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Enrollment rates have risen constantly in colleges and there is a question lurking in the minds of many as to whether all students who attend college today will actually come out well educated. This means, will students actually learn as much as they are supposed to once they get into campus.

Two authors have conducted an extensive research with 2300 students spanning 24 universities the details of which are published in their book, the Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses.

This study measured the amount of papers written for courses by the students, the amount they studied and how much they have improved in terms of writing skills and critical thinking. New York University’s sociology professor and co-author of this book Richard Arum says that surprisingly one third of the students did not show any improvement in critical thinking whatsoever even after four years of university studies. He said that this is indeed a cause for concern.

According to him, we are facing economic crisis just like every other country in the world and we cannot really afford any luxuries like before to send students to universities and colleges that do not offer the best education. As all of us struggle to send our children for higher education, it is our prerogative to demand of them to develop the necessary higher education skills for our children.

He said that today’s system is all about not asking students much, giving them easy grades, keeping them entertained and ensuring that their evaluations are high. In other words, there is no academic rigor anymore which is also one of the reasons for the decrease in critical thinking skills.

Out of all students who took part in the study, at least 50 percent of them said that not a single course in their previous semester required them to write more than 20 pages. 35 percent of them said that they studied only about five hours or less a week.

There is indeed a huge decline in reasoning and writing skills due to a steep decline in academic rigor which could be due to the end of the semester student evaluations that essentially determines the principal faculty performance evaluation.

There are exceptions of course. Many students defy the current trend of studying lesser number of hours and put in their own individual efforts to improve their thinking and writing skills. The study analyzed this trend too and found that this was happening more in selective universities and colleges where students have higher academic records and learn more than their peers in other colleges.

The alarming fact remains that overall there is a fifty percent decline in hours students spend on preparing for classes and studying. Arum says that just go talk to college freshmen today and you will get an interesting insight into the situation.

He says that most of them will say that they are surprised with how college and university were much easier than their high school contrary to their apprehensions and expectations. This is a sad state of affairs indeed and something has to be done toward correcting this situation.