Archive for the ‘UGA’ Category

The state is investing less and less in college educations. (AJC/file photo)

The Sunday AJC contains several great education stories, some of which will not appear online as the stories are subscriber only. One of the Sunday stories that is online delves into the rising costs of public colleges and the concomitant rising student debt.

This is the line that I suspect will provoke the most debate: A decade ago, the state paid 75 percent of the cost of educating a student. Today it covers 54 percent, with students and their parents picking up most of the rest.

The retort that I expect is that students and parents should be responsible for all the costs, and that it shouldn’t fall to the state to pay the bills for students.

But state governments have long taken the position that underwriting college educations is a potent investment and a proven route to a stronger economy. A better educated workforce attracts jobs and leads to a higher tax base, lower health costs, less crime …

Continue reading As state cuts its college investment, campuses turn to students. Is there a breaking point? »

Are new teachers undermined before they even step into the classroom? (AP Images)

Anabel Fender is a graduate student in education at the University of Georgia. This is her first essay on the Get Schooled blog.

I think it is terrific and an ideal follow-up to the survey results I posted earlier today. Read them both and you will get a sense of what teachers are experiencing right now.

By Anabel Fender

I am an idealist. A dreamer.

An…Oh-My-Goodness-Scared-To-Death-Future Teacher.

And I am made out to be a failure before I even start.

I am battered and bruised from the war against teachers and I haven’t even started teaching yet.

Scripted curricula tell me that the “higher ups” have no faith in my words. My Words! An integral part of what makes me a teacher is not trusted, so I will be given a script telling me exactly what to say, when to say it, and how to say it. In what other profession do we not trust the words of the professional? Before I start, they make me …

Continue reading Future teachers – failures before we even start »

On the issue of gender divides on college campuses due to more qualified females seeking admission, I asked the University of Georgia about its recent admissions by gender. (This is an outgrowth of our discussion about who has the edge in college admissions, men or women.)

UGA is about 60 percent female and 40 percent male. Last year, it admitted 66 percent of its female applicants and 59 percent of its male applicants.

Overall, UGA admitted 63 percent of its total applicants. (For a sense of how hard it is to get into the Ivies, some of those schools admitted less than 10 percent of their applicants.)

UGA admitted 11,171 students, but not all of them chose to enroll. In the end, 5,539 students enrolled  –  51 percent of the admitted males enrolled (2177) and 49 percent of the admitted females enrolled (3362). That means there are 1,185 more women in the class.

For summer/fall 2011, UGA had the following gender breakdown:

Gender       Applicants   …

Continue reading UGA admissions by gender: Women take the lead »

Here is a release from Gov. Deal’s office on the state’s new push to both enroll and graduate more students from college:

Gov. Nathan Deal, along with all 35 presidents of the University System of Georgia, 25 presidents of the Technical College System of Georgia and representatives from Georgia’s independent colleges and the business community, today launched the campus level completion portion of Complete College Georgia, which was first initiated in August 2011. The initiative calls for and identifies strategies for the state’s public and private colleges to add an additional 250,000 college graduates – whether a one-year certificate, an associate’s degree or a bachelor’s degree – by 2020, a number that is over and above current graduation levels.

“Any significant increase in the number of Georgians who complete college will require a historic new era of coordination between the state’s public and private colleges and the business community,” said Deal. …

Continue reading Gov. Deal: Get more Georgians into college. And get them to graduate. »

What do you call a Division I school that doesn’t lower its admission standards to admit star athletes?

Probably 0-12.

While many people condemn any consideration of race in college admissions, few complain about the routine acceptance of lower-performing student athletes admitted because of their outstanding abilities on the field rather than in the classroom.

In an investigation three years ago of admission standards for athletes, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution found that football players average 220 points lower on the SAT than their classmates — and men’s basketball players average seven points less than football players.

At the University of Georgia, the average football SAT was 949, which was 239 points behind the average for an undergraduate student at Georgia at the time. The Bulldogs’ average high school GPA was 2.77, or 45th out of 53 big-time college teams for which football GPAs were available.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision last week to revisit the …

Continue reading Without “affirmative action” for athletes, fewer football stars on the field »

State Sen. Jason Carter is sponsoring legislation to restore an income cap for HOPE that would be predicated on available lottery funds.

