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Universities rob students of life
 Kristen J. Kubisiak -- Staff Essay
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Getting hired is hard.
Most college students know good grades are not enough to get hired in today’s job market. Employers are seeking graduates with “professional” experience.
Some undergraduate programs, such as that of the College of Education, are able to provide students with a curriculum that accommodates the growing need for professional experience AND the credit requirements necessary for graduation. But most, unfortunately, do not.
Motivated, however misguided, students are unaware of the weight employers place on professional experience and may spend their college days immersed in campus activities and their college nights pouring over text books, but all for naught.
The editor of a college news publication may dedicate more than 40 hours per week to the paper, but after presenting a potential employer with a resume stating that fact, all the editor receives is the sound of those horrible eight words: “Come back when you have more professional experience.”
The question is, “When?”
When would this editor have been able to acquire all of this “experience?” Certainly not while trying to manage a student publication.
Any student involved in an organization, whether it be the newspaper, radio, television or student government, can attest to the fact that those organizations and their upkeep is time consuming, especially when coupled with homework or another part-time job. They may justify the time they spend running these organizations, believing it will pay off in the end.
But what happens when it doesn’t?
If all students used organizations for the sole purpose of getting the minimum amount of experience necessary to apply for an internship or a job with a professional business, many of these organizations would be in dire need of leadership. Students with little experience and no one to teach them would be forced to head these organizations and the quality of learning and productivity for all involved would rapidly decline.
That doesn’t have to happen.
One way to keep students active and interested in student organizations, without forcing them to sacrifice time that could be spent interning or working in their intended career field, is to assign a credit value to the levels of involvement in these organizations that could be applied toward graduation requirements. In this scenario, students majoring in political science, for example, could be active in Student Government and receive a grade and a certain number of credits for involvement instead of participating in Student Government in ADDITION to all of their political science classes and university electives.
The same credit hours per organization involvement could be applied to other disciplines as well. For example, students in the Mass Communication area of study could, instead of working on UTVS, University Chronicle or KVSC independently of class, receive credits and grades for their involvement in the aforementioned organizations. They would then have more free time to accommodate homework, part-time jobs and even possibly pursue an internship or job with a professional television studio, radio station or newspaper.
This modification to the curriculum could improve the level of practical learning that college affords students, as well as permits students more time to produce higher quality work instead of allowing them to spread themselves so thin they don’t even have time to attend a “time management” seminar.
Assigning credit values and a grading system to some student organizations won’t solve all-or even half-of the burnout problems experienced by college students. Nor will it cure all the ills of the college institution. What it will do is give students more time to get professional experience and to find an outlet for the practical application of the skills necessary for their intended career field. Students will then find their entrance into the “real world” a bit less daunting and their time spent at college a bit less wasted.
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