On 16 Dec 2006 at 16:46, Christopher D. Green wrote: > > The eudcational system that is being proposed for the US here -- two > years of community college between 10th grade and university -- is > effectively the system that has existed in Quebec for decades now. >< snip>
> As a product of that system myself, I strongly recommend that they look > > closely at the Quebec experience before going there.In theory, the idea > of > having students gradually ease into the freedoms and electives of > > university is a good one. Where it falls down is in the quality of the > > professors in the CEGEPs (as the equivalent of community colleges are > > known in Quebec) ><snip> > No doubt Stephen Black, Stuart McKelvie (who both have a CEGEP sharing > their university campus) will have interesting insights with respect to > this proposal. (Are their any other Quebecers on theTIPS list? Was our > resident Klondiker, Jean-Marc Perreault, educated in Quebec?) > Did someone call my name? A few personal observations follow. I went through the Quebec educational system before the introduction of the CEGEP (community college) reform in Quebec. I think I was better off. I went directly from Grade 11 into McGill University, and graduated in four years. With the CEGEP system, I would have gone from Grade 11 (not Grade 10, as is apparently the case for the US proposal) to two years of CEGEP, then three years of university. I saved one year by not having to enrol in CEGEP. I doubt that I was disadvantaged by the lack of the additional year of education. Of course, results for others may vary. Both of my daughters graduated from CEGEPs. But while it's true that the qualifications of its teachers may not be overall as high as for those in universities, it seemed to me that it made little difference in the education my kids received. I thought it was generally rigorous and of high-quality, pretty much the equivalent of what they would have received in university and, in some courses, better. As a university teacher, though, I found working with the CEGEP system difficult. In theory, students should have arrived in our programme with their introductory-level courses completed. Some did, but many did not, and the result was that we had to duplicate many of the courses which were offered in CEGEP. Also, it was difficult to determine whether the content of the courses taken in CEGEP were sufficient for our requirements. It was a continuing administrative headache having to evaluate, for each student, whether he or she had satisfied our prerequisites or would be required to take additional courses. And our students were often unhappy with our decisions. As for Jean-Marc, he'll have to tell us himself whether he went through Quebec high school and CEGEP (I guess yes). But I wonder whether Chris is aware that Jean-Marc is, like himself, a fellow graduate of the Bishop's University psychology programme, although I can't recall whether their years overlapped. We, of course, take all the credit for the success of both. Stephen ----------------------------------------------------------------- Stephen L. Black, Ph.D. Department of Psychology Bishop's University e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 2600 College St. Sherbrooke QC J1M 0C8 Canada Dept web page at http://www.ubishops.ca/ccc/div/soc/psy TIPS discussion list for psychology teachers at http://faculty.frostburg.edu/psyc/southerly/tips/index.htm ----------------------------------------------------------------------- --- To make changes to your subscription go to: http://acsun.frostburg.edu/cgi-bin/lyris.pl?enter=tips&text_mode=0&lang=english
