Double Screw-up

Last Updated on: 29th October 2013, 11:26 am

While I’m on the subject of school and gouging, it just pisses me off to see how unbelieveably unprepared universities are around here for the double cohort. For people who don’t live in Ontario, or Canada for that matter, in the good old days, there were five years in high school. Grade 9 through O.A.C. or grade 13 in the real real good old days. But around, hmmm, 7 years ago, the government decided that after a certain point, there would be no more fifth year of high school. But they didn’t just cut it off, ker snap, and leave the aftermath to be dealt with by the universities and colleges. No. They decided that for the grade nines entering in a certain year, and all students after them, they would not have the fifthe year, but for anyone already in high school, they still had it. This means that in a certain year, which happened to be last year, the last group of kids who had O.A.C. and the first group of the new structure graduated high school at the same time and flocked to get degrees. This is what they call the double cohort.

So why is it that the schools still were unprepared. They had at least 7 years to plan for it, and I’m sure there were stats on how many students there were across the province. I mean that wouldn’t give exact numbers, but that would give a general idea, and it would be a hell of a lot more useful study to conduct than the ones I see now coming out of schools on shit like whether or not overcrowding is hazardous to your health. Thanks for the update sparticus. But alass, in September when the new clump arrived, what were the schools doing? Still building lecture halls and residences. I’m not joking. And they tell us not to procrastinate. Practice what you preach.

And now it’s getting worse because this mass of students is getting older. So in first year it’s not so bad because the classes are big anyway. I mean it sucks, but it’s not insurmountable to get everybody herded into huge lecture halls and teach that way. But this year they’re in second year, and next year they’ll be in third! That’s when classes are supposed to shrink. But they’re not, so everybody’s freaking. Classes that usually have 40 students are going to have 90. A zillion courses are being offered distance ed now because they don’t have enough profs. I mean, what were they thinking? That they’d all fail out until we were left with the usual class sizes? Isn’t that just wishful thinking, and an awfully foolish way to do things? “Oh maybe the problem will just go away on its own.” Well no, boss, it’s not.

I’m just really glad I’m getting out when I am. But it makes me sad to see how screwed those kids are, and while everybody passes the hot potato of blame, they all struggle with the consequences of a serious case of administrative procrastination.

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