Pedagogical Implications of a Meritocratic Analysis of Burton Clark's Cooling-Out Process

The "cooling-out" phenomenon at community colleges refers to an institutional process of encouraging students whose academic aspirations exceed their abilities to move out of transfer programs and into terminal degree programs. Critics claim that the cooling-out process is unfair, arguing...

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1. Verfasser: Hellmich, David M
Format: Report
Sprache:eng
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Zusammenfassung:The "cooling-out" phenomenon at community colleges refers to an institutional process of encouraging students whose academic aspirations exceed their abilities to move out of transfer programs and into terminal degree programs. Critics claim that the cooling-out process is unfair, arguing that its basis on meritocratic principles of fairness favors students of social privilege. To determine if the cooling-out process denied access to the transfer degree for students from particular segments of society, a study was conducted using a sample of 103 African American and 96 white students from a Florida community college who had earned either an associate of science degree or an associate of arts degree between winter 1984 and fall 1991. Students in the sample were determined to have been exposed to the cooling-out process if they had expressed an intention to earn an associate of arts degree upon entrance but were subsequently placed into one or more college preparatory courses based on pre-entrance examination scores. Results indicated that while access to the transfer degree appeared to be unrelated to the socioeconomic status, race, and gender of students, the probability of being cooled-out increased as student age increased. The results suggest that community college faculty should increase their awareness of cultural capital and its relationship to college mission. Contains 26 references. (TGI)