Jason Carter, D-Atlanta, is the state senator from the 42nd District, representing DeKalb. Carter is sponsoring legislation to restore an income cap on HOPE recipients, although his cap is higher than the one that Gov. Zell Miller put in place when he created HOPE.

In 1993, HOPE was limited to students from families earning less than $66,000 a year. The cap was raised to $100,000 in 1994. A year later, flush with lottery revenues, the state eliminated any cap on HOPE.

However, with the lottery failing to keep pace with the rising costs of HOPE, there is now discussion of restoring an income cap.  I asked Sen. Carter to write an op-ed piece for the Monday AJC about his legislation. Here is a preview for blog readers:

By state Sen. Jason Carter

Last year, Governor Nathan Deal made his reform of the lottery-funded HOPE Scholarship programs …

Continue reading State Sen. Carter: Reinstitute cap on HOPE and base it on available lottery funds each year »

If you want to find a Zell Miller Scholar, go to UGA or Tech. (AJC file)

Interesting data out of today’s joint House and Senate hearing on the shrinking HOPE Scholarship.

The only speaker was Timothy A. Connell, president of the Georgia Student Finance Commission, which manages HOPE. The Georgia Lottery funds HOPE and pre-k.

With lottery revenues failing to keep pace with rising tuition and growing demand, Gov. Nathan Deal last year made drastic and controversial changes to HOPE, and those changes were retrofitted to students already in college.

For most recipients, HOPE tuition payments fell 10 to 15 percent. The payments could fluctuate each year based on how much money the lottery raises and how much students must also pay for mandatory fees.

Only one group of college students — those who graduated high school with a 3.7 or higher GPA  and scored at least 1200 on the math and reading portions of the SAT test or a 26 on the ACT –  earn the assurance of full tuition …

Continue reading Nearly nine out of 10 Zell Miller Scholars attend UGA or Tech »

The celebrating might be less once high school grads see their HOPE amounts. (AJC/file photo)

The luster of a HOPE Scholarship — once a full tuition ride to public colleges for Georgia high school graduates with a B average — may dim a bit more this year.

To recap how we came to this depressing situation: Faced with a money crunch, Gov. Nathan Deal last year reduced HOPE for all but top high school students, those who graduated with a 3.7 or higher GPA  combined with a minimum score of 1200 on the math and reading portions of the SAT test or a 26 composite score on the ACT.

And he dubbed that new elite scholarship the  Zell Miller Scholarship.

It turns out that more kids qualified for the Zell Miller Scholarship than had been expected, so the regular HOPE Scholars — which I call HOPE Lite –  could see their financial awards shrink even further than predicted over the next several years.

In stark terms, to fully fund the Miller-level scholars, the state could end up …

Continue reading Most kids could get less HOPE so a few can get more. Seems unfair to me. »

Yikes. The AJC is reporting possible deeper cuts to HOPE starting with the fall semester in 2014. While HOPE once covered all tuition costs and some books and fees, it now covers 80 to 90 percent of tuition and no books and fees.

As I said in my first blogs about HOPE Lite last year: Start doubling up on those college savings as HOPE may eventually only cover the gas to Athens.

Earlier today, Tim Connell, president of the Georgia Student Finance Commission, gave legislators a grim outlook.  To prevent further erosion of HOPE in 2014,  Connell said the state would need an additional $107 million for the 2014 fiscal year.

According to the AJC:

The gap is expected to increase to $163 million by 2016, Connell told a joint economic development committee of the Legislature on Monday.  Lottery revenue is projected to remain flat, and more students are expected to be entering colleges and be eligible for awards through HOPE.

Gov. Nathan Deal and lawmakers overhauled the popular …

Continue reading HOPE Scholarship could shrink even more in 2014 as lottery funds fail to meet demand »

Kiplinger’s Personal Finance released its annual 100 Best Values in Public Colleges list today based on outstanding education and economic value and awarded the University of Georgia the No. 6 spot.

Georgia Tech earned the 31st spot on the list.

For the 11th year in a row, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill took first place. The rest of the top five in order are the University of Florida, the University of Virginia,  the College of William and Mary and the New College of Florida.

North Georgia College and State University landed in 88th place.

According to a release on the Kiplinger’s list:

The total cost of private colleges has recently averaged almost $39,000 a year, more than twice the average annual in-state sticker price–roughly $17,000–at public schools. A third of the public schools on Kiplinger’s top-100 list charge about the same as or less than that …

Continue reading UGA in top 10 list of best values among public colleges »