Roadmap to Debt or Degree?
By: Katie Priest
Are general education requirements helping or hurting college students?
There has been an ongoing debate in the Twitter Space on whether or not general education requirements in higher education are necessary or not. Some students argue that general education or "Gen Ed" prolongs the process and adds to the already inflated price of higher education. While others believe that the Gen Ed requirements add to knowledge you gain in college and exposes students to more subjects. Other colleges have also taken a look at this issue as well.
At Chaffey, to get an AA you need to take on average 23 units of Gen Ed before major requirements this does not include IGETC or CSU requirements either. This amount of units for a full-time student, 12 or more units a semester, adds a full year to completing your degree and more time if you are not a full-time student.
This also increases the amount of money you are going to pay to go to class. For a student who does not receive financial aid, this extra year will cost $1,200 in registration and college fees alone this assessment also includes parking fees for two semesters.
For students who receive financial aid this cost varies, as some may just receive a BOG waiver and others might receive a Pell grant. this increase in time lowers the length of time a student may receive their Pell grant money since you are only allowed to use up to 600% of the money or six years of instruction.
There is also another issue financial aid recipients face; if a recipient completes more than 90 units at Chaffey, the aid will be taken away until the student goes in and submits an appeal. This process usually happens when a student is close to graduating and can cause some issues with getting enough class materials, as you can not appeal until the middle of the semester, and this can hurt students with minimal support systems.
This increase in time and fees can cause strife for some students, especially in community college as some students are self supporting or have limited support outside of school.
Not including this increase in units can also cause students to fall back behind ,as some Gen Ed classes are harder than others. We all know the story of someone who has straight A's in all of their major classes, but their GPA is lowered by their general education courses. For others, Gen Ed may have been their pathway to finding their desired major, but for others it is keeping them from moving forward.
General education requirements, whether deemed good or bad, need to be reevaluated, for students and their futures. People should not have to choose between education and survival.