what I mentioned in the first post.

Presumably, the students likely to enroll in a math or science program were (by and large) already heading to college 25 years ago.

This presumption is not supported by the data. Since 1970 the proportion of STEM degrees out of all degrees awarded has averaged 24% with a SD of `2.

Bereft of outside research, I was responding to the article, which stated, "Over the past 25 years the total number of students in college has increased by about 50 percent. But the number of students graduating with degrees in science, technology, engineering and math (the so-called STEM fields) has remained more or less constant."

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