In the state of Missouri, where 25 percent of people older than 25 have at least a bachelor’s degree, House Bill 1042 might make it easier for students to earn a college diploma.
Higher education is a financial burden for many students, which is why quite a few start their education at a two-year school in hopes of transferring to a four-year university, such as MU, after getting some general education classes out of the way first.
A goal of HB 1042 is to make that transition easier. The current text gives the Coordinating Board for Higher Education the ability to work with public colleges and universities in Missouri to create a list of courses that will transfer between community colleges and universities so students will not lose credit.
Leona Rubin, an Intercampus Faculty Council representative on MU’s Faculty Council, said whoever is paying the tuition bill does not want to waste money and have to delay graduation.
“I think that’s important,” Rubin said. “If the goal is to get the education, why not be efficient about it?”
Sometimes, the courses transfer but do not count for what students thought they would, which is why starting the course list will help the transfer process, said Rep. Mike Thomson, District 4, who sponsored the bill.
“We’re trying to start with 25 (courses) so that students would know that if they take certain classes, it’s going to count no matter where (they) go,” Thomson said. “We think that will facilitate a much smoother pathway to graduation.”
At MU, most likely these courses already exist, Rubin said.
“The courses that (HB) 1042 is thinking about, we probably have already worked through the issues,” she said. “We know that we have so many courses that would be considered the foundational courses, like English 1000.”
Vice Provost for Undergraduate Studies Jim Spain said students could transfer core courses such as College Algebra and Statistics, but those might not meet the math requirements of their degree programs.
“For example, (their program) might require Calculus or Finite Math,” Spain said. “I’m not sure how much tuning, if you will, our campus would have to accomplish (if HB 1042 goes into effect).”
Another part of this bill is to modify how remedial classes are taught to students. Thomson sees these classes as redundant.
“Basically, we shove them in a classroom and teach them the same thing they learned in high school, only twice as fast,” he said. “We want to be more effective so students aren’t wasting their time and their money.”
MU, along with other colleges and universities, went through an alignment process with the Missouri Department of Higher Education two years ago. The Curriculum Alignment Initiative established entry and exit level competencies for common general education classes.
Spain said MU has already looked to see if the alignment is still in place.
“We think that we are very well aligned with the other institutions of higher education, both two- and four-year,” he said.
