Most New Graduates Would Take a Pay Cut to Make a Difference

Ask any new college graduate about her immediate goals, and chances are she’ll tell you she wants a job. But it turns out today’s students aren’t going to be satisfied with any job. According to the latest survey from Net Impact, making a difference through their work is essential to young people’s happiness.

photo via flickr:CC | USAG-Humphreys

Active Friends Key to Combating Childhood Obesity, Study Suggests

A child’s group of friends holds the greatest influence on determining how physically active that child will be, suggests a study published online Monday in the journal Pediatrics.

Want your child to become more physically active? Pair him or her up with a group of physically active friends, the study suggests.

photo via flickr:CC | alfstorm

More High School Students Are Going to College Than Ever Before

Today’s high school students are taking more math and science courses and more are going straight to college after graduation than their peers from a generation ago. That’s the finding of “The Condition of Education 2012” a just-released report from the National Center of Educational Statistics, which covers all aspects of education, from preschool through through college.

photo via flickr:CC | hharryus

Studies on Multitasking Highlight Value of Self-Control

Simply put, the brain can’t be in two places at once.

In a landmark 2009 study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Stanford University researchers compared the attention-switching abilities of people who said they multitasked often with those of people who did so rarely. It found that the frequent multitaskers were more easily distracted and performed worse on memory and attention tests than those who preferred to do one thing at a time.

What Really Matters to Working Students

I decided to have a candid conversation with my students about why school just doesn’t seem that important to many of them. 

For almost two hours, we discussed attitudes and expectations—theirs and mine. We had many moments of catharsis. I explained that faculty members do care, and that we create expectations so students will have continued success in college. The students stated that we (the faculty) seemed to have forgotten what it was like to be students, trying to balance our academic and personal lives. I asked the class to help us understand the life of today’s students, and to give us advice on how to help them succeed.

What follows are anecdotes and suggestions in my students’ own words—including italicized comments from particular students—that focus on what the majority of them felt were the most important areas to discuss…

photo via flickr:CC | PaulBlackPhotography.com

More Students Receiving Accommodations During ACT, SAT

Nationally, as the number of students taking the ACT has increased in the last four years, so has the number of students asking for, and getting, extra time or other accommodations when taking the exam, the testing agency told me.

The numbers of requests have been rising among SAT takers, too, along with an increase in test takers overall. Once students are approved for an accommodation, they don’t have to reapply. Of new requests—almost 80,000 during the 2010-11 school year, compared with 10,000 fewer five years earlier—about 85 percent are approved, said Kathleen Steinberg, the spokeswoman for the College Board. The ACT said roughly 90 percent of requests made are granted.

photo via flickr:CC | biologycorner

With reduced public funds available, should policy and practice focus on attitudes or on other directions? The study evaluates research evidence from five groups of interventions with children and parents: parent involvement, extra-curricular activities, mentoring, volunteering and peer education, and interventions with a primary focus on changing attitudes.

It found that:

• Changing three attitudes – aspirations, locus of control and valuing school – did not impact on educational attainment;
• There should be a shift in emphasis from ‘raising aspirations’ to ‘keeping aspirations on track’.

Bring water into exams to improve your grade

Students who bring water into exams may improve their grade by keeping hydrated.

That is the finding of a study conducted by Chris Pawson from the University of East London and his collaborators Sarah Doherty, Laura Martin, Ruth Soares and Caroline Edmonds from the University of East London and Mark Gardner from the University of Westminster.

The researchers recorded the behaviour of 447 undergraduate students across three different cohorts in relation to whether students brought drinks, and the type of drinks they brought, into exams. Students who were in higher levels of the university degree were much more likely to bring drinks into the exam that those in their first year of undergraduate study.

photo via flickr:CC | 92YTribeca

Confused in Class? A New App Can Help

“If there’s something you don’t understand, just raise your hand and ask a question.” Almost every teacher says that line to her class on the first day of school. But when that professor’s in the middle of explaining a concept and everyone else looks like they understand, following that advice isn’t as easy as it sounds. Now a new web-based app called Understoodit wants to take the fear out of learning by allowing students to anonymously communicate confusion.

photo via flickr:CC | Guudmorning!