With all due respect, I think there are some majors that probably aren’t as easily accessible through the JC + transfer 2year approach. Now if there wasn’t a plan to enter those majors, it shouldn’t matter. But, let’s be certain that in some cases it does matter.
For example, speaking strictly statistically, what percentages of Med students started out at a 2 year JC versus 4 year traditional college for instance?
Again, not saying the JC route is a bad thing or such. But there are pros/cons to everything. If med school wasn’t on your plans, well then it does really matter. Medical/enginerding.. it probably does matter having 4 years at a reputable school, though some (not many) have been able to manage doing the 2/2 thing. A part of this is the rigor of the subject and caliber of the students who effectively are setting achievement bars. At least for some of these majors, the rigor just isn’t there at the 2 year colleges. Probably the same could be said for things like Med/dental or enigineering in general.
And along AN’s point…Junior colleges were excellent places for some folks to get extra schooling while in high school…When I was in high school, there a large student body from high school attending JC’s classes at the same time of high school. Some of which, was to supplement AP course material. Some folks used it as extra tutorial sessions and never transferred the credit back to H.S….This was done in biology, chemistry, physics, math…
…though when it came to Calculus B/C AP, our H.S. teacher was much more rigorous than both J.C. in our area..In fact the first two weeks, he intentionally flunked 22 of the 40 students and made them transfer to the Calculus A/B class..I was told not a single student of his got anything less than than a 5 on the Calc B/C exam.
In college, most of the premed/chem-e/mech-e/cs/ee students already had at least a year’s worth of Calc, physics,chemistry at least at the AP/JC level. Some who hadn’t had Calc or exposure to this at the AP level really struggled to keep up with the rest of the folks that have seen the material. The prof’s also taught based on the assuming that the material was aren’t taught in H.S. and moved on to more rigorous things on the same subject. And yes, whatever contorted reasons prof’s have, some do enjoy flunking half the class to weed out people.
So in all, I guess it depends on what the person whats to do, and when they want to do it. For some, 4 years in a regular college probably isn’t the right thing to do and/or they arent mentally prepared to do it. But considering only the cost aspect of 2/2 versus 4 years, can potentially be limiting one’s kids opportunities, imho…especially as the world turns increasing more competitive.
Keep in mind that, when you went to college, it was considerably less competitive than it is now. Namely, because we are a more global world now, and what previously were “underdeveloped” countries, are not as underdeveloped anymore. Yes, high quality professions will be scarcity in the United States moving forward. And yes, thee is increasingly amount of competition in education.. So I’m not so sure it’s a good suggestions of potentially shortchanging a kid’s education these days would be a good thing to do. (It’s a different story if the kid just cant/won’t learn…)
To give you into a view as into what I started to see in terms of competition is the following. When I went high school, a lot of the my asian friends’ parents sent there kids to enrichment programs to “get ahead”. On the same token, my friends from non-asian families, from within the same social/economic background did not do this, as they felt it was unnecesary, since the competition wasn’t that bad…(And they rightfully were accurate…It wasn’t that competitive back then…)…I think the reason why some of the Asian parents did this was because unlike in the U.S. back then, in Asian (Japan/Korea/Taiwan), good opportunities was scarce, and there was a need to compete and get ahead..Not so much a problem in the U.S. at the time…
Now, fast forward to preset day. Where I live (comparable in economically/socially to where I grew up), I noticed that a lot of my non-asian friends are doing exactly the same thing and sending their kids to private schools/after school enrichment programs, etc so that their kids can “get ahead”…It’s all the sudden everyone realizes the world has gotten much smaller, resources are scarcer, and that folks feel they must do more to “get ahead”…I’m not necessarily a believer of all this extra “enrichment” is necessary…..I’m just reporting what I see. But i just find it very interesting that it seems like I’m seeing 5-6 year olds being shuttled around from one enrichment school to another…It’s kinda disturbing imho.